Church Planting in a Struggling Economy

The down-turning economy is impacting local churches and church planting. Here are a few other examples:

One church planter spoke about his funding coming to an end in a few months and the pressure to find ways to bring in ‘new tithers’ to help make ends meet. If this does not happen he will have to find a part-time job. Lately, we have received more requests to the Tentmaker Group for people who are struggling to make ends meet and seek additional streams of income.

Existing church offerings are down. Many of the leaders I have spoken to say this has been about 20% lower since earlier giving. This may limit their ability to fund new church plants.

Numerous people have been laid-off that were once church staff.

Attendance at Church Planting conferences are down sharply, which may be a sign of the inability to afford the cost to attend or in a decrease the number of plants.

How does this new economic reality change the way churches are planted? Are church planters moving to more organic & decentralized models? Will there be more bi-vocational church planters? Will more church doors close, consolidating Christians into larger churches?