Wise church planting: Are we quick to listen?

My dear brothers and sisters, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, (James 1v19).

In a world saturated with social media that’s way too often characterised by being slow to listen, quick to speak and quick to become angry, James’ challenge for us in the 21st Century is timely in all kinds of ways.

However, for the purposes of this article, just focus with me in on the first call from James of being ‘quick to listen’.

We’ve all heard the adage of two ears and one mouth, but, really, how quick are we to listen? And, if we’re honest, how much does it depend upon whom we are listening to? Why do some voices matter to us more than others?

The project that sits behind this series of articles is an attempt for the church planting community to be more quick to listen, though not to the ‘experts’ or the usual ‘voices of authority’, but rather to those who have struggled in their church planting journey.

Perhaps their church did not last? Perhaps it’s just about limping along and keeping going? What wisdom can we learn from the voices of those who have known the pain of nothing going according to (their) plan? Of dashed dreams and, for some, questions of their callings and even God’s faithfulness.

I spoke to planters from 26 countries (from Albania to Zambia!) representing 80 struggling plants from across the globe. There were core groups of a single family or upwards of 200 people, they planted in urban areas, rural areas and everywhere in between, but they were all united in that they found it hard. For some, too hard.

And so the plan over these next months in future articles is to be quick to listen to them and their ‘hard-earned-scabby-knees-costly-wisdom’ and to re-consider what wise church planting (or to be honest, simply ‘wise ministry’) might look like. Rather than ignoring their voices and sweeping them under the carpets as slightly awkward statistics (as can often happen) we’ll be quick to slow down and open our ears and see what they have to teach us – even if in one sense their project was not ‘successful’.

We’ll note that lots of the problems often begin within the church pastor, ministry team and the church family, but pressures from the outside very often seem to lead to more mess within. We’ll hear the wise voices of these ministers and their teams, but also consider the voice of God as He speaks into their contexts and circumstances through the pages of the Bible.

One of my sons is just getting ready for the cross-country season in the autumn; he’s now waaaay quicker than me (!), but whenever he heads somewhere new for a race he arrives an hour early, walks the entire course so that he knows what will be coming up – where there are slopes and narrow bits and bogs and tree roots. Because if he knows before he starts where they are, the pitfalls, he’ll be more able to deal with them. So if we can know in advance where some of these ‘planting pitfalls’ might be, perhaps we’ll be more able to cope, or at least, not as surprised when they appear?

The question is, will we be quick to listen?