My own churchopolis...

Metropolis
Originally uploaded by ericblauer.

Planting and growing a church is tough work....way more work than I ever dreamed. It's the kind of work that transforms you...kind of like the physical change a desk worker would have if he started landscaping. The work breaks you down and builds you up. You learn a lot and you have to unlearn more than you know. You come to realize that you are going to have to become someone bigger and deeper than you currently are to survive. You will have to grow.

Like a mad scientist who dares to work towards creating new life...you find out that life never turns out the way you thought it would. And if you are not careful the very thing that you helped create can end up trying to kill you. Unleashing life is dangerous. Like raising kids...they start out cute and cuddly and end up confronting, demanding and naively independent....for a season, God willing. Where did that little one go that adored you so???

Such is the path of life....and church planting.

Your needed for life and than you somehow become a barrier to life.
It reminds me of this quote:

Jurgen Moltmann put it this way: "If Christianity is to become aware of what it is, we must abandon the pastoral church which takes care of people, which is the usual form of the Western church. Instead, we have to call to life a Christian community church. Either we set about this church reform by ourselves, or it will be forced on us by the loss of church members."

Such is the challenge of pastoring...of being used to mother life into being.
You really do have to be somewhat of a madman to engage in it.