What factors determine the viability of a new church in its first five years

Abstract

This thesis seeks for a greater understanding into what helps new churches to succeed in their God appointed mission, and, given the greater number of stakeholders committed to church planting in Australia currently, it endeavours to help all those involved, to find best practice for church planting in this country. The researcher’s journey in church planting of over forty years, either as a church planter, a trainer, a coach, or an assessor, means that the successes and failures experienced by those involved in church planting are of real interest. What affects the viability of the new churches established in Australia in their formative years? How do these experiences affect the new church leaderships and teams as well as those who seek to support them? In this thesis there is an attempt to provide insights into these matters by listening and examining the stories of church planters seeking to establish some of the new churches begun in Queensland between 1986 and 2015 under the oversight of the Baptist Union of Queensland. What emerged was data pointing to factors that have a definite and significant effect on viability and so this thesis proposes both theoretical and practical implications for church planting in this country in the 21st century. The data provides insights that will enable those who are leading new churches to maximise their efforts to do what powerfully improves the viability of the new work. It also assists those who oversight and support church planting to do so proactively with new insights and convictions. In addition, it finds that further research that relates to all denominations and cultural contexts as well as new churches in every State and Territory of this country might contribute powerfully to the establishment of greater and greater numbers of new churches in this country without the loss of some of those new churches in that formative first five years in the life of the new church.