“Would your church be a strong Bible church?” one man asked. I assured him that we would most definitely teach the Scriptures. He had more questions, and the more he pressed, the more I realized I had just as many questions as he did, questions about details I hadn’t thought of.
It was, honestly, often more meaningful to meet people who didn’t know Jesus. My neighbors, for example, who when they found out I was a pastor had backed away from me like they had stumbled upon a crime scene, slowly warmed to our family. Once, over the chain-link fence in our backyard, a neighbor unfolded her life. Childhood religious trauma had sent her so far into herself that she, as a teenager, needed the care of an inpatient facility. That night I wept, wanting her to meet the Jesus that I knew.
Another time, later in our church planting journey, I went into a tattoo shop to meet an artist that I had been following for a few months. I already had a couple of tattoos on my arms. He skateboarded; I skateboarded. I thought it might be a connection.
When I walked in for the appointment I wasn’t too sure what I even wanted, but we arrived at a “Rock of Ages” tattoo with a cross made out of stone withstanding waves. Throughout the few hours of work, he and I talked. His name was Frankie.
“Bryan, I’ve been sober for years. I’m proud of it, too. But there is still something missing. You’re spiritual, right?”
“Yeah, I’m a pastor.”
I wanted him to know the love of Jesus, but at the time he asked this question, I was nervous, still carrying insecurities around, and didn’t want to mess up the connection. I’ll share more of that story later.
These meetings with believers and nonbelievers kept happening, but only 2% of the people seemed interested in the church we were planting. I would ping-pong between insecurity and pushiness—straining to display charm—and occasionally even shift the church’s vision, just slightly, to make it palatable to the person I was talking with.
I was stressed. We were putting groceries on our credit card. People from our old church were asking, “How’s it going?” and I wanted to offer a good report.
At one point a close friend told me, “Bryan, I think you’re too heavily weighing the last meaningful conversation you’ve had.”
Sometimes words, perfectly arranged, can transform into something else. My friend’s words were a hand that slapped me across the face but then stayed open and extended, inviting me forward.
That moment was a revelation, a glimpse into my own anxious and needy God-forgetful self. Over the next few months, this insight would be bolstered by times of prayer, spiritual direction and Scripture reading. I would become comfortable in my own skin and with the church God was calling Kandice and me to plant, not the imagined church born out of pleasing and pandering.
Straining for Growth
Two weeks after moving to Tacoma we hosted an “Info Night” in the lobby of the church building. Kandice and I, and a few friends, passed out fliers to the mildly interested. We texted everyone we knew in the Tacoma area. It was July, so we made lavender lemonade, fiddled with the AC, and put out fans. Then we arranged chairs and prayed.
Fourteen people came. We didn’t know if we should be excited or depressed, but it was a start. We invited all of them to join the “Core Team.” We needed this committed core if we were going to build something strong and lasting.
There was another very practical reason we needed them: The building we inherited mirrored the run-down part of town where it was located. I’d walk around nursing low-grade panic attacks as I tried to figure out how to clean up graffiti, pick up condoms and needles in a sanitary manner, and plot out which bit of deferred maintenance we should aim our limited finances at fixing. For these reasons and more, starting the church would require a team.