Know the God of the Gospel

Paul’s dramatic encounter with the risen Christ on the road to Damascus is the bedrock for his understanding of the gospel. We can understand Paul’s great letters as being meditations on this world-changing event. His mission and ministry flow out of this. Understanding the scope and the depth of the gospel gives us the motivation, the mandate, the methodology, the message and the model for church planting. This will prevent us working out of our projects, plans, strategies and skills, and drifting towards idolatry of ministry which is the antithesis of why we plant churches. Through the gospel, Paul kept a vision of a big God with whom he had a vital relationship, and this impacted directly on how he planted.