In recent years, the Wisconsin Presbytery has transformed its approach to starting and supporting new churches. In 2012, it consisted of only six established congregations, and nearly two decades had passed since a new PCA church had been planted in the state. Today, the presbytery includes twenty-four churches and six active church plants, with more prospective leaders in development and plans to establish additional congregations in the years ahead.

In this conversation, Derek Radney speaks with Dan Breed, Mark Kaiser, and Josh Golackson about how that growth happened—not through a single program or unusually large churches, but through a shared commitment to planting churches together. They describe the development of the On Wisconsin network, a three-path approach to identifying and training planters, and a presbytery-wide culture in which existing churches, new plants, ruling and teaching elders, and multiple committees all contribute to the same mission.

A major part of that strategy has been expanding the pastoral pipeline. Wisconsin churches are identifying men already present in their congregations, encouraging them to consider ministry, helping make seminary financially accessible, and giving them years of hands-on training within local churches. That approach has opened new pathways for candidates who might never have imagined pastoral ministry as an option and has helped prepare leaders who already know the communities they hope to serve.

The interview also explores the less visible work that makes sustained church planting possible: building trust across a presbytery, raising money among relatively small churches, coordinating pastoral development, and creating systems that keep candidates from falling through the cracks during the long process from initial interest to church planting.

Underlying this interview is a conviction about Presbyterianism itself. Church planting does not have to be the project of a few unusually entrepreneurial pastors or congregations. Presbyteries can actually function in a connected way—sharing resources, developing leaders together, accepting real sacrifice, and treating the growth of another church not as a loss, but as a common gain.