The question of why church planting has crossed our minds very frequently over the last few months. This passage in Colossians has frequently been the answer for us.

We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints, because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. Of this you have heard before in the word of the truth, the gospel, which has come to you, as indeed in the whole world it is bearing fruit and increasing—as it also does among you, since the day you heard it and understood the grace of God in truth, just as you learned it from Epaphras our beloved fellow servant. He is a faithful minister of Christ on your behalf and has made known to us your love in the Spirit. (Colossians 1:3-8 ESV, emphasis added)

Paul is writing to the church in Colossae, a church that was planted by this man Epaphras, who heard the gospel from Paul and took it back to his city. And now Paul is reflecting on how the gospel grows. It grows deep and it grows wide. The gospel message, the truth about the person and work of Jesus Christ grows. It does not stagnate, it does not stop, and it does not stay put. It grows. And it will continue to grow. That's the why of church planting for us: gospel growth. I am saddened by the truth of the decline of the church in America, but I am not depressed. The gospel cannot be stopped and we are trusting God that by the power of his Holy Spirit he will use the proclamation of the gospel to bring men and women into relationship with himself. And that is why we are trusting God for gospel growth and not simply gospel transfer. We don't want to just plant the coolest church so that all the christians flock to it. No. We want to plant a church so that we and those joining with us will engage the lost, the sinners, the tax-collectors, the pharisees and all who are far from God with the grand proclamation that the King has made a way for us to be restored to relationship with Himself! And just as Paul thanks God for the way that the gospel is multiplying throughout the whole world, we too want to thank God as we trust him to multiply the gospel through the planting of churches in central Indiana.

As we step forward in this new adventure we will cling to the words of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ: "I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it." (Matthew 16:18 ESV)


This video helps explain the biblical foundation of church planting:

What Is The Biblical Foundation Of Church Planting? from The Gospel Coalition on Vimeo.

Our good friends Dave and Licia Radford of The Gray Havens released this single last week from their upcoming album Fire and Stone. It's a great song for Easter. Check it out and enjoy.

 

Check out their website: http://www.thegrayhavensmusic.com/

 

And get the single here: http://thegrayhavens.bandcamp.com/

 

 

"When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written: “Death is swallowed up in victory.” “O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?” The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ." (1 Corinthians 15:54-57 ESV)

 

On April 2nd 2014 my grandfather, Harley Bontrager went home to be with The Lord. "Pops" as we called him had struggled with cancer for a few years but passed peacefully. At his funeral I said a few words as I had meditated on his life and the glory he longed for and now enjoys. I have thought even more about this in light of Easter and offer this up as a meditation upon glory for Pops.

Cancer is terrible. It really is. But God is in the business of taking terrible things and using them for our good and his glory. While cancer destroyed his body, God used it to continue to soften his heart. The last few years were hard for all of us, as we watched the cancer weaken Pops. He was an independent man (some may say stubborn, but let's go with independent). And cancer changed that. It made him dependent. And you know what- God used that for good. I got to see Pops grow in two key ways as he died. Dependence upon God, and the longing for worship.

 

Revelation 21 gives a glorious picture of the end of time. When Jesus, the King of Kings and Lord of Lords will return to raise the dead and to gather his own for this glory that was talked about and condemn those who are not his own. Being his own does not mean being perfect, no, otherwise Pops and the rest of us would have no hope. But it does mean being dependent. Dependent on another for our hope. Dependent upon the work that Jesus accomplished the first time he came.

 

Jesus came, lived a perfect life, the life we never could and than died the death we deserved to die on the cross, where he took the punishment from God for our sins. And the triumphantly rose from the grave to crush sin and death forever. So that any and all who trust in him could be forgiven of all their sins. This is the dependence Pops had. He trusted in Jesus to save him, which is why we trust he is with him now. And he would want all of you to have this same dependence and assurance. This dependence grew immensely as Pops neared death. And it was a sweet grace of The Lord to allow that to happen. And it's why he had so much peace.

 

Well this dependence led to the second thing I remember well of pops. He longed to worship Jesus. Everytime I saw him, without fail, he told me about a church service he would watch on tv, mainly for the worship, the church was in Pepsi-cola Florida as he called it. I believe its Pennsicola, but Jesus cares far more about our heart for worship than our knowledge of geography. And he loved to sing the praises of Jesus name. He loved to listen to records of worship, turned up really loud as I recall. Well, this place, this glory that Revelation talks about — Where Jesus will wipe away every tear, where death is no more, and where he promises to make all things new— is a place of worship to this Jesus.

 

In Revelation 5 it says this:

 

And they sang a new song, saying, “Worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals, for you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation, and you have made them a kingdom and priests to our God, and they shall reign on the earth.” Then I looked, and I heard around the throne and the living creatures and the elders the voice of many angels, numbering myriads of myriads and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice, “Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!” And I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and in the sea, and all that is in them, saying, “To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be blessing and honor and glory and might forever and ever!” And the four living creatures said, “Amen!” and the elders fell down and worshiped. (Revelation 5:9-14 ESV)

 

This is the glory that Pops looked forward to— not his own— but Jesus's glory! And it's why we have peace, knowing that he knows the joy of seeing the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ right now! And that one day, when Jesus returns and makes all things new and sets up the new Heavens and the new earth we will together enjoy Jesus for all eternity. It is not the warm fuzzy feeling that our culture declares to us when everyone dies that they are simply in a better place. No. It is a sure hope based on the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. If it were not for this, we would have no hope. "For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Romans 6:23 ESV). Apart from Jesus there is no hope. No hope beyond the grave. But in Jesus we have victory, hope, and life. This Easter I will sing again in a fresh way about the resurrection of Christ, knowing it is this that gives us hope.

 

"But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep." (1 Thessalonians 4:13, 14 ESV)

 

 

Since Whitney and I began our journey with Jesus, we have always desired to be sensitive to God's leading on our lives. This included interning with Cru, and then joining staff. We talk often with students about a willingness to follow God and go wherever he would call you to go, say whatever he would call you to say, do whatever he would call you to do, and to give whatever he would call you to give. We have really prayed that God would make that true of us as well and not just our students. Well, that is easy to pray and hard to follow. But, by God's grace and power, we are trying to follow.

Over the past few years God has been slowly tugging on our hearts and moving us in the direction of Church planting. This started with our experiences of a gospel-centered church, New Life Presbyterian, that we have been involved in for the past few years and has been fueled greatly by our ministry to college students at Ball State. We have encountered countless students that have some church background, being from the midwest, but know nothing of the gospel and do not have a relationship with God through Jesus Christ. This burdens our hearts greatly and ignites a passion within us for this not to be the case.

Simply put, we want to see lost people come to know Jesus, so that the gospel will go to all nations and the great commission will be fulfilled (Mat. 28:18-20). This has always been our motivation. And as we have been seeking The Lord about how to best steward our gifts and lives towards the completion of this, church planting has been His answer. Research shows that new churches are usually far more effective at seeing people come to faith in Jesus and engaging unchurched people with the gospel in a community. This is why we are sensing a call not only to plant a church, but to commit our lives to planting churches that plant churches that plant churches...until Jesus returns.

We have for the last few years believed that God was calling us to church planting, but thought it was still years away. But, God has a way of changing our plans and bringing things in his timing. God has surprisingly presented an opportunity through our local church, New Life Presbyterian, for me (Josh) to take a full-time role as a church planting apprentice. This support-raised position will allow me to finish up my seminary, pursue ordination, learn a whole lot, and begin the work of planting a church. Our current timeline is to pursue launching a new congregation in 3-4 years. We are still determining location, but have narrowed it to somewhere near our current location.

In order to assess our readiness to such a task, the church sent us to the church planting assessment center for our denomination, the PCA (Presbyterian Church in America), earlier this February. This weeklong intensive assessment was so helpful and confirmed many of the things that God was doing in our lives and that others were recognizing. We were given the go ahead for church planting after completing an apprenticeship. This was incredibly encouraging as the assessment center has a very high rate of success for establishing self-sustaining congregations, especially when compared to the national statistics for church planting. This has given us incredible confidence to move forward- not confidence in ourselves- but in the one who has called us- God himself.

In light of all of this, we are leaving staff with Cru in June of 2014 and beginning our work in church planting. As an apprentice, I want to take the posture of a humble learner and soak in as much as possible over the next few years to prepare me for a lifetime of work in church planting.

Please pray for us as we get ready for this transition. Cru has been so much a part of our lives for the last decade and we are not sure what it will be like to leave (though we hope to volunteer some time with the Greeks!). We have shed many tears about this when we think of all the ways God has used this wonderful organization and the people on our teams to shape us and our walks with God. It has been difficult to process all of this over the last few months, especially as I do things like give my last official weekly meeting talk as a Cru Staff guy last night (3/27/14). But we are confident in what The Lord is calling us to do and so we want to step forward. So, please pray that God will continue to show us the way forward as we trust him, stepping out of what is comfortable to us now and into the unknown.

As we prepare to leave staff, a few things that we would like to say to all those who have been a part of our Cru lives (staff friends, students, supporters, family, friends):

1. Thank you. We have been overwhelmed with emotion several times (knowing more to is to come as this gets closer) when we think of the very specific ways that you all of shown us Jesus. We cannot think of better way to spend almost all of the last decade as students and now staff with this wonderful thing called Cru.
2. We are incredibly indebted to Cru. This sounds like a repeat of #1 because it is a repeat. I just can't say it enough, we are so thankful. The way that we walk with Jesus, study the Word, participate and are committed to Evangelism and Discipleship. All of it, in so many ways is connected to our time in Cru. This is one of the things that fuels us forward. We want to take everything that Cru has taught us and apply that to the work of Church Planting so that all nations will hear the gospel and that Jesus will be lifted high.
3. If you ever have the opportunity to support, join, volunteer, go with, or otherwise rub shoulders with Cru staff- do it.
4. A special note- if you are on staff- please still be our friends! We love you all!

 

We will be sending out more updates on all of this and what God is doing so stay tuned or sign up for our email updates through mailchimp.

In Christ alone,

Josh, Whitney, Tyko and Finn

 

IndyCC 2013 Recap from IndyCC on Vimeo.
 
Recap video of the 2013 Cru Great Lakes Winter Conference.
Here is a recap of what God did at Indy CC this year!