I meet church planters all the time. Almost all of then have plans. Almost all of them have some sort of vision. Almost all of them have a logo and a web site. Some of them, though, seem to lack one vital ingredient…passion.
There are many wise plans, tips, rules of thumb and formulas out there for church planters today and I’m truly thankful for all the tools that are available but let us not forget that planting a church is more art than science. There must be a call burning in a planter’s heart. There must be a passion.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m not talking about being emotional all the time. I’m talking about being passionate. You’ve got to have this thing inside of you that makes you feel like you’re going to die if you don’t reach your community. You’ve got to have this thing in you that says “I’ve got to do this no matter what.” If you don’t have that, don’t plant a church. We don’t need another hip church with a cool logo and a killer website with a passionless leader.
One of the deans of the college I went to once said about the ministry, “If you can do something else, do it.” I agree. I also think that statement holds true for church planting too.