Church Planter Quotes

“Most churches do not grow beyond the spiritual health of their leadership. Many churches have a pastor who is trying to lead people to a Savior he has yet to personally encounter. If spiritual gifting is no proof of authentic faith, then certainly a job title isn't either.

You must have a clear sense of calling before you enter ministry. Being a called man is a lonely job, and many times you feel like God has abandoned you in your ministry. Ministry is more than hard. Ministry is impossible. And unless we have a fire inside our bones compelling us, we simply will not survive. Pastoral ministry is a calling, not a career. It is not a job you pursue.

If you don’t think demons are real, try planting a church! You won’t get very far in advancing God’s kingdom without feeling resistance from the enemy.

If I fail to spend two hours in prayer each morning, the devil gets the victory through the day. Once a month I get away for the day, once a quarter I try to get out for two days, and once a year I try to get away for a week. The purpose of these times is rest, relaxation, and solitude with God.

A pastor must always be fearless before his critics and fearful before his God. Let us tremble at the thought of neglecting the sheep. Remember that when Christ judges us, he will judge us with a special degree of strictness.

The only way you will endure in ministry is if you determine to do so through the prevailing power of the Holy Spirit. The unsexy reality of the pastorate is that it involves hard work—the heavy-lifting, curse-ridden, unyielding employment of your whole person for the sake of the church. Pastoral ministry requires dogged, unyielding determination, and determination can only come from one source—God himself.

Passive staff members must be motivated. Erring elders and deacons must be confronted. Divisive church members must be rebuked. Nobody enjoys doing such things (if you do, you should be not be a pastor!), but they are necessary in order to have a healthy church over the long haul. If you allow passivity, laziness, and sin to fester, you will soon despise the church you pastor.

From the beginning of sacred Scripture (Gen. 2:17) to the end (Rev. 21:8), the penalty for sin is death. Therefore, if we sin, we should die. But it is Jesus, the sinless one, who dies in our place for our sins. The good news of the gospel is that Jesus died to take to himself the penalty of our sin.

The Bible is not Christ-centered because it is generally about Jesus. It is Christ-centered because the Bible’s primary purpose, from beginning to end, is to point us toward the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus for the salvation and sanctification of sinners.

Christ-centered preaching goes much further than merely providing suggestions for how to live; it points us to the very source of life and wisdom and explains how and why we have access to him. Felt needs are set into the context of the gospel, so that the Christian message is not reduced to making us feel better about ourselves.

If you do not know how sinful you are, you feel no need of salvation. Sin-exposing preaching helps people come face-to-face with their sin and their great need for a Savior.

We can worship in heaven, and we can talk to God in heaven, and we can read our Bibles in heaven, but we can’t share the gospel with our lost friends in heaven.

“Would your city weep if your church did not exist?”

It was crystal-clear for me. Somehow, through fear or insecurity, I had let my dreams for our church shrink. I had stopped thinking about the limitless things God could do and had been distracted by my own limitations. I prayed right there that God would forgive me of my small-mindedness. I asked God to forgive my lack of faith that God could use a man like me to bring the message of the gospel through our missionary church to our lost city. I begged God to renew my heart and mind with a vision for our city that was more like Christ's.”
― Darrin Patrick, Church Planter: The Man, The Message, The Mission

“Most people think that Christianity is spelled DO: they look at the Bible or the life of Christ, and they simply try hard to live like Jesus. Christianity is really spelled DONE: it is what Christ has done that enables us to live a life of obedience.30”
― Darrin Patrick, Church Planter

“A good preacher, for example, must be able to exegete not only the text but also the culture of the hearers in order to be a faithful and fruitful missionary. We are to bring the gospel through the church to the world and avoid allowing the world to influence the church and corrupt the gospel. This definition also hints at the thoroughness required in contextualization. It must be comprehensive. This involves examining every aspect of the text being preached and the truth being explained through the eyes of those who are listening to that truth.17 This is why a missional pastor should always preach as if there are unbelievers in the crowd. He should never assume that his audience is comprised only of those already convinced of the truth and power of the gospel. We must literally consider everything we do through the lens of the unbeliever, always asking the question, “How does this come across to unbelievers?”18”
― Darrin Patrick, Church Planter

“We will close this chapter with a lengthy quote from Tim Keller about how we should read the Bible and think about Christ even in the Old Testament: Jesus is the true and better Adam who passed the test in the garden and whose obedience is imputed to us. Jesus is the true and better Abel who, though innocently slain, has blood now that cries out, not for our condemnation, but for acquittal. Jesus is the true and better Abraham who answered the call of God to leave all the comfortable and familiar and go out into the void not knowing whither he went to create a new people of God. Jesus is the true and better Isaac who was not just offered up by his father on the mount but was truly sacrificed for us. And when God said to Abraham, “Now I know you love me because you did not withhold your son, your only son whom you love from me,” now we can look at God taking his Son up the mountain and sacrificing him and say, “Now we know that you love us because you did not withhold your Son, your only Son, whom you love from us.” Jesus is the true and better Jacob who wrestled and took the blow of justice we deserved, so we, like Jacob, only receive the wounds of grace to wake us up and discipline us. Jesus is the true and better Joseph who, at the right hand of the king, forgives those who betrayed and sold him and uses his new power to save them. Jesus is the true and better Moses who stands in the gap between the people and the Lord and who mediates a new covenant. Jesus is the true and better Rock of Moses who, struck with the rod of God’s justice, now gives us water in the desert. Jesus is the true and better Job, the truly innocent sufferer, who then intercedes for and saves his stupid friends. Jesus is the true and better David whose victory becomes his people’s victory, though they never lifted a stone to accomplish it themselves. Jesus is the true and better Esther who didn’t just risk leaving an earthly palace but lost the ultimate and heavenly one, who didn’t just risk his life, but gave his life to save his people. Jesus is the true and better Jonah who was cast out into the storm so that we could be brought in. Jesus is the real Rock of Moses, the real Passover Lamb, innocent, perfect, helpless, slain so the angel of death will pass over us. He’s the true temple, the true prophet, the true priest, the true king, the true sacrifice, the true lamb, the true light, the true bread. The Bible’s really not about you—it’s about him.51”
― Darrin Patrick, Church Planter

“Here are some essential questions for a good shepherd to consider: Are the people under your care loving God both privately and corporately? Are they taking ownership over connecting other people into the church community? Together, are they mobilizing toward the mission of God to transform the world? An effective shepherd will do all he can to answer those questions in the affirmative. What”
― Darrin Patrick, Church Planter

“The gospel actually saves, because in the gospel the God of the universe acts.”
― Darrin Patrick, Church Planter

“preaching is like firing artillery. It is a relatively safe and clean job because artillery men are removed from the actual battle line. But pastoral work is like being in the infantry. It is hand-to-hand, eyeball-to-eyeball combat.”
― Darrin Patrick, Church Planter

“a pastor must always be fearless before his critics and fearful before his God.”
― Darrin Patrick, Church Planter

“You don’t preach to hear yourself, you preach to heal the church.”
― Darrin Patrick, Church Planter

“Husbands in the home and pastors in the church are not more valued or more gifted, but they are charged with more responsibility and will be accountable to God for the way they lead.”
― Darrin Patrick, Church Planter

“In its context every passage possesses one or more of four redemptive foci. The text may be predictive of the work of Christ, preparatory for the work of Christ, reflective of the work of Christ, and/or resultant of the work of Christ. (Bryan Chapell)3”
― Darrin Patrick, Church Planter

“Second, Jesus is calling his disciples to learn to observe all that he commanded. The word “observe” here means “obey.”2 Jesus does not want his followers to settle for a head full of knowledge about theology; he wants his followers to actually obey (i.e., keep, do, live out) the revealed teaching of God’s Word. And what is it that he wants us to obey? What does it mean to observe all that he commanded? Jesus summed it up with two commandments. In Mark 12:30–31 Jesus sums up the law by explaining the two most important commandments. “‘And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” To observe all that Jesus commanded is primarily going to look like loving God and loving people.”
― Darrin Patrick, Church Planter

“The church, realizing that it is a missionary entity,28 must realize that people in culture have deep-seated beliefs about their lives that must be addressed by the gospel if they are going to give Christianity a hearing. To reach people with the gospel, we have to address a person’s view of the nature of truth, history, science, and, at times, politics. Gospel-sharing and preaching that does not address the cognitive aspects of culture may tweak the emotions but may not transform the worldview of the person.”
― Darrin Patrick, Church Planter

“It is simply impossible for the church to not allow some aspects of culture to come into its worship or programming.21 He explains: The minute we begin to minister we must “incarnate,” even as Jesus did. Actual Christian practices must have both a biblical form or shape as well as a cultural form or shape. For example, the Bible clearly directs us to use music to praise God. But as soon as we choose a music style to use, we enter a culture. As soon as we choose a language, as soon as we choose a vocabulary, as soon as we choose a particular level of emotional expressiveness and intensity, as soon as we choose even an illustration as an example for a sermon, we are moving toward the social context of some people and away from the social context of others. At Pentecost, everyone heard the sermon in his or her own language and dialect. But since Pentecost, we can never be “all things to all people” at the very same time. So adaptation to culture is inevitable.”
― Darrin Patrick, Church Planter

“Deacons lead the church by serving her; elders serve the church by leading her.”
― Darrin Patrick, Church Planter

“Once a month I get away for the day, once a quarter I try to get out for two days, and once a year I try to get away for a week. The purpose of these times is rest, relaxation, and solitude with God. Some of us are so busy that we are not giving God access to our hearts. By slowing down and spending some unhurried time away from our ministry, we can allow God to speak into our lives. For those of you who are reading this who are totally dry, consider taking a sabbatical, a season off from ministry. One counselor told me that pastors should go on a three-month sabbatical once every seven years, or even a six-month sabbatical if possible. Trust God to maintain the ministry in your absence. You will be better able to serve your people once you are refreshed.”
― Darrin Patrick, Church Planter

“At his baptism Jesus heard the Father’s voice: “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased” (Matthew 3:17). Before he lifted a finger to touch a wounded body or spoke a word to transform a wounded spirit, before he accomplished any ministry whatsoever, Jesus knew in the depth of his being that he had his Father’s approval. His motivation for his life and ministry was the gratitude that he had because of the Father’s”
― Darrin Patrick, Church Planter

“At his baptism Jesus heard the Father’s voice: “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased” (Matthew 3:17). Before he lifted a finger to touch a wounded body or spoke a word to transform a wounded spirit, before he accomplished any ministry whatsoever, Jesus knew in the depth of his being that he had his Father’s approval. His motivation for his life and ministry was the gratitude that he had because of the Father’s approval apart from his performance.”
― Darrin Patrick, Church Planter

“Jesus is not just a servant of God who was bruised by Satan, but the Lord who destroyed Satan’s power over the human race. The resurrection is the vindication of all of Jesus’ claims and the salvation that is offered by him. It completes our Lord’s work and shows beyond all doubt and argument that the salvation he offers is real.”
― Darrin Patrick, Church Planter