Launch: Called?

I'm gonna do a few series kind of interacting with and starting discussions about themes in some books on church planting. This series comes out of the book Launch by Nelson Searcy.

“Your call to start a church is the most critical factor to the church’s success.” So says Nelson Searcy in Launch. Is he right? Maybe so. One thing I know for sure is that if you’re going to start a church, you better feel called. I tell guys that if there’s anything else you can do besides start a church, go do that. Why? Because church planting is incredibly difficult and you’ll be tempted to quit over and over. So if there’s anything else you can do, you’ll end up quitting and you’ll go do that. But if there’s nothing else you can do, you can revisit your calling when things get tough.

So … potential planters: Are you feeling called? Is there nothing else you can do?

Searcy lists four calls of a church planter: (1) Your call to start a church; (2) Your call to understand your spouse’s call; (3) Your call to a place; (4) Your call to a people.

Perhaps the most destructive of those to be lacking is your spouse’s call. If someone told me he could only have three out of the four, but still wanted to be successful, so which one could he be missing, I would say, “Dude, your wife better be on board!” I know guys who drug their wives into it and that is a recipe for disaster.

So … potential planters: Is your wife down with your plan? If not, push pause. Don’t just continue down the path like everything is going to be okay. It isn’t. And, a little inside information: My wife has a blog for church planting wives, and she gets comments and e-mails from ladies who say, “My husband is basically forcing me to do this. Help me!” … Any chance that’s your wife?

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