I finished off last week with a post about a church planter that I have come to know and a little about his story. There are valuable lessons to be learned as I plant Eternity and I am so grateful that he shared his thoughts with me. Over the coming days, I will share his nine lessons he learned from planting a church. Hear him as he says:

In the following pages, we will share the things that brought us to the point of quitting. For each problem, we will try to identify a reason why this problem presented itself in us and a possible solution to overcome the problem in the future. In addition, we are working on identifying accountability partners who will weekly pray for us and keep us accountable to our personal growth plan. Our goal is to grow through this experience and be better for it.

#1 - Problem: Not observing a Sabbath rest

Reason: I need to manage my time better. I can’t let my Sabbath day be a fall back if I don’t get everything done before then. I need to learn to be more productive in less time.

Solution: Choose one day every week to take off from work and sales. Make it the same day if possible. If not possible, substitute a different day.

It truly is amazing to me when I meditate on the fact that God reminds us every day of our limitations by making us sleep. He even further reminds us of our frailty and dependence on Him by commanding us to rest one day a week. I was struck by the phrase “let my Sabbath day be a fall back”. How easy it is to be tempted to rob ourselves of our rest time because we rested inappropriately throughout the week. Eventually it will catch up to you.

#2 - Problem: Seldom taking a Sunday off. (7-8 times in 5 years)

Reason: At first I thought the church couldn’t go on without me. Then I reasoned that since we only have 1 service per week, I need to be the voice of the church.
Solution: Have someone else speak once every 7-10 weeks.

What you just read is that out of 260 Sundays this man was a church planter, he preached about 250 of those Sundays. Folks that is staggering. Absolutely staggering. I know I don’t fully appreciate and most church members don’t fully appreciate the mental, physical, spiritual, and emotional drain of preparing a sermon but to do so 96% of all the weeks is just crazy. It’s crazy for two reasons: 1) The pride of thinking that your voice is the voice that HAS to be heard in order for the church to grow spiritually and 2) The fault in thinking that it’s good for your people to hear you that often. I am becoming more convinced that a preaching team is absolutely vital if churches are to thrive long term. The church has to hear different voices on a fairly regular basis. If not, the lead guy’s voice will become simply routine and will be tuned out. NO ONE ON EARTH can sustain a 96% preaching ratio. Besides, it is good for the church to hear different perspectives and insights into Scripture.

So what are your thoughts on these first two? What is your take?