Church Planting tidbits

One of the early milestones that any church planter must accomplish is developing a prayer support team.  I’ve seen hundreds of prayer updates over the years from church planters.  The majority of them all sound about the same.  Most include prayer for more funding, the right facility, an upcoming event and prayers for people to come.  Notice a theme?  The prayers are primarily self-centered and focused on what the church planter needs to succeed.  Most church planters naturally look at these prayer updates as ways to get people to pray for their needs.  Now I know church planters pray better than that.  I spend time in prayer with them and they pray for things like specific people coming to know Jesus, praise for God’s work in the city the church is being planted in, prayers for wisdom and discernment, etc.  These prayer just don’t often make it into the prayer update.  Church planters generally don’t stop to consider how significant and influential it is for a supporter to receive prayer updates.

Most people never get an intimate look at the prayer life of a pastor.  By receiving updates and prayers, supporters can see how the church planter’s  faith handles difficult obstacles, takes on the impossible, perseveres, and trusts God.  That open window into your life will help stretch their faith and serve as a model for how they approach God.  Essentially the prayer updates will serve as discipleship tools to your supporters.  As the church planter shares stories about lost people coming to know Jesus, supporters will be inspired to reignite their passion to reach out the lost in their midst.

So the next time you realize its been over a month since your last prayer update, don’t dread it.  Take it as an opportunity to teach and inspire the people who are making a sacrifice of time and money so that this new work of God can exist.