Sheep rustling or building the kingdom?

I've just had the first of what will no doubt be a number of emails from student/youth/assistant pastors asking me that if we were sending any students to university in their town/city we would direct them towards their church.  I always have mixed feelings when I receive such emails.  Whilst in one sense its great to know that there are churches to direct students towards I almost want to vet those churches.  To email back and ask if they will be sending those students back to us (or any other church) three years hence better equipped and trained, more in love with Jesus and more aware of the need and more determined to see God's kingdom grow in the United Kingdom.  Or whether their students usually stay on with them after graduation, thus growing their church at the cost of churches in non-university towns.

Last year I posted some questions I'd love to ask them but haven't yet dared to:

1. What percentage of students who come to you do you encourage to engage in the work of mission on campus through the CU because you recognise the unique strategic opportunity it presents?  How practically do you encourage and facilitate that?


2. How do you help students gain a vision of God's kingdom that encompasses more than just your church or city or town, but a passion for the gospel to be known across the UK?


3. How do you equip, train and release those students who come to you to serve the kingdom across the world?

4. What percentage of your students stay with you on graduation and why do they stay?

5.  What percentage of your graduates leave to go to gospel deprived areas of the town or city or to serve in gospel work in other UK towns or cities?

There are others but they are the principle five.  Because here's my concern the cost to small evangelical churches of sending their young people to university is staggeringly high because most do not return.  It means that nationally churches outside of university towns are ageing, lose the next generation of leaders, and will eventually die out.

I'm almost tempted to add one last question to those above.  'Imagine, that over the next 5 years every one of your young people left to move to another city and did not return and were not replaced by other young people, how would that impact your church?  How would it effect it's budget, it's children's work, it's bible study, it's pastoral care, it's ability to reach out with the gospel, it's leadership?  What values would you ask the churches where those young people went to instil in them?'

Do we need more churches?

I was interested this last week to read of Saddleback and Rick Warren's initiative to plant churches in twelve major cities worldwide including London, it has also provoked an interesting reaction and discussion about the need for such a thing.  Will a new church just weaken existing churches?  Will it be done in consultation?  Is there a need?  Why not just support existing churches?  etc...

We need to recognise a two things about the UK and ask a fundamental question about church planting in the UK; firstly the UK is now a largely unreached people group with the gospel.  Secondly the UK church-going population in general is both ageing and in decline.  And thirdly we need to ask the question do most church plants win new people to Christ or do they simply recycle the flock thus weakening the church?

I think all new church plants would say that the two facts about the UK and the gospel are what drive them to plant, but I wonder if many church plants fail to reach new people and instead recycle the flock, thus weakening existing churches either because people move from one church to the new church because it is young and vibrant, or because it is simply something different, or just that it is a brand of church that better fits their needs (consumerism), or by simply spreading out the pool of Christian students coming to a university city or town more thinly.

Now I want to say right away that some churches need people to leave them, if they are not teaching the gospel, if they are not growing disciples, if they are not encouraging people to serve, and if they are striving to reach out to the lost around about them.  Those are churches I want people to leave, if they cannot reform them and the leadership and membership continue to resist and refuse biblical change!  But what about those people who leave good bible teaching but small churches to go to the new church, thus weakening the gospel work being done at those churches?  Does church planting then help to reach a town or city or undermine the reaching of a town or city?  Is there any point planting a church to reach an area if in doing so we shut another or disable a church which is gospel centred and bible teaching?

I wonder if those who plant ought to have a stringent interview process with any newcomers who are from existing churches?  Why do they want to leave?  Why do they want to join?  Are those gospel motives or merely consumerism?  Ought we to seek to meet with existing churches and their leaderships to discuss this and how we can minimise the impact on existing churches?

I know that people will instantly say that you can't force someone to go to one church and not another, and I'd agree but we can not make it easy for people to church hop, we can make people stop and think.  After all no-one church plants because they want to recycle the flock, or because they want to damage existing gospel centred churches.

The struggle to remain Gospel Hearted, Mission Minded and Kingdom Conscious

I don't know about you but I struggle investing in people only to see them leave, part of me - heavily influenced by the sinful world around me says 'only invest in those who won't leave, only pour your time, energy and discipling into those who you will see develop and benefit you and your church'.  That's in part why Romans 1 has been such a challenge personally Paul is so kingdom conscious, so gospel hearted and so mission minded.  I think I and we in the UK have much to learn from this.

Just think about the non-university town church, who has always invested heavily in its young people, teaching them the bible from an early age and throughout their teenage years, discipling them and training them in how to handle the bible and living out the gospel in front of them.  In non-university town churches a high percentage of those young people will go to university, serve in CU's settle in a church and often stay in that church after they graduate, serving along with other young twenties.  It takes a kingdom consciousness to keep on training up young people, investing in them to see them leave and then serve in often much bigger churches.  We have to keep telling ourselves to be gospel hearted, mission minded and kingdom focused.

One church I was part of has seen 3 of its youth group or young twenties go into the ministry having been discipled in it, they have been very generous in giving away and supporting those they have invested in, especially as they are now without a pastor.  Such continual giving away can be energy sapping, the temptation is to focus on those who will be around long term, indeed some ministry manuals would tell you to do just that.  But Romans reminds us and refreshes us in truth that to love Jesus is to love people and to be gospel hearted, mission minded and Kingdom conscious.

But what about the university town church?  Increasingly parts of the United Kingdom are less churched than overseas mission hot spots.  These areas are non-university towns with faithful churches but often faithful churches with few young people in their twenties.  In the UK I fear that there is a very real danger that in 20-25 years time Christianity will have shrunk to the university towns with many areas unreached and unreachable with the gospel from those towns and cities.  This situation is exacerbated by young people rightly wanting company of like minded people and therefore staying in university town churches with twenties groups etc...  But what if those churches encouraged small groups of twenty somethings to move together to a different town, maybe encouraging those who are from a non-university town church close by to find a like minded group of people and support that local church.

It has been thrilling to see just some of that sort of gospel hearted, kingdom conscious thinking beginning to happen, but it is still a rarity.  We as churches in the UK and in gospel partnerships need to think big picture as Paul did - encouraging the Romans to partner with him in reaching Spain with the gospel.  We need to encourage larger congregations to partner with smaller congregations in reaching their area with the gospel, we need smaller congregations to keep investing in those who will leave, we need groups of believers willing to move to the town or area they work in rather than commute 35 minutes.  Dare I say it we don't always need to new churches in an area where there are bible teaching churches already but we need people to involve themselves in those bible teaching churches with gospel hearts who will labour conscious of the kingdom of God.

Father God save me from being 'my kingdom' focused and liberate me through the gospel to serve your kingdom with your heart not my agenda.