The U.S. Census Bureau recently released data on the 10 metro-areas in the U.S. with the greatest population growth in the last one year period. Four of the ten are in Texas. DFW-Arlington at #1 grew by 162,250 people. Houston-Sugar Land-Baytown at #4 grew by 120,544. Austin-Round Rock at #8 grew by 65,880 and San Antonio at #10 grew by 53,925. Austin-Round Rock is also in the 10 ten in rate of growth at 4.3%.That totals 402,599 and does not include the growth happening elsewhere in Texas. That growth is not an anomaly but is the norm for our state!
The Texas District has set a goal that through its congregations, 200 new churches would start by 2017. Some might think this goal overly ambitious, but when compared with the growth of our state, it looks modest.
Whether these statistics are merely interesting facts or create an urgency to share the Good News of Jesus personally and have a stake in planting new churches depends on your view of the church. If the church exists merely to care for those already in God's flock, the numbers don't mean much. If, however, you believe that the church is a living organism that does not exist only for the benefit of its members, the numbers mean much more.
In state where only 17% of the population worships regularly, many of those 400,000+ new residents don't know Jesus well. In fact, for many, no one has ever even told them that Jesus loves them and has paid the price to buy them back from sin, death and the devil.
Every pastor, church worker and member needs to be asking "What is my stake in planting new churches that reach new people?" It is not a question for some future time but for right now!
1 Corinthians 7:29, Paul said "What I mean, brothers, is that the time is short." We are surely in those "short times" The time to begin is today.
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