This past Tuesday night, I was given the opportunity to speak at the Pennsylvania-Delaware District Council (an annual event for AG pastors in this region). The speaker they had previously scheduled had to cancel at the last minute - and since the theme of the night was church planting...they asked if I could pinch hit.
I shared a message that I had never really shared before out of Acts chapter eleven. In this moment in the history of the early church there are some leadership transitions that set things up for a church planting explosion. What happened?
Barnabas was sent to Antioch to pastor a bunch of 'pagans' from non-Jewish decent. It was kind of an accident how the church at Antioch got started.
Now those who had been scattered by the persecution that broke out when Stephen was killed traveled as far as Phoenicia, Cyprus and Antioch, spreading the word only among Jews. Some of them, however, men from Cyprus and Cyrene, went to Antioch and began to speak to Greeks also, telling them the good news about the Lord Jesus. The Lord’s hand was with them, and a great number of people believed and turned to the Lord. Acts 11:19-21
The church in Jerusalem (predominately Jewish) was scattered because of persecution. The scattered church preached wherever they went...but only to other Jews.
Accidentally - some preached to Greeks in Antioch. An unintended consequence occurred. A 'great number of Greeks believed the message and started following Christ!' Now they had a church in Antioch filled with wild pagan Greeks who knew little about a Biblical way of life - yet with no pastor or leader.
So they sent BARNABAS to Antioch. And this set in motion a church planting explosion. Barnabas was the nickname they had given Joseph (See Acts 4) because he was such a high-grace encouraging person. So they sent this high-grace leader to Antioch to pastor these newly saved wild pagan Greeks.
And this new church in Antioch becomes the primary apostolic church planting center that we read about in the rest of the book of Acts. Missionaries are sent out of this church to plant churches all over Europe and Asia.
We can see three reasons why in this passage:
#1 - REACH PEOPLE THAT NEED TO BE REACHED
If there had been no church planted in Antioch, the gospel would have stayed in the region of Israel and have been contained within the cultural comfort zone of the Jews. But the choice to send Barnabas to Antioch broke the boundaries of geography and culture to reach people needed to be reached with the gospel.
#2 - RAISE UP LEADERS THAT NEED TO BE RELEASED
Every church plant creates a vacuum of leadership that needs to be filled. The Antioch Church needed a strong teacher to train these pagans to become mature in Christ. So Barnabas goes after Saul (soon to be known as the apostle Paul) to join his staff in this new church.
Then Barnabas went to Tarsus to look for Saul, and when he found him, he brought him to Antioch. So for a whole year Barnabas and Saul met with the church and taught great numbers of people. The disciples were called Christians first at Antioch. Acts 11:25-26
Saul had been 'sitting the bench' so to speak and waiting to be used. He was trained as a Rabbi so he was perfect to be able to teach. But he would never have been able to break into the teaching rotation in the Jerusalem Church - because the other apostles were teaching there.
The Antioch Church gave room for one of the greatest teachers in history to find a place of ministry. And he was so effective at his work that the rest of the city of Antioch began to identify his church members as 'christians'. These wild Greeks had become 'little christs' in the eyes of their community.
#3 - RESOURCE NEEDS THAT NEED TO BE MET
Agabus, stood up and through the Spirit predicted that a severe famine would spread over the entire Roman world. The disciples, as each one was able, decided to provide help for the brothers and sisters living in Judea. This they did, sending their gift to the elders by Barnabas and Saul. Acts 11:28-30
It's interesting that the Antioch Church began to send funds to help the Jerusalem Church during a time of famine and need. Jerusalem was the more stable established church. But Antioch begins to sow back into the Jerusalem Church.
When we invest in planting a new church - we set in motion a series of reproductive activities. It's like planting an apple seed - which grows a tree - that produces thousands of apples. And each apple contains seeds that if planted produces more trees and more apples.
Planting churches is meeting needs in perpetuity. A new church gives to needs not just once, but over and over again. They win souls not just in one outreach. But over and over again.
Church planting is all about setting a revolution in motion. Remember, it's not so much what we do that counts, its what we set in motion.
