I grew up in fundamentalist circles and was in (foreign) church plants for ~5 years of my life.
The founder is very young, often under 25.
He might work alone or with a founding team, but when he tells the story of the founding it will always have him at the center.
He has no credentials for this business.
Founders at foreign plants are usually older, typically in their 30s or 40s. Some are even in their 50s or 60s, arriving as empty nesters. Supporter attrition is extremely high; our church turned over about every ~2 years. About 50% of foreign missionaries leave after 2 years, another 1⁄2 of the remaining leave after 4, and another 1⁄2 after 7 years. So only about 1⁄8 of people stay long-term at one of these harder plants that take about 10 years to start. So many fail before they even truly get underway, especially in the most hostile areas. Mission orgs almost always try to send a team to a new area, because planting is extremely lonely and isolating. When the pastors I met talk about the history of the church, they often mention other planters etc. and give themselves a much lower profile (seems reasonable that podcast guests aren’t representative of the pastor at one of these plants).
Not all foreign missionaries are seminary-educated, but most pastors are regardless of denomination. Many were actively involved in the church, had some sort of sending/validation by other members, and some were even pastors of their former church. Churches usually start in living rooms and there’s often no church building that you could take over. Oftentimes you rent space from a building; during the week you can use it as an office or something.
Generally unconcerned with negative externalities
This wasn’t my experience; many people expressed sadness/wishes that scandals like Mars Hill didn’t happen. Leadership also take precautions against causing scandals etc., but each plant varies but most in foreign places are fairly upright and try to do good in general.
The most useful function [of a mission team] mentioned was mowing the pastor’s own lawn, to free up his time.
Mission teams are often criticized for their effectiveness even within Christian circles because they take a lot of resources from the hosting church (providing food, place to sleep, spend time with them, etc.) and the output is often manual labor/construction instead of trying to build relationships with locals because of time constraints or language barriers. It’s sometimes comforting for the receiving church though; it can be lonely at a plant. An argument for mission teams is that it “strengthens the faith” of the people going and they forge closer relationships with each other, which leads to lower attrition rates from the church on the margin.
I grew up in fundamentalist circles and was in (foreign) church plants for ~5 years of my life.
Founders at foreign plants are usually older, typically in their 30s or 40s. Some are even in their 50s or 60s, arriving as empty nesters. Supporter attrition is extremely high; our church turned over about every ~2 years. About 50% of foreign missionaries leave after 2 years, another 1⁄2 of the remaining leave after 4, and another 1⁄2 after 7 years. So only about 1⁄8 of people stay long-term at one of these harder plants that take about 10 years to start. So many fail before they even truly get underway, especially in the most hostile areas. Mission orgs almost always try to send a team to a new area, because planting is extremely lonely and isolating. When the pastors I met talk about the history of the church, they often mention other planters etc. and give themselves a much lower profile (seems reasonable that podcast guests aren’t representative of the pastor at one of these plants).
Not all foreign missionaries are seminary-educated, but most pastors are regardless of denomination. Many were actively involved in the church, had some sort of sending/validation by other members, and some were even pastors of their former church. Churches usually start in living rooms and there’s often no church building that you could take over. Oftentimes you rent space from a building; during the week you can use it as an office or something.
This wasn’t my experience; many people expressed sadness/wishes that scandals like Mars Hill didn’t happen. Leadership also take precautions against causing scandals etc., but each plant varies but most in foreign places are fairly upright and try to do good in general.
Mission teams are often criticized for their effectiveness even within Christian circles because they take a lot of resources from the hosting church (providing food, place to sleep, spend time with them, etc.) and the output is often manual labor/construction instead of trying to build relationships with locals because of time constraints or language barriers. It’s sometimes comforting for the receiving church though; it can be lonely at a plant. An argument for mission teams is that it “strengthens the faith” of the people going and they forge closer relationships with each other, which leads to lower attrition rates from the church on the margin.