church planting

Lack of Awareness, Bad Change Management, and More Things That Prevent Church Multiplication

November 15, 2016 By Daniel Im

There are barriers that you need to overcome in order to take your first steps towards multiplying your church.

In the previous article, we addressed the first four barriers to multiplication. In today’s article, we will address the next four barriers to multiplication:

5. Don’t See the Need for Multiplication

Before churches can multiply, they need to see it first. The problem is, many churches don’t see the need for multiplication. They assume that multiplication is not for them. Their reasoning is predicated on the assumption that other churches will multiply. While they may understand the vision behind multiplication, they just don’t have a personal conviction to multiply.

Before churches can multiply, they need to see it first.

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We believe every church should not only embrace a vision of multiplication, but personally engage in multiplication.

Leaders do need to assume that even some of the most committed Christians will not have a pre-existing favorable disposition towards multiplication, and will see multiplication as the church’s responsibility and not theirs. This is why it’s vital to share the vision for multiplication, consistently, clearly,  and in different forms and fashions each time.

We saw this clearly in our research. You can click here to get the State of Church Planting Research Report that this is based upon.

Churches who regularly communicated a commitment to multiplication were more likely to multiply within their first five years than those who didn’t.

Until your church sees multiplication  as a personal conviction that they should embrace and enact, you will  be facing an uphill battle. So work on communicating Jesus’ commitment to multiplication to the entire congregation through different means, like vision talks, sermon illustrations, state of the union addresses, print pieces, stories, and video. And if you’re worried about sounding like a broken record, don’t be. After all, “vision leaks.”

6. Absence of a Change Management Strategy

Your efforts to multiply and plant a daughter church will never launch off the ground without a vision for multiplication. However, unless you have a clear change management strategy, your efforts will always stall mid-way. This change management strategy has to address each level of leadership in your church and every venue for public communication. [Read more…] about Lack of Awareness, Bad Change Management, and More Things That Prevent Church Multiplication

100 Episodes on our Church Planting and Multisite Podcast

October 25, 2016 By Daniel Im

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Recently, Ed Stetzer, Todd Adkins, and I celebrated our 100^th episode on the NewChurches.com Q&A Podcast. It’s been such a joy to dream up and implement this idea of a podcast that answered real life church planting, multisite, and pastoral leadership questions.

Our heart is to serve the church in her mission of making disciples by helping her multiply. That’s what this podcast is all about. As a result, twice a week, we answer listener submitted questions.

Here are the questions from our top 5 most downloaded episodes:

Episode 1: As a young church planter, what are some blind spots that I need to be aware of?
Episode 3: In a context with so few believers, what strategies would you recommend for church planters to expand their network in order to raise financial support?
Episode 11: The growth is slow in my church. What are the growth barriers in church planting?
Episode 59: On launch day, what would you recommend to preach on? What would be your first series?
Episode 61: What are the differences in gifts and temperaments for someone who will revitalize a church vs someone who will plant a new church?

More than any other topic we covered, bivocational ministry was definitely the one with the most questions! This is because I believe it’s a trend for the future of church planting, as well as a topic with little to few resources out there.

Why Your Church Needs to Multiply

October 18, 2016 By Daniel Im

After the disciples received the Great Commission before Jesus’ ascension, they began to preach the gospel, first in Jerusalem and eventually expanding into other cultures. The book of Acts details early efforts to obey Jesus’ command. The letters of the New Testament give us an inside view of the establishment of Christianity in new territory. It may seem obvious to us now, but we should continue to contemplate the fact that everywhere Christians have gone to share the gospel churches were formed.

Church planting should not end with the establishment of one church. The process can repeat itself when a new church matures to the point of becoming a sponsoring church. The kingdom is best advanced through multiplication and not just addition. Reproduction is in the biblical DNA of churches.

Church planting should not end with the establishment of one church.

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Percentage of Churches that Multiply

In Viral Churches, Ed Stetzer and Warren Bird shared research from an interview of senior pastors in various denominations in the United States. In that research project, they discovered that 28% of those they surveyed indicated that they had directly participated in helping a new church. While that number may sound good, upon further investigation, they discovered that only 12% of that 28% were actually churches that acted as a mother church or accepted direct financial responsibility for a new church as a primary sponsor.
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How Do You Find Launch Team Members?

October 11, 2016 By Daniel Im

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The process of gathering a launch team is not an easy task. With the right training almost anyone can plan the launch, mail appropriate advertising, and prepare for people to come on the launch day. But molding an effective launch team is another story. There are several ways to find such people committed to starting a new church with you.

1. Recruit Members from the Sponsor Church

One possible source for launch team members is a sponsoring church, which can appeal for volunteer families (sometimes called “extension members”). Bob Roberts, pastor of Northwood Church and founder of GlocalNet, has started over 180 churches out of his church (and many more in partnership with GlocalNet). Their local church is directly involved in training, mentoring, and coaching twenty-five church planters each year. In several cases, he has sent out members to start these new churches. Bob explains:

When we sponsor a daughter church, each church is different. Generally for a new plant, sending out three to eight families from our church is the most. We sometimes send staff as well. We don’t recruit this much because we have found that core groups from established churches can slow a plant down. A planter will start a small group and multiply it while being an intern at Northwood. If they can’t do that, they can’t plant a church. I give them a 100 percent fishing license with those people.

This presents both positives and negatives. A strong positive is that the planter has a launch team almost overnight, and the length of start-up time decreases considerably. The church can begin services while developing one-on-one relationships. In addition, the planter usually finds that these volunteer families are solid believers who can assist immediately in the development process.

On the negative side, not all of these people come from strong churches like Northwood Church! These “experienced” believers may have strong feelings about the form of worship, leadership style, and other matters. Such convictions, if different from the vision of the church planter, can create significant conflicts in the early development of the congregation. These conflicts may quickly put at risk the continuation of financial support from the sponsoring church. We recommend using this recruiting method for launch team development only if the sponsoring congregation is highly similar in philosophy and style to the new church and the planter and the context of the new start are similar to the context of the sponsoring church.

2. Develop a SWAT Team

In settings where extension members are unavailable or their use would be unwise, several other means for recruitment are possible. One alternative has been termed a SWAT team, an acronym for Servants, Willing and Temporary. SWAT team members commit themselves to the new church for a short time, usually six months. These volunteers staff the nursery, teach small groups, serve on set-up teams, or fill other roles in the first months following the launch.

Seismic Shifts and a Missional Response

October 4, 2016 By Daniel Im

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There have been two seismic shifts in the church and culture in the English-speaking Western world over the past few decades. The first shift is predominantly a good one, while the second shift has mixed reactions.

Seismic Shift #1: An Increased Focus on Church Planting

Recently, I came across a tweet from my friend, Jeff Christopherson, who leads the North American Mission Board’s Send Network.

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I love this! In the Southern Baptist Convention, church plants baptize almost four times the number of people than existing established churches! I agree with the hashtag, #plantingworks.

Statistics like this are one of the reasons that denominations are placing a greater emphasis on church planting. The dynamic long-term growth of many church plants has helped as well. Consider Life Church with Craig Groeschel, Saddleback with Rick Warren, and Redeemer Presbyterian with Tim Keller, among many others. Compare that to a few decades ago, when church planting was on the periphery and seen as a ‘suspicious activity’ to most.