Discussion Jumpstarter
Study leader reference - not a definitive answer
Question 3
The speaker imagines planting a church in “Hamburg” with ten families, leaving after 18 months with no ongoing contact, no New Testament, and no appointed leaders; what do you think would actually happen, and what does your answer expose about your confidence in modern discipleship methods versus the kind of durability God produced in the first century?
Another way to ask: If you planted a church with ten families and left after 18 months with no Bible books and no leaders, what do you think would happen? What does your answer show about your trust in modern discipleship methods versus what God did in the first century?
Discussion Jumpstarter
Direct Answer
The speaker’s point is that such a modern church plant would likely collapse, split, or drift doctrinally—showing that we often overestimate our own strength while underestimating the durability God produced in first-century churches like Corinth.
- He proposes planting in a “wicked city” like “Hamburg, Germany,” sending “10 Anabaptist families” for “18 months,” then all returning home.
- He stresses there would be “no phone calls…no Zoom,” like Paul, meaning “no communication” for years.
- The plant would have “no New Testaments,” only “some Old Testaments,” “no literature,” and “we didn’t appoint any bishops or deacons.”
- Leadership would default to people who “said they’re prophets,” and he notes he’s seen how that “can turn out.”
- His conclusion: it “probably wouldn’t even exist…If it was, it would be split…who knows what kind of doctrines.” Yet Corinth still existed and was correctable.