Last week, I took some time to review Darrin Patrick’s new book Church Planter. Below is all three parts compiled in one place.
Church Planter: The Man, the Message, the Mission by Darrin Patrick
(Wheaton: Crossway, 2010), 238 pp. Buy: Amazon | WTS Bookstore
Reviewed by Tim Brister

The Man
One does not have to look far to discover the plethora of books in the world of church planting. However, the majority of these books focus on the pragmatics of church planting—systems, techniques, processes, etc. Wisdom has often been discovered not in those who have learned to give all the answers, but rather from those who have learned to ask the right questions. The burning question among most church planting books seems to be, “How to plant a church?” In his book, Church Planter, Darrin Patrick takes a completely different approach, starting with a different, and I would argue, more pertinent question. He begins by asking not how to plant a church but who should plant a church. The first section of his book seeks to answer this question with the end goal to find men who are “fit to carry the message of Jesus to the world” (103). Patrick’s focus and prayer is that there would be a resurgence of “godly men to serve the church by the power of God’s Spirit” (17). This theme runs throughout this section and in many ways lays out a template for discovering and assessing men according to God’s Word.
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