The third part in Eric Davis’s Fledgling Church Planter Series, featured on The Cripple Gate.  This article recalls some of the earliest experiences of Cornerstone, and from them challenges the notion that pragmatic methodology is acceptable in young Church Plants, showing that Pragmatism stems from Idolatry, and looses sight of God and the Gospel for the sake of visible results and satisfaction.

Pragmatism: that prominent swear word in evangelicalism, which many of us claim to never touch. Throughout my years in seminary, I had an arm-chair disdain for pragmatism. From the sterilized desks at which I studied, I could call it down with fledgling-boldness.

Never would I have thought that pragmatism would be a temptation for me. After all, during my four years in seminary, I sat under a band of faithful men who navigated the waters of ministry for decades while seeming to avoid it’s temptations themselves.

However, as I would soon find out, it’s one thing to call down battle techniques not having been in battle, yet quite another to be tossed in the throes, grasping for any weapon within arm’s reach to accomplish the immediate job. Once plunged into the storm of church-planting, I was quickly and blindly grabbing for whatever worked. And on a deeper level, I was on a mission to soothe my ego by filling another pew or two.

(Read more at http://thecripplegate.com/church-planting-and-pragmatism/trackback/)