Stratford Church Plant 2026

Before reading this, please see my previous three posts and videos, which together with this post are part of an introductory series regarding establishing a Church Constitution and regarding the Great Confessions of the Reformed Tradition.

Part I:    He’s been in a good paddock…
Part II:   The Great Confessions of the Reformed Tradition
Part III:  Adopting and Adapting the Westminster Confession Faithfully for 2026

Please also note that the proposed constitution has been further developed to achieve what is discussed in this post, by adopting the 39 Articles of Religion and the London Baptist Confession as well as the Westminster, while clearly allowing discretion in matters of conscience where these confessions conflict, and emphasising that which is held in common, while broadly honouring and not condemning the wider content of the confessions. You can read more about this in the article Stratford Church Plant 2026: Constitution.

SPECIAL GENERAL MEETING FOR CONSTITUTION OF NEW CHURCH PLANT FOR STRATFORD

Tuesday November 11, 7:30pm

A new church plant is planned for Stratford for 2026. A meeting is being held tonight, November 11, at 7:30pm, at the Stratford A&P Showgrounds, at the old Skinner Road Hall at the entrance to the showgrounds. The purpose of this meeting is to table and discuss a confession and a constitution that can govern a new church plant.

A church plant is an initiative with the goal of putting down a new set of spiritual roots into the soil, built on a foundation of faith in Christ, to become a self-sustaining community of faith that can be fruitful over a long period of time.

A faithful church plant is propelled by the life, love and power of Jesus Christ himself, as we come to the cross and recognise Jesus’ death as the one perfect sacrifice for the sins of the world. When we put our faith in Christ and in his loving sacrifice, he imparts to us his very spirit, so that we can show the same kind of love that Jesus showed in the self-giving sacrifice of the cross.

This is God’s design for his church. It is Jesus’ intent that we would live grounded in faith and powered by his spirit, bearing much fruit (John 15:5). Such a life will show fruit of obedience to Jesus’ commands – obedience that is more than just fearful duty. Rather, obedience that is a natural consequence of gratitude for his love, motivated by the powerful presence of his spirit in our lives. We love because he first loved us (1 John 4:19). For the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law (Galatians 5:22, 23).

To successfully build a church community that is faithful to the power and the reality of this gospel is no small task. As has been discussed, many churches have begun with such intent, but over time have lost focus on preaching the gospel and expecting to see its power at work. Instead of preaching the great doctrines of grace, pulpits have become pre-occupied with everyday wisdom and counsel, and with peoples’ stories and anecdotes. And often such preaching completely neglects to discuss the details of what Christ achieved on the cross, and what he can achieve in our lives through the indwelling of the spirit. Often such preaching fails to tackle head-on the idols of our age, and the social trends and fashions of the world that defy God’s standards and yet seep into our churches.

As we prepare for this church plant, I am tabling some proposals for a constitution that I hope will help to protect our new church plant from becoming undermined in this way. I have already talked about the value of being a confessional church. I have discussed the various confessions that have served Protestant churches in the last 500 years. I have identified the Westminster Confession as a good basis, and I have proposed some amendments that enable this confession to be adopted, and yet adapted. So it can be a confession that does not go beyond what scripture would require of us. So that differences of opinion that are held with a strong conscience, and can be argued for from scripture, can be honoured without requiring homogeneity on such matters.

Adopting a confession that is biblical and truly catholic (with a small c) is, I think, the most critical element to settling a sound constitution for a church plant. Yet, there are lessons to be learned from what has happened in the last 500 years of church history, that indicate there are other critical matters that also need to be addressed, namely:

• providing for church membership and government structures
• identifying commitments that would be required for members
• establishing clear processes for conflict resolution and discipline

Submission and democracy

The Bible teaches us that Christians who are led by the spirit of God submit to one another out of reverence for Christ (Ephesians 5:21). Many Christians will jump straight to Ephesians 5:22, to discuss the duty of wives to submit to their husbands – and yet completely overlook Ephesians 5:21. Husbands, how can you expect your wives to submit to you, if you don’t know how to submit to the church?! The Bible says we are one body (1 Corinthians 12:12 – 27), a temple of living stones (1 Peter 2:5), and that we are to be devoted to one another in brotherly love, outdoing each other in our honour for one another (Romans 12:10).

Some might say it’s a bit rich of me to talk about submitting to the church, when I’m the guy talking about starting an independent church plant – rather than going and submitting to a congregation that already exists. And yet, as Ecclesiates 3:1 says, there is a time for a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven. I have certainly had by time of submitting to the work of other men in this space. I am well practiced at it! But I have often noticed that in many of these works, there is little sense of those same men themselves being in submission to their Christian brothers and sisters. There is little conversation about how governance works in the church, how elders are identified and developed, or how diligence is shown in the pulpit.

This is one of the driving concerns behind establishing a new church – to address this need to have a church culture and church government structure committed to accountability between the leadership and the wider church, and committed to developing leaders. Having a clear constitution is a great help, in identifying goals and guardrails that can develop leadership the accords with God’s will articulated in the Bible. It is also necessary, though, to establish governance structures and patterns that ensure a congregation can keep their leaders accountable, and keep them faithful to the Bible.

Historians show there is a strong link between belief in the power of the gospel, and the development of democratic systems of governance in societies, churches and governments over the last few centuries. On one hand, the earliest explicitly democratic systems of governance appear to have come from the Greeks. Yet, the idea of deliberation by community, and of grounding power away from the centre, had a much longer history in Israel. Each tribe was directed to elect its own leader from “among the congregation” (Numbers 1:16), and God warned Israel against having a king. Deacons were elected by the congregation in Jerusalem (Acts 6:1 – 6).

If the church is the body of Christ, all joined to the head which is Christ, and if each believer is to be led by the spirit, and together have the mind of Christ – then it is sensible for the leaders of a church to be in subjection to the deliberation of the wider congregation. So long as there is plenty of room for leaders, preachers and teachers to persuade the congregation where necessary. And so long as the church has confidence that all of the members of the congregation are committed to obedience to God’s will and God’s word.

Membership

And this is why membership is important. And this is why it is important to ensure that the constitution and confession articulate scripture and scripture alone, and do not go beyond scripture. The requirements for members ought to include a commitment to upholding the constitution of the church, and upholding its confession. The constitution includes the confession, and also includes an outline of the processes by which a church will be structured and governed.

Book of Order

In Presbyterian churches, as well as having a confession, these churches typically also have a Book of Order (also called Book of Procedures, or Book of Discipline), examples are linked below:

The Book of Order of the Presbyterian Church of Aotearoa New Zealand

The Book of Church Order of the Grace Presbyterian Church of New Zealand

Governing Documents of the Communion of Reformed Evangelical Churches

These documents go into much more detail concerning the operational procedures of a denomination, including details about how a Presbytery is run, and how a church manages interests across a number of congregations.

Settling and establishing a book of order like this is no doubt valuable. And to review these documents and check their suitability as a faithful articulation of the bible, that doesn’t go beyond the Bible, and fits with the consciences of those in a new congregation in Stratford, is obviously no small task. I am comfortable with tabling an adopted and adapted confession. But to do the same with one of these documents would be a task for a church that is between the stages of conception and birth. In the meantime, a standard democratic constitution used by incorporated societies could be adopted to govern the affairs of a church in transition, until such a time as a Book of Order like those discussed above can be adopted.

Discipleship bands

Finally, when the requirements for membership are considered, it seems plain to me that the commitments required of church membership should include a commitment to Christian discipleship, and this commitment should reflect the obligations the bible requires of Christians. One of the greatest success stories of Christian discipleship and church planting in the last few centuries was that of the Methodist movement, founded by the brothers John and Charles Wesley.

Two things clearly made this movement a success. One of those things was a commitment to and belief in the power of the gospel and preaching that gospel. The other was a commitment to and belief in the power of a holy life. Methodists believed that the gospel was a promise of salvation not just from Hell, but from sin. Methodists expected that a Christian would put to death sin in their lives, through the power of the Holy Spirit. And they required that every member of a Methodist society attend regular class meetings for the purposes of discussing together their battles against sin, and arming each other with encouragement and prayer to be victorious in those battles.

It is obvious that this commitment to holiness, together with the commitment to gospel preaching, was why God used the Methodist movement to radically change lives and change a nation through the life and times of John and Charles Wesley, and the likes of William Wilberforce. It is also obvious that when the Methodist churches were reconstituted in the early 20^th Century, and the requirement to attend class meetings was dropped, the result was the rapid demise of the Methodist church.

For this new church plant in Stratford to be a success, we need to have the same commitment to holiness, and to each other, that these early Methodists had.

Tonight, November 11, at 7:30pm, at the Stratford A&P Showgrounds, at the old Skinner Road Hall at the entrance to the showgrounds, this day November 11, all of these matters will be discussed:

An Adapted Westminster Confession for Stratford in 2026

A constitution based on the democratic standard used by incorporated societies

The inclusion of commitment to discipleship as a requirement for membership in discipleship bands

I want to close with the words of the Apostle Paul in 2 Corinthians, which express the heart of what these meetings are all about, and why it is important that everyone, everywhere, takes this work of preaching the gospel and teaching God’s word so seriously.

From 2 Corinthians 5:14 – 21:

For Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died. And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again.

So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer.

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!

All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation.

We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

Be reconciled to God, to Jesus Christ, and to his body, the church.