Daniel Im

Pastor + Author

church planting

Preface to the Korean Version of Planting Missional Churches

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The book I co-authored with Ed Stetzer, Planting Missional Churches (2nd edition), is now in Korean! A huge thanks to 설훈 and 요단출판사 for their work to translate our book.

I had the opportunity to write a new Preface for the Korean edition. Here’s what it says in English:

I am who I am today because of church planting. My love for Jesus is stronger, my faith is rooted deeper, and I believe my ministry has experienced a greater measure of fruitfulness because of the church plant I grew up in, and the church plants I’ve been a part of.

My parents (Byongnam and Soonim) immigrated to Canada in the 1970s from South Korea. They brought their faith in Jesus, their love for the church, and their desire to start afresh and anew to Canada. Because of a desire to be in community and on mission, they helped plant the church that I grew up in, The Philadelphia Church of Vancouver.

Growing up, I didn’t know anything else. Of course you would start new churches to reach new people. Of course you would sacrifice your time, talent, and treasure to help the church grow. Of course you would have people over to your house to fellowship, worship, study the Bible, and pray. Of course you would be incredibly welcoming and evangelistic to reach the lost. Of course life would revolve around the church.

I didn’t know that Christians lived any other way. I didn’t know that for many Christians, faith is a once or twice a month commitment if it suits their schedule. I didn’t know that some could call themselves Christians simply for the social benefits that it gives them. I didn’t know because church planting was my all and everything.

The first two churches I served in were church plants. The third church was a global church planting church. And the church that I’m now the Lead Pastor at, Beulah Alliance Church in Edmonton, Canada, has planted over 30 churches in its 100 year history.

I love church planting because it’s one of the most powerful means of spreading the gospel. Ed Stetzer and I are convinced that church planting is, and will always remain, a key part in the advancement of the Kingdom of God.

Now while Ed and I worked on this book together, we’ve chosen to write the rest of the book in first person and in Ed’s voice. However, since I’m a second-generation Korean Canadian, and this is the Korean translation of the book, we decided that I, Daniel Im, would write the preface.

So before we get into the book, let me end this preface with a story about a heroic church planter.

He rises up early in the morning—earlier than anyone else like Jesus did (Mark 1:35)—to pray and seek God’s face for the salvation of his city. He single-handedly raises more than enough finances to cover all of his church plant’s expenses for five years because of his earnest faith in our Father who gives us our daily bread (Matthew 6:10). His church plant quadruples in size every single year because of his anointed preaching and dynamic worship services (Acts 2:41-47). Every month, he plants church after church after church because the fields are ready for harvest and he’s cracked the code on rapid multiplication (John 4:35).

Do you know anyone like that? Is this who you want to become? This person sounds incredible, don’t they? Intimacy with Jesus and fruitfulness in ministry—what else would you want as a pastor?

The only problem is that it’s a myth!

Now let me clarify before you close this book, or throw it away.

I’m not saying that intimacy with Jesus and fruitfulness in ministry is a myth. I’m saying that the individualistic heroic church planter who single-handedly accomplishes and grows their church plant because of their own skills and abilities is a myth! Growing spiritually and ministering effectively is not a solo endeavour. And the key to success isn’t charisma and a master plan. 

The path to planting missional churches that multiply for God’s glory is one that can only be taken together with others, with Jesus as the Head, and the Holy Spirit’s empowerment. And that’s the path that we want to take you on in this book. So let’s get started.

Daniel Im

Edmonton, Canada

If you are interested, you can pick up a copy of the book here.

Church Leader! The Gig Economy Matters and This is Why

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The gig economy is the new normal and it’s changing everyday life.

If you have no idea what I’m talking about, you can read last week’s article for context. But last week, I addressed seven ways the gig economy is affecting everyone in our culture today—especially those in your church.

In short, the gig economy is changing the way that we view ourselves—and it’s not for the better.

Here’s the thing though. The gig economy not only affects everyone in your church—whether they’re Christian or not—but it also affects your leaders and how you should approach leadership in the church.

Let’s start with your changing congregation.

On a practical level, since the gig economy is the new normal, this means that close to half of your congregation is probably working more than one job.

Close to half of your church is probably working more than one job.
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So have you considered how this should affect:

  • Your approach to streaming your service?
  • Attendance patterns and measuring engagement in your church?
  • Preaching on and discipling your church on issues of faith and work?
  • When and how you offer leadership development and training?

On a side note, if you haven’t read chapter three of my book, No Silver Bullets, where I talk about the shift that we need to make “from being the sage on the stage to being the guide on the side,” you’re going to want to pick it up. In that chapter, I illustrate how you can flip the classroom and offer both a high tech and high touch approach to leadership development

There’s also the issue of money and multiplication.

If you’ve read anything on movements—particularly church planting movements—you’ll know that money and education are two massively stifling factors to movemental energy.

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Why Every Church Planter Should Plant Pregnant

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Planting a church is like having a baby.

It’s hard to know when you should start trying. During pregnancy some babies thrive, and others have more of a difficult time. When the baby is delivered, it’s messy and painful, but in the end a beautiful life is born, the labor is forgotten, and we often want to have another.

Planting a church is like having a baby

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In the same way it’s difficult to know when you should start plans for a daughter church; after all, there always seems to be a countless number of reasons to put it off:

  • “We aren’t even two years old, and I’m the only staff member.”
  • “When we begin to hit budget, I’ll consider starting a daughter church.”
  • “We’re too small. If we start a daughter church, that’ll cannibalize our people and finances.”
  • “Isn’t that the denomination’s responsibility anyway?”
  • “I’m barely keeping my head above the water, and you want me to add something that big onto my plate?”

Sound familiar? If you’ve found yourself saying similar things, you’re not alone.

However, once you get past those initial hurdles and decide to plant a daughter church, sometimes the assessment, training, and preparation of the planter goes well; however, other times the process unfortunately ends prematurely.

And when that daughter church is finally ready to be launched, it’s painful because everything changes.

You lose leaders, people, tithes, and your sense of normal.

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7 Constants for Church Planting

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Let’s go on a short journey exploring the recent history of significant movements that have shaped what we’re seeing in the West today.

This history is important to digest as we look forward to the possibilities that lie ahead—with God! Less than 50 years ago, a movement was birthed to reach a specific subculture in the United States: the hippies. At a time when America was infatuated with drugs, sex, and rock-n-roll, there was a great awakening of individuals who decided to reject that lifestyle and seek God instead. This was the Jesus People movement of the 1960s and 1970s.

When Kenn Gulliksen was sent out by the Calvary Chapel in 1974 to start a church in West Los Angeles, no one would’ve guessed or even imagined that less than 50 years later, there would be over 2,400 churches in 95 countries that would share the same name: Vineyard.

Eight years after Gulliksen planted
 the first Vineyard church, there were at least seven Vineyard churches in this loosely defined network. It was at this point, in 1982, when John Wimber became the first director of this growing Vineyard movement.

Sure, your church may not be 
Vineyard and may not affirm all they do, but you can’t deny the tangible, movemental impact they have had planting new churches. This impact is, without question, one of their greatest attributes.

In fact, here are seven constants to church planting that John Wimber outlined and lived by as he led the Vineyard movement to plant over 1,000 churches in their lifetime:

1) Constantly Tell Your Story.

When church planters were getting ready to launch, Wimber would commonly teach them to share why they were there.

Tell everyone why you are there. And once you’ve told them ten times—tell them five hundred more…The problem is many pastors get bored of telling their own story—so they quit telling it. And then they wonder why their church quits growing. People thrive on narrative, that’s how God created us as humans, and a powerful narrative becomes the key factor of vision-casting and leadership. Not telling your story can be a contributing factor to lack of church growth, because people lose focus when you’re not consistently telling who you are and where you’re going. And they lose their reason for existence. 

2) Constantly Tell His Story.

As important as your story is, the true priority is His story—Jesus’ story. Because people thrive on narratives, you need to consider how to share your story in a way that connects
 with God’s grand narrative for the world.

How does Jesus fit into why you are there? Wimber would teach church planters that, “Every occasion ought to have His story in it. Jesus is the Son of God. It’s always in there, always wrapped up in the midst of any exchange with people.”

How can you share your story in a way that connects with God’s grand narrative for the world?

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3) Constantly Explain the Mysteries of Life.

This point was twofold for Wimber.
 On the one hand, he emphasized
 the importance of calling people to a deeper commitment to Christ—not just to salvation but also to mission. Then he elaborated on the importance of metrics to help you know how you’re doing in ministry.

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Mass Gatherings and Movements

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The year 2011 was the year of social media, mass gatherings, and movements, or as we now know it, The Arab Spring.

It’s believed to have all started in Tunisia when a 26-year-old man, who was trying to sell fruits and vegetables in order to support his widowed mother and six siblings, had his cart confiscated and was slapped by a policewoman. Humiliated and full of rage, he set himself on fire in front of a government building. This wasn’t the first time an instance like this had happened, but when it was captured by cellphone cameras and shared on the Internet, everything changed. This act of injustice, which led to the President of Tunisia fleeing the country a month later, awakened a sleeping giant across the Middle East. Just consider what else happened that year:

  • January 14, 2011: Government overthrown in Tunisia
  • February 11, 2011: Government overthrown in Egypt; President Mubarak resigns facing charges of killing unarmed protestors
  • February 15, 2011: Anti-government protests begin in Libya, and on October 20, Gaddafi is killed.

And the list goes on and on with Syria, Yemen, Algeria, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Morocco, and Oman.

Mass gatherings, riots, and movements are nothing new.

Just consider when over 200,000 people gathered on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial to hear Martin Luther King Jr.’s speech in 1963. Or what about the L.A. Race Riots of 1992 and the Ferguson, Missouri, riots of 2014? Then there are the riots that I am personally most embarrassed of—not because I was there, but because this was my home city—when, in 2011, the Vancouver Canucks lost the Stanley Cup 4-0 against the Boston Bruins.

Fans went insane. Police cars were set on fire, shops were looted, glass was broken, and cars were overturned. It was chaos.

And at the end of 2016, let’s not forget the massive movement where millions came out protesting and calling for the impeachment of Park Geun-Hye, then President of South Korea.

We remember moments like these because people gathered. And when they gathered, they did something together they wouldn’t have been able to do by themselves. They saw both the dificulties and possibilities so clearly that they were able to visualize a different reality. This vision for a golden tomorrow has fueled movements in the past and is what will spark a church multiplication movement today.

Vision has fueled movements in the past and is what will spark a movement today.

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A Golden Tomorrow: Planting 1,000 Churches

Subtract your age from the number 80. Now take that number, and add it to this year’s number. What year do you get? 2050? 2070? 2090?

What if I told you that it’s possible to plant 1,000 churches before you get to that year? 1,000 churches in your lifetime? Would you believe me?

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