Dan Steel
One problem in the church-planting world is that the stories we hear, the books we read, and the people we admire are often anomalies. They are the outliers. The rare success stories capture our hearts, help us dream, and inspire...
J.A. Medders
The “9 Essentials of a Faithful and Effective Church Planter” is a framework for assessment, training, coaching, and resourcing church planters. Here is a quick overview. Every sport has metrics for what makes an ideal athlete. Speed, wingspan, IQ, mechanics,...
Tony Merida
We believe that the better equipped a church planter is, the more missionally effective church he’ll plant. In this free eBook by Tony Merida, you will learn about the qualities for faithful and effective ministry that provide the foundation for...
Gus Hernandez Jr.
Have you ever ended up in the wrong location? Navigation woes can be quite frustrating! Several years ago, my wife and I were driving up to visit her family in Delaware for Christmas. After driving all day, we decided to...
Noah Oldham
In seminary, I took a class called “Baptist History.” It was touted as the hardest class in the MDiv program because it covered such a breadth of details that make up the history of Baptistic faith and practice. I took...
Mark Lee
My parents were born in Seoul, Korea. I was born in Portland, Oregon. My parents lived through a war when they were children. My most traumatic childhood experience was when the guacamole gun at the Taco Bell went dry. In...
Dayton Hartman
Hospitality is a defining feature of the Christian life, individually and of the church corporately. The Apostle Paul calls us to be a welcoming people because we have experienced the gracious welcome of Christ (Rom. 15:7). To put it another...
Barnabas Piper
Steve Jobs, Michael Jordan, and Tiger Woods stood alone in their fields as cutthroat geniuses. General Stanley McChrystal, Jocko Willink, James Stockdale and other fine military men offer lessons on leadership in extreme circumstances. Winston Churchill was the Last Lion....
“If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.” — African Proverb Starting a church often feels like something of an adventure. There’s early energy, vision, anticipation, and a belief that God will...
Jon Kelly
The appointment of leaders is all throughout the Scriptures. Whether it is Moses delegating responsibilities to other leaders at the recommendation of Jethro, Jesus entrusting authority to the Twelve, or Paul giving Timothy counsel on appointing leaders within the church,...
John Piper warned us years ago, “Brothers, we are not professionals.” The leadership-guru-ization of pastoral ministry is a corrosive danger. Piper’s warning isn’t a call to abandon excellence and diligence. It’s a siren, a lighthouse, a bulletin to not approach...
Ronnie Martin
As hard as it is to believe, New Year’s resolutions are about to ramp up again, and to be honest, I’m here for it. The reason why I happen to be pro-New Year’s resolutions is because I like a blank...
New Churches Podcast Season 2 Episode 12
In this final episode of the season, host Jeff Medders is joined by fellow laborers Vance Pitman, Tony Merida, and Matt Carter to dive into Paul’s closing words for his protege in Titus 3:12-15.
There’s an infamous rumor that church planting is a lonely journey. Since 2020, one of my responsibilities has been to oversee Church Planter and Spouse Care for the largest church planting network in North America. For the previous nine years,...
Recently one of our elders, as we were milling about waiting for our monthly meeting to start, looked me in the eye and said, “You know you’re our pastor, right? Like, a real pastor.” Some discernment in him recognized in...
New Churches Podcast Season 2 Episode 11
Tune in to discover why Titus 3:10 is so often overlooked and disobeyed within the modern-day church planting context and how you can know how to best address “the attention economy” for the betterment of those you’re called to serve.
One of the questions I’m often asked about, when discussing why church plants struggle, is whether any of the results were particularly surprising. In one sense, the answer is no. Having served as a pastor and planter for over 20...
In 1991, doctors at Stanford University Medical Center removed a 300-pound tumor from the stomach of a 34-year-old woman. The tumor was twice the size of her natural body weight! Reporters asked her the obvious question, “Why did you wait...
Not a New Churches member? Create your free account.
