REVIEW: Starting New Churches on Purpose
I recently pulled this book back out for some research. This is a review I wrote of it back in 2015. I must have been in a snarky mood that day!
Starting New Churches on Purpose by Ron Sylvia
My rating: 1 of 5 stars
Supersized Church Menu with Purpose-Driven Shake, Bible at market value.
A friend gave me this book shortly after I took over a church plant. He thought I might benefit from some of the advice in these pages, and indeed, it provides practical advice. Even so, it’s not an overstatement that this book gives represents everything wrong in Evangelical churches today.
Primarily, the book lacks concern for what God has said concerning churches. So, when developing the core values of a church, one should take “time to research churches on the Internet” (57). When planning what to preach, go to a megachurch website to find a sermon series—a.k.a. plagiarism—in case you don’t want to plan an “original series” (146). Readers with no outside knowledge would leave God’s Word out of the planning stages of a new church and the messages presented on Sunday mornings—not the best of advice on the most foundational level.
Make no mistake: this is an intentional omission. Sylvia creates a false dichotomy between what is relevant and what is informative. He writes, “Purpose driven teaching results in life change, not information exchange” (92). As such, in his chapter on planning the worship “experience,” he makes sure to call for creative folks like movie buffs, but never once mentions the importance of Bible study, textual commentaries, or systematic theologies. He writes, “It is about food presentation. It is not about the food itself” (138). In case that is not clear enough, Sylvia actually laments driving away people with a gospel message after a free rock concert his church sponsored (118). Purpose-driven churches are specifically designed to give as little Bible as possible.
It’s not that his book is entirely without biblical citations, but references to the Great Commission and Jesus’ compassion for the crowds hardly comprise a scriptural treatise on how churches should operate. This is especially true since books like Titus and 1 and 2 Timothy exist in God’s Word and uncited by Sylvia. As such, instead of arguing from the Scripture, his book is full of worldly ideas on church structure and polity.
For instance, instead of looking to Scripture, Sylvia looks to McDonald’s— “The church must do the same [give back to the community like McDonald’s] and keep up with the culture that we are called to reach” (118). When he does return to the Bible, like he does in chapter 10, he uses this corporate mindset to misread Jesus as creating buzz and attracting the masses—advocating worldly techniques to launch a church “big.” It’s no surprise; the book is a corporate model for feeding countless souls every week with spiritual junk food.
It’s no surprise, then, that he seems to judge success also according to worldly means. Apparently Texan, Sylvia advocates going big or going home, seeming to ask the reader whether a church of only a couple hundred people is worth the effort. Sylvia repeats the struggle of getting past the ceiling of 200–300 people (e.g., 15, 108, 180, 193), the unspoken statement each time that there’s something wrong with a church of only a few hundred people. Citing the massive number of conversions on Pentecost in Acts 2, Sylvia gives the false impression that God wants us to have big churches—one would think that Jerusalem had a 3,000-member mega-church in the first year of Christianity! The reality that churches in Scripture were typically humble house churches is ignored in the face of millions of people served every week at purpose-driven churches.
It took me a long time to finish this book—not because it wasn’t an easy read (it is), but because I kept putting it down for months at a time to read better books. I haven’t even touched on the claims of direct revelation, the purposeful ousting of elderly people, and the simple fact that Sylvia himself lacks any formal training to be a pastor. It is simply bad. It’s bad from a biblical perspective, and it promotes the creation of bad churches. But if you disagree with me and believe that every day God “dreams of people building Experimental Churches of Tomorrow” (3), then get this book and follow your heart, you Nadab and Abihu, you.
View all my reviews
Starting New Churches on Purpose by Ron SylviaMy rating: 1 of 5 stars
Supersized Church Menu with Purpose-Driven Shake, Bible at market value.
A friend gave me this book shortly after I took over a church plant. He thought I might benefit from some of the advice in these pages, and indeed, it provides practical advice. Even so, it’s not an overstatement that this book gives represents everything wrong in Evangelical churches today.
Primarily, the book lacks concern for what God has said concerning churches. So, when developing the core values of a church, one should take “time to research churches on the Internet” (57). When planning what to preach, go to a megachurch website to find a sermon series—a.k.a. plagiarism—in case you don’t want to plan an “original series” (146). Readers with no outside knowledge would leave God’s Word out of the planning stages of a new church and the messages presented on Sunday mornings—not the best of advice on the most foundational level.
Make no mistake: this is an intentional omission. Sylvia creates a false dichotomy between what is relevant and what is informative. He writes, “Purpose driven teaching results in life change, not information exchange” (92). As such, in his chapter on planning the worship “experience,” he makes sure to call for creative folks like movie buffs, but never once mentions the importance of Bible study, textual commentaries, or systematic theologies. He writes, “It is about food presentation. It is not about the food itself” (138). In case that is not clear enough, Sylvia actually laments driving away people with a gospel message after a free rock concert his church sponsored (118). Purpose-driven churches are specifically designed to give as little Bible as possible.
It’s not that his book is entirely without biblical citations, but references to the Great Commission and Jesus’ compassion for the crowds hardly comprise a scriptural treatise on how churches should operate. This is especially true since books like Titus and 1 and 2 Timothy exist in God’s Word and uncited by Sylvia. As such, instead of arguing from the Scripture, his book is full of worldly ideas on church structure and polity.
For instance, instead of looking to Scripture, Sylvia looks to McDonald’s— “The church must do the same [give back to the community like McDonald’s] and keep up with the culture that we are called to reach” (118). When he does return to the Bible, like he does in chapter 10, he uses this corporate mindset to misread Jesus as creating buzz and attracting the masses—advocating worldly techniques to launch a church “big.” It’s no surprise; the book is a corporate model for feeding countless souls every week with spiritual junk food.
It’s no surprise, then, that he seems to judge success also according to worldly means. Apparently Texan, Sylvia advocates going big or going home, seeming to ask the reader whether a church of only a couple hundred people is worth the effort. Sylvia repeats the struggle of getting past the ceiling of 200–300 people (e.g., 15, 108, 180, 193), the unspoken statement each time that there’s something wrong with a church of only a few hundred people. Citing the massive number of conversions on Pentecost in Acts 2, Sylvia gives the false impression that God wants us to have big churches—one would think that Jerusalem had a 3,000-member mega-church in the first year of Christianity! The reality that churches in Scripture were typically humble house churches is ignored in the face of millions of people served every week at purpose-driven churches.
It took me a long time to finish this book—not because it wasn’t an easy read (it is), but because I kept putting it down for months at a time to read better books. I haven’t even touched on the claims of direct revelation, the purposeful ousting of elderly people, and the simple fact that Sylvia himself lacks any formal training to be a pastor. It is simply bad. It’s bad from a biblical perspective, and it promotes the creation of bad churches. But if you disagree with me and believe that every day God “dreams of people building Experimental Churches of Tomorrow” (3), then get this book and follow your heart, you Nadab and Abihu, you.
View all my reviews
