Healthy [Not Sick] Churches.
Church planters and ministry leaders are often drawn to what is next.
The next church plant. The next city. The next ministry opportunity. The next person who has yet to hear the gospel.
That impulse is good. After all, the Great Commission compels us to go. We should feel a burden for places where Christ is not known and churches do not yet exist.
But in our passion to multiply churches, we must be careful not to neglect the health of the churches we already have.
This tension appears in an unexpected place in Acts 15.
Following the Jerusalem Council, Paul and Barnabas remained in Antioch for a season, teaching and strengthening believers. Then Paul approached Barnabas with a proposal:
“Let’s go back and visit the brothers and sisters in every town where we have preached the word of the Lord and see how they are doing” (Acts 15:36).
At first glance, Paul's suggestion may seem unremarkable. But the more you consider it, the more significant it becomes.
There were still countless people throughout the Roman world who had never heard the gospel. Entire regions remained unreached. New opportunities for expansion lay ahead.
Yet Paul's concern in this moment was not primarily advancing into new territory. Instead, he wanted to revisit existing churches and strengthen believers who had already heard the gospel.
Why?
Because the mission of the church is not merely about multiplication. It is also about maturation.
Multiplication Without Health Is Unsustainable
Healthy churches should desire multiplication. The New Testament consistently demonstrates a commitment to sending, planting, and expanding gospel witness into new places.
But the same New Testament also reveals a deep concern for the spiritual health of local congregations.
Paul understood that planting a church was not the finish line. New believers and new churches require ongoing care, encouragement, teaching, and discipleship. Left unattended, churches naturally drift toward weakness.
That drift can take many forms:
Doctrinal compromise
Disunity
Neglect of prayer
Spiritual complacency
Cultural accommodation
Weak discipleship
The reality is that churches do not accidentally become healthy. Health must be cultivated.
Consider a gardener who spends months preparing soil, planting seeds, and establishing a garden. It would make little sense to walk away immediately after planting and never return to water, fertilize, or cultivate what was started.
Plants require ongoing care.
Churches do too.
The work of gospel ministry is not simply starting churches; it is strengthening them so they remain faithful for generations.
Why Church Health Matters for Church Planting
Sometimes conversations about church planting unintentionally create a false choice.
We can begin to think that we must choose between caring for existing churches or planting new ones.
The New Testament presents no such divide.
In fact, healthy churches are often the most effective church-planting churches.
Healthy churches produce mature disciples.
Healthy churches raise up qualified leaders.
Healthy churches develop future church planters.
Healthy churches create cultures of generosity, mission, and evangelism.
Healthy churches become sending churches.
When church health is neglected, multiplication often becomes shallow and unsustainable. But when churches are grounded in truth, united around the gospel, and committed to disciple-making, multiplication becomes both fruitful and enduring.
The goal is not simply more churches.
The goal is more healthy churches.
Holding Both Priorities Together
Across North America and around the world, countless communities still need healthy gospel-preaching churches. We should continue praying, sending, giving, and working toward multiplication.
But Acts 15 reminds us that multiplication and health must remain connected.
Paul's instinct was not to choose one over the other. His desire was to strengthen churches so they could continue advancing Christ's mission.
Church planting and church strengthening are not competing priorities.
They are complementary priorities.
As we seek to plant more churches, may we resist the temptation to view church health as a distraction from the mission.
Instead it is an indispensable part of the mission.