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Planting Incubators

A program for Bible college students and grads exploring church planting.

Apply now for 2025
Meet up to four times a year with an experienced planter to dive into the practicalities, assess your suitability, and get a clear vision for your role in church planting.
We need people to step up to plant churches because we need healthy, evangelistic, multiplying churches across the country.
As a network, we’ve seen the power of walking alongside others who can encourage and spur one another on.
We need the next generation of leaders to have a clear vision of what it looks like to lead gospel-centred churches.
Apply now for 2025

“My experience of Bible College was that we were discouraged from being ambitious.

The point of Planting Incubators is to cultivate gospel ambition. To encourage people to take risks, have plans, and try something great for God.

It’s a chance for the generation above to invest, dream and encourage people to be ambitious for the gospel.”

Toby Neal

Planter of Vine Church and Planting Incubator leader

I wanted to think about church planting, but the busyness of ministry meant it ended up on the back burner. The incubator kept me thinking about planting and led to me actively taking steps to explore planting opportunities.

Tim Bones

It helps you think about what it looks like to be a leader and what it looks like to lead an organisation.

If you’re thinking about being a gospel leader you need as much input as you can get. I’m excited to see what might happen for people in the program in the future!

Lee Murray
Planter of Establish Church and Planting Incubator leader

I met with others who have similar convictions of the need for more churches to be planted. It blessed me with friendships and challenged me to consider deeply how I intend to faithfully serve God and reach the lost.

Mitch Dunne

I loved meeting together with people who are interested in sustainable, fruitful, long-term ministry.

Dave Matthews

Toby Neal (church planter of Vine Church, Sydney) has been sharing some of his experience, and investing in us. He shows that it’s achievable, it’s doable. It’s not rocket science. It’s just applying the story of Jesus to our contexts.

Marc Safari

Join Planting Incubators if you are

A male or female Bible college student or a recent graduate.
Wanting to gain wisdom and insights from church planters.
Open to thinking about planting a church or helping to plant a church down the line.
Willing to ask the hard questions about what it looks like to reach Australia with the gospel.
Apply now for 2025

Incubator Leaders

Aaron Boyd
Planter of Darebin Presbyterian Church VIC
Aaron is based in Melbourne and is part of the team that is responsible for recruiting and mobilising church planters across Australia, with a particular focus on Victoria. Prior to joining the Reach Australia team in 2024 Aaron spent 11 years planting and pastoring at Darebin Presbyterian Church in Thornbury, Melbourne. Aaron also plays a role in coaching church planters and leaders of established churches across Australia, and has some involvement with church consults.
Derek Hanna
Planter of Village Church in Brisbane QLD
In 2009 Derek worked at Mitchelton Presbyterian and then planted Village Church in Brisbane. He then began working with Geneva Push to help see hundreds more churches evangelised into existence across Australia, and his work now with Reach Australia is to inspire, equip and unleash thousands of leaders in new churches across Australia to reach Australia.
Peter Hughes
Planter of Soma Church in Sydney NSW
Pete has over 25 years experience in professional ministry covering areas like church planting, university ministry and Anglican parish ministry. At Reach Australia he fulfils his passions of developing resources for gospel workers, including our podcasts, and helping to raise and develop the next generation of church planters. He’s a member of Kellyville Anglican church.
Alan Au
Senior Pastor of Captivate Presbyterian Church Ryde in Sydney NSW
Alan gets excited about seeing people explore all the ways Jesus can transform our lives. Alan trained as an apprentice at the Sydney University Evangelical Union before completing his B.Div at Moore Theological College and M.A. at Christ College. Prior to becoming a pastor he was a pharmacist.
Toby Neal
Planter of Vine Church in Sydney NSW
Toby and Liz Neal planted Vine Church in 2011 in one of Sydney’s least religious areas. Since then, Vine Church has grown to be a vibrant inner city church known for its unique voice in the way it converses with Sydney about Jesus.
Andrew West
Planter of Bridge Church Macquarie in Sydney NSW
Andrew is the Site Pastor of Bridge Church Macquarie. He was assessed by Reach Australia and helped plant Bridge Church Macquarie in 2021. Four years later, it's a church of thrree congregations sharing Jesus with the people of Macquarie Park.
Richard Wilson
Planter of Valley Presbyterian Church in Melbourne VIC

“Meeting with Tim Clemens and Andrew West was an absolute win.
They helped me keep planting on the agenda and learn first-hand from their journeys of planting. They had a wealth of experience and wisdom.
I felt better equipped to think about planting in the future and serve my local church. Loved being a part of it through my last few years of Bible College!"

Andrew Loh went to Moore College and has just started a two-year Church Planting Residency with Providence Bayswater, Perth

Small groups

Four times a year you’ll meet with four to five others in a similar stage to you and led by a church planter.

You’ll discuss an aspect of starting a new church, share how you could be part of the vision for Australia, and pray for each other.

Time away

Meet with potential planters in your city to go under the hood with an established church to see how it operates.

Learn about what’s working in their context. Reflect, encourage and cast a vision for what’s next.

National Conference

Connect with Incubator participants across the country at Reach Australia’s National Conference in May.

Apply now for 2025

Apply for 2025

Planting Incubators 2025: Expression of Interest

Thanks for expressing interest in the Reach Australia Planting and Leadership Incubators for 2025. This is a rolling program for Bible college, and post-college students, to connect them with each other, and church planters, throughout the year to help them keep pursuing the ends God has called them to.

In 2025 we'll be running Planting Incubators in locations across Australia. Fill in the form below and we'll contact you with more details.

Groups will aim to start in March 2025.

Got questions?

A once a term catch up with an experienced planter and a small group of peers, plus an invitation to join us at an ‘Under the Hood’ to see how a more established church operates.

For sure! Content will be different from year to year, so even if you’ve already been part of an incubator before, another year in a group will, God-willing, keep pushing your thinking.

Yes, we have groups for graduates as well! If you would still like to be challenged, encouraged and consider your next steps towards planting, an Incubator is still the right space for you.

Apply now for 2025

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