Torch, Spring 1984

Y our church can plant a church! We can't, you reply. Pray tell, Pastor Younger, whatever possesses you to say that when you don't even know us. How could you possibly know our situation? Your generaliza– tion sounds similar to the TV ad pitch, "Wouldn't you really like to have a Buick?" - as though one had the resources to buy a Buick today . You sound like a bureaucrat implying that the cure to today's ills is one more social program, when he him– selfdoesn't have to support his asser– tion with dollars. Sorry, friend, don't load us up with guilt about planting churches or whatever it is you think we ought to be doing that we' re not. My old Daddy once said to a book salesman fresh out of the university and eager to sell Dad on how to be a better farmer, "Son, I ain't Jarmin' near as good as I already know how to!" 4 ·. Do I hear you saying you cannot plant churches because your church is small? Are you implying that be– cause you are small you can't? Some of the greatest miracles of grace oc– curred when God used small things. Yes, small churches plant churches. A fine church in southwestern Ohio, Faith Baptist of Greenville, was planted through the vision and faith of people in Immanuel Baptist, a church of 125, from nearby Arcanum. It began when two men caught a vi– sion of the possibility. Then with the support of the small body of believers in Arcanum and the entry of Rev . Harold Green (presently cam– pus pastor at CedarviJJe College) as pastor, the new work became a reality . I agree with Ftrancis Schaeffer in his sermon "No Little People": " ... that much can come from little if the little is consecrated to God; that there are no little people - no big ·.: :.··rch Ianting by Dr. W. ThomasYoS. people, only consecrated and uncon– secrated." We need not feel inferior or insig– nificant because we are small. If you have not read Marshall Shelley's arti– cle about "Double Digit Churches" in the Fall 1983 Leadership journal, by all means do so. You will be glad you did . Shelley says, "Small churches, too, are actually a majority . Well over half the churches in the United States are ecclesiastical sub-com– pacts." He says that 76 percent of the churches in the fastest growing de– nominations, the Assemblies ofGod, report a membership of less than a hundred; that 59 percent of Southern Baptist Churches have a Sunday school enrollment of less than 150. You reply, But it's not that we feel inferior about being small; we just have so little leadership that we can't afford to give any ofit away to plant a new church. We need every single