Church Planting Locations: Why Not Here or There?

That wraps up our look at possible locations.  There are a couple of other slim possibilities, like Airdrie and St. Albert, but they won’t get as much attention, barring God changing our minds in no uncertain terms.

You might also ask, “Why not X or Y community?”  The reality is there are many more communities in Alberta where churches are needed.  Edmonton and Calgary metro areas are the most important, in everyone’s mind.  Paul didn’t go to the country to preach, he went to the cities.

There are several things to consider – one being our own expertise.  It takes a special kind of person to minister cross-culturally with a special gift set, and really neither Cheryl nor I are comfortable in urban culture.  We believe that God wants us to use our gifts in ways that just come out of us – who we are.  And we believe that part of our calling is to teach people that the place where they are at is the place where God calls them to fulfill the Great Commission.  We dream of equipping and discipling people to reach out to the place they are at – their neighbours, their co-workers, and make the gospel a part of the fabric of their lives so that they become the salt and light that God desires all of us to be.

So we have to ask ourselves, who are we?  Are we country folk?  Do we see ourselves as farmers, rural people?  In some ways I wish I was.   I know I am not though.  Do we see ourselves at home amongst the towers of steel and pavement?  Definitely not!  But there are lost people no matter where we look here in Canada – lost hockey moms, lost mechanics, lost truck drivers, lost schoolteachers.  We go to where they are, because they live all around us.  Because they need Jesus, and because we can’t ignore what God put in our hearts long ago.

I still remember long ago, just after I began to follow Christ at 16, I looked at the “missions bulletin board” at my little baptist church.  I admired those people who set aside their comfortable lives in North America to serve people and teach the Gospel.  But God was prompting me even then – “What about the lost right here at home?  They’re everywhere!”  Even when God was not first in my life, I found myself held back – wanting to “get to know my own backyard” before the rest of the world.  As a result, I have driven at one time or another, nearly every highway in BC and Alberta, and many many backroads as well.

I find this is also my passion when it comes to the Gospel – we, right here in Canada, need to hear the Gospel.  So many of us here have been deceived into thinking we know all there is to know about Jesus and about what it means to be Christian.  But we are blinded – perhaps by pride in our beautiful, peaceful lives and culture.  We all need to hear the radical story of God come down, painting a picture in his own blood of what it means to truly love, and saving the world along the way.

It is our hope and prayer that our church would be another extension of the vision of Grace Brethren Canada – to begin a movement of planting churches across Canada.  Even though we might not be called to places like downtown Edmonton or Calgary, or to places of need like Fort MacMurray or Grande Prairie, we hope to build a center that trains and equips people to go and plant in those places.  That Jesus would be preached in every corner of Alberta.  Not that the churches that are there aren’t trying… but that we need all hands on deck to accomplish this massive task that is bigger than any denomination, creed, movement or following.  We need more churches – more ecclesia, more local representations of the Body of Christ, everywhere so that everyone has a chance to accept his Lordship or reject it.

Tags: calling, church planting, location