Brother I encourage you to press on….pray and study Gods Word and other adjunctive books that will assist you as you prepare to plant His church. Enlist the prayers and aid of others. I also encourage you to ponder the sense of biblical community that is lacking in to many of the churches across our nation. I am completely convinced that what all Christians need to be entrenched into a community of believers. We need to stop the lip service of “being Christians” and live for Christ – by being “Joiners” and not just joining a body of believers but being an active part of the body of Christ. Too many times, our flesh wants to enjoy all the comforts of being attached to a church body, but we don’t want to “really” be involved. We stay detached because of our sin – because of PRIDE! We are afraid to let others see beyond the mask that we all wear that we think protects us from allowing others to get to close.
The community that I long for and truly believe that we are to be a part of is one that allows us (or makes us) be more and more transparent. With this transparency comes liberty and freedom from the oppression of sin. As we mature in the Lord, we need this type of relationship to continue to grow. We must have other brothers and sisters that know us and love us to help us remain on the path of righteousness. As an aside, this is why there should be a plurality of Elders for proper church government – so one man doesn’t fall into a rut of believing his own thinking without having others men that are equally responsible for the congregation and that love and care about each other enough to protect each other from their own sinfulness. To call sin -SIN and point it out to one another and call for repentance and to walk along side each other – arm in arm always pointing the way to the Lord.

Another book you may be interested in that goes along with Putnams book is the Diffusion of Innovations by Everett M. Rogers.

Be encouraged Brother and press on towards the goal.