Together for the City, by Neil Powell and John James

Neil Powell and John James are church planters in Birmingham, the second largest city in England.  In Together for the City: How Collaborative Church Planting Leads to Citywide Movements, they describe the work of 2020birmingham (https://2020birmingham.org/) which set out in 2010 to plant 20 churches in the Birmingham area by 2020, and now is on its way to planting 30 churches by 2030.

Powell and James bring a passion to Together for the City that is contagious and effective.  First of all, they remind us that church plants are on the cutting edge of the reaching people for the gospel.  Churches, they write, are the primary means for bringing people into the kingdom of God, and are the primary place where new believers are discipled.  Further, new churches are statistically much more likely to reach new believers.  So the message of Together for the City is, in part, to promote the vitality of church plants for the sake of the larger Church.

But more than that, they want to expand the vision for church planting well beyond the single church or single denomination model.  Most church planting I have been aware of is either one church planting a "daughter" church, or, better, a series of daughter churches.  If not a single church, then a regional denominational office will develop a plan to plant a church that is supported by that denomination.  In Powell and James's model, churches join across denominational lines to pursue a unified vision of reaching the city, through church plants, for the gospel.

Maybe I'm too cynical or insulated, but this, to me, sounds pretty radical.  They write that they "aren't seeking to plant churches together but to be together as we plant churches."  They still recognize denominational distinctives while sharing resources, strategies, and plans, with a greater vision of seeing people across their city come to walk with Jesus.  A church planting pastor in my area used to say, "We don't want to be the largest church in the area; we want to church the area."  This is the type of attitude that I see in Together for the City.

2020birmingham, as a group, grasped the conviction that "we are far too tribal, and tribalism is the consequence of failing to reflect deeply on the gospel."  As they look at the "fields white unto harvest," they embrace the attitude that "This field is far too big to farm without collaboration."  As unique and revolutionary as this sounded to me, I apparently am way behind the times.  The authors include interviews with church planters from similar networks in Chicago, Tokyo, Pretoria, and other cities around the world.  The type of collaboration that Powell and James write about is happening all over the world.  As one pastor in Chile said, "We began the first church plant funded by local churches of different denominations.  In this case, a Presbyterian church and an Anglican church are helping financially to support a Reformed Methodist Pentecostal church plant."  What a great vision of working together for the sake of the gospel.  We need more of this, in every city!  May it be, Lord!


Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the complimentary electronic review copy!