I grew up in rural Indiana. There in rural Indiana, against my druthers, I was a planter. We had a 60 acre farm and a 1/2 acre truck patch. Planting was a year-round project for me. Plow, disc harrow, plant, fertilize, herbicide, cultivate, hoe, walk the beans, pull the tomato worms, harvest the crop, glean the fields, shell the corn . . . you get the picture. Though planting requires caring attention, it also involves something that is completely beyond our control. In fact, you could put seeds in the ground and something happens whether or not you follow through for the best possible crop. It requires a miracle from God and his faithfulness to follow through with seasonal necessities that are only in his control.
To be honest, as a kid, I didn’t like planting. It took too much patience. If you’ve ever spent 10 hours at a time riding around in circles on an H-International tractor dragging a disc, you’ll understand where I’m coming from.
I grew up, went away to college and became a constructor. I became a launcher. It didn’t take nearly as much patience. On behalf of owners who needed buildings, I hired design professionals (i.e., architects and engineers), managed the design process, made a schedule, scoped the work, bid to contractors, contracted to winning bidders, and managed the construction. I pushed it all along the way. Patient I did not have to be; I just pushed harder.
Launches are engineering feats, whether in construction or otherwise. It takes careful engineering, a whole lot of resources, force and energy to pull off a launch. We might more readily think of a NASA shuttle project as a launch project. It requires a whole bunch of money, professionals and a huge payload of fuel to get it off the ground. In the beginning, it truly is a marvel to wonder at, but, in the end, it’s also a huge maintenance project.
Am I a planter or a launcher?
I suspect that what often occurs is a church plant and launched crowd. Planters move into their new communities and gather a tight group who are committed and buy into the vision and then together they engineer a crowd. From this crowd disciples are drawn, but at what maintenance cost? Is this any more effective than disciples making disciples?
Seth Godin writes, “People don't coalesce into active and committed tribes around the status quo.
The only vibrant tribes in our communities are the ones closer the edges, or those trying to make change. The center is large, but it's not connected.
If you're trying to build a tribe, a community or a movement, and you want it to be safe and beyond reproach at the same time, you will fail.
Heretical thoughts, delivered in a way that capture the attention of the minority--that's the path that works.”
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