Posts Tagged ‘Conferences’

2010 West Africa Update – Part 2

Monday, May 31st, 2010

This just in: Another update from Steve Childers!  It sounds like things are going really well so far.  Please pray for the remainder of Steve’s time in Africa – which he will spend with his team in Togo – that the team will be safe and that God’s glory will shine through their work with church leaders there.

Here’s what Steve had to tell us:

I learned today that most of these pastors have been taught (and have been doing it) to be “praying down Gods wrath on all pagans/poor/etc. NOW they have openly repented of this practice and have PLEDGED to pray the Lords prayer (i.e. the exact opposite), praying fervently instead that Gods will on earth (their part of it) will now be done as it is in heaven … through their radical acts of mercy & justice!

I’m so in awe and humbled by all this. Your prayers are being answered! Thanks again.

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Prayers For GCA 2010 West Africa CPI: Part 1

Monday, May 24th, 2010

Editor’s Note: We’ve already shared that GCA President Steve Childers is currently in West Africa, leading a group of indigenous church leaders in the GCA 2010 West Africa Church Planting Institute.  Some supporters have known about this for awhile and have been kind enough to commit their prayers to writing and share them with us.  In the spirit of coming together as an online community in prayer, we are passing along some of these prayers with you.  Please take this opportunity to join with us in prayer!

Gracious and Powerful Lord,

We commit Steve, his travels, his teaching, his partners on the journey, and his family as they remain to you.

We ask for wisdom as he teaches, sensitivity to the workings of the Holy Spirit, insight into the gifts and challenges of his translators and images that teach in powerful pictures the lessons you would have the pastors who hear learn.

Allow the lessons to be woven into the hearts of all who participate. Open Steve’s heart to the messages with which you would have him bring home. Join hearts together in the Hope of your Kingdom Come and in the work that is here now.

Protect all the families who remain and lend your travel mercies to those who join together. Fill up the participants with a mighty outpouring of the Holy Spirit that they might be refreshed, encouraged and empowered.

Provide good soil for the seeds which are sown.  Send water and sun to nourish them.   Raise up harvesters to reap the Word in deed and in their thoughts.   Hold back the thorns that would choke your harvest.   Protect the footpaths of those who would work and not damage the fields.   Allow patience for your timing and what you will bring forth.  Let there be rejoicing in all that you provide.   We give you the Glory!

“O Taste and See that the Lord is Good!”

We lift all these things up in the name of Jesus,

Amen.

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Steve Childers In West Africa This Week!

Sunday, May 23rd, 2010

A team of missionaries led by GCA President Steve Childers are making their way to West Africa for the 2010 GCA West Africa Church Planting Inistitute.  We’ve already shared details about GCA’s goals and aspirations in holding this summit.  Now we want to give you specific details (i.e. dates and places) so you can pray with us.  Steve has also asked us to pass along some personal prayer requests.

West Africa 2010 Dates:

  • Depart USA: Sunday afternoon/evening, May 23, 2010
  • Ghana, West Africa Summit: Monday, May 24, 2010 to Saturday, May 29, 2010.
  • Togo, West Africa Summit: Saturday, May 29, 2010 to Wednesday, June 2, 2010.
  • Return USA: Wednesday evening, June 2, 2010

Mission Team 2010 Leaders:

  • Steve Childers
  • Dick Brown
  • Allen Hunter

Steve Childers’ Personal Prayer Requests:

  • The health and safety of the African church leaders I’ll be training, as well as their families and churches while they’re away. Many of them will be traveling long distances in remote areas of Africa in order to receive the training.
  • Wisdom for me to know what to teach: even though the training topics are already planned I often find that I need to change some topics, put down the prepared notes and address real needs that have surfaced during the training.
  • The ability of my French translators in Togo to understand accurately the concepts I’m teaching and communicate them with great effectiveness—resulting in not only renewed minds but renewed hearts. I’ve learned the hard way that my translators can make or break the learning experience.
  • My relationships with the African leaders would be deepened resulting in new levels of mutual trust, love and ministry partnership.
  • God would be glorified and His invisible kingdom would be made visible through starting, growing and multiplying gospel-centered churches in West Africa (starting in Ghana, Togo, Benin & Senegal) that result in the spiritual, social and cultural renewal of all West Africa (15 countries) AND that West Africa would become a major sending sub-continent to ALL nations.

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2010 GCA West Africa Church Planting Institute

Sunday, May 23rd, 2010

You’ll be hearing a lot from us over the next week about the West Africa Church Planting Institute.  In particular, Steve will be sharing his prayer requests with us.  We will also be sure to pass along any updates we get from the field from day to day.

So, since we’ll be talking about it, we should probably get you acquainted with what the Church Planting Institute is – namely, what are GCA’s goals and aspirations.  This is a pretty exciting time for us; and we want you to be excited too!  Because there is so much to share, this post will be longer than usual.  So, without further ado …

GCA West Africa 2010 Church Planting Institute (CPI) Goals

During the early GCA Leadership Training Summits in a nation, we intentionally do not focus primarily on church planting methods and programs for the indigenous leaders such as “practical steps to planting a church in Africa” or “how to develop and manage a church plant core group”.  Instead, the initial, primary focus is on laying a strong, biblical foundation among the indigenous national leaders and churches—from which these more practical church planting methods will emerge. The four foundational goals (pillars) of the initial training are:

I.  Uniting around a National Kingdom Vision for Church Planting

  • A Vision for the Glory, Kingdom & Will of God to come with great power through the Church of God in all it’s various forms (denominations/agencies).
  • A Vision not merely for individual church plants but for regional church planting networks that form kingdom alliances with other like-minded denominations that birth true gospel renewal movements and spiritual awakenings.
  • A Vision for developing a common church planting training curriculum (“practical steps to planting a church in Africa, etc.”) through a Kingdom Partnership with GCA and other denominations that share this vision.

II. Renewing the Church Leaders through the Power of the Gospel

  • Almost every great awakening in the history of the church has been started by a great awakening in the hearts of the church leaders. If we long for an awakening in our churches and nations, it must first begin in the hearts of the church leaders.
  • So there is a strong focus on the need for the release of the transforming power of the gospel in the hearts of the leaders through their ongoing repentance (from heart idols) and faith in Christ—setting their heart affections on Christ in worship.

III. Renewing the Churches through the Power of the Gospel

  • Like a spreading flame, the personal renewal of the leaders must spread to the churches. The leaders must return to their churches as agents of personal renewal that will lead to church renewal and reproduction of new churches.
  • For a church to parent other churches (new church plants) it must first be strong and healthy itself. If not, it will birth sick babies—unhealthy church plants that have little or no true Kingdom impact. So we must have a strong, healthy base of leadership churches in these emerging movements or we will be reproducing unhealthy churches.
  • During this training church leaders will study the “Vital Signs” of church health/growth and participate in practical exercises where they evaluate their present church plant or established church in order to help these churches become healthy (especially in evangelism, discipleship and mercy/justice ministries) so they will grow and reproduce new transformational churches.

IV. Raising Up Church Planting Movement Leaders

  • For there to be true movements born in these nations, God must raise up movement leaders. So during this training we are asking the Lord of the Harvest to begin raising up church planting movement leaders from all the denominations represented.
  • We need what we call “Movement Champions” in several critical areas: We need Vision Champions, Prayer Champions, Worship Champions, Preaching Champions, Discipleship Champions, Small Group Champions, Evangelism Champions, Mercy Champions and Leadership Development Champions. As we spend time studying these areas, we’re asking the Lord to begin raising up key movement leaders who will become champions for strengthening these areas in their own emerging regional and national movements.
  • These movement champions will then begin to work in partnership with GCA to develop a common curriculum that will include contextualized church planting methods and programs that can be used effectively by all denominations and agencies in the movement.

GCA West Africa 2010 Church Planting Institute (CPI) Aims & Aspirations

This 2010 GCA West Africa Church Planting Leadership Summits (Ghana & Togo) are designed to equip key West African national leaders to strategically partner together to glorify God by advancing a movement in the West Africa that is multiplying churches and disciples through the transforming power of the gospel. Our purpose is to use this forum as a catalyst to help start strategic church planting movements in West Africa that will advance God’s kingdom in word and deed over every sphere of life by starting, growing and multiplying churches in West Africa that share a passion for the glory of God to be manifested in and through His Church for all nations.

Through these Summits, we aim to foster:

  • Kingdom Vision: Helping to develop kingdom-minded church leaders throughout West African with a strong focus on transforming cities, towns and villages through deeds of mercy and justice as well as words of truth.
  • Servant Leadership: Equipping leaders to better understand the capacity of the indigenous church to minister to and serve well their own people—leaders who will think and act strategically in spreading the gospel in West Africa.
  • Church Planting Networks: Fostering a vision for leaders to develop cooperative Church Planting Networks that recruit, train, and mentor emerging their own indigenous church planters that will help multiply churches among their regions’ diverse groups of people. These networks will work in strategic partnerships with other ministries and NGOs to form alliances, create resources and facilitate more and better church planting movements in West Africa.
  • Kingdom Collaboration: Creating platforms for dialogue with various regional leaders to explore new strategies and best practices for working together in their regions.
  • Community Development: Fostering a vision of developing creative, entrepreneurial and passionate leaders who are constantly working to create a process of problem solving and improvement in the community that is sustainable through the leadership of different alliances and networks both at the regional level and abroad.

Through these Summits, we also aspire to:

  • Explore and learn new strategies and best practices for working together in various West African regions
  • Bring church leaders together to build alliances with various like-minded groups who are strategically involved in the same regions and are seeking partners to join them in their efforts.
  • Share ideas and models with national leaders regarding how to foster church planting movements through establishing regional church planting networks and alliances.
  • Examine holistic ministries and deliberate, proven models that foster social transformation by providing employment, encouraging social change (justice/mercy), influencing government and key national leaders, and helping church leaders provide a credible platform for demonstrating the love of Christ.
  • Share proven business strategies that work well hand in hand with church planting, growth and multiplication movements.

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A Gospel-Planted Life Blog Reviews GCA Conference

Friday, February 5th, 2010

The folks over at A Gospel-Planted Life were kind enough to share their experience at last week’s North American Church Planting Conference. You should check it out!

[A Gospel-Planted Life]

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Foundations: Remembering What’s Really Important

Friday, January 29th, 2010

With all of the practical advice our trainers had to offer at the conference sessions, it would be easy to be overwhelmed.  Each trainer went over enough material to fill a full-week conference on its own, and they did it in about ninety minutes!  Suffice it to say, if you were here with us this week, your task of learning and applying all of the material has only begun.  That’s why it’s important to keep in mind what Steve Childers shared at the closing session.  It’s important to remember “The Main Thing.”

The Success Syndrome

In the book Liberating Ministry from the Success Syndrome, R. Kent and Barbara Hughes share how they had to reorient their understanding of success before they were happy in the ministry.  Nobody wants to be a failure.  But the point here is that success ought to be measured according to the proper criteria.  Church planters are as prone as anyone else to measuring their effectiveness against unhealthy, counter-productive, and even dangerous benchmarks.  If your top goal as a church planter is to grow your church beyond 200 people – or even 50 – then you ought to be taking a step back and asking yourself why growth is important to you.  Statistics can be helpful in gauging the health of your church.  But real success ought to be measured according to God’s Word.

For example, look at what Jesus tells his disciples in Matthew 25:14-30 (“The Parable of the Talents”).  Even though one servant is trust with much and another with little, in the end they are each equally blessed.  Why?  Because each servant was faithful with what the master had given him.  Likewise with church planters.  The size of our churches are not indicative of our level of success.  Rather, according to Steve, we are successful in ministry by “faithfully pleasing God with the resources and responsibilities he has given [us].”

The Tyranny of the Urgent

Another source of trouble in the ministry can be all of the unexpected things that creep up and demand our time.  If we’re not careful we’ll find more and more of our days spent dealing with things according to their level of urgency and regardless of whether they align with our ministry vision.

The root of the problem here is that we all tend to deal first with the things that are right in front of us (urgent).  Instead of blindly following this approach, we should be mindful of our goals and do the things that serve them.  This won’t mean always saying no to urgent matters that come up.  But it does suggest that not all urgent matters are important.  Distinguishing these two factors allows us to more effectively prioritize our schedules.  Freeing ourselves from the tyranny of the urgent allows us to accept that our time is limited and that we cannot do everything that is asked of us.  Instead, you should focus on the things that are important.

The Main Thing

Once we have liberated ourselves from both the success syndrome and the tyranny of the urgent, we can more clearly consider who we serve and what He is asking of us.  Remember that it is God Himself – not church planters – who is building His church.  Our work, then, should be done in the kind of faith that allows us to trust Him.  This doesn’t mean we give up considering our vision, our Ministry Focus Group, or even our financial situation.  But it means that we trust God with those things and do our work in the faith that He is sovereign and controls the outcome.

Practically speaking, Steve suggests five things to help us “make the main thing the main thing”:

  1. Understand the difference between your goals and desires. You have control over your goals.  You do not have control over your desires.  Learn to work towards your goals and pray for your desires.  For instance, you can make it a goal to share the Gospel will five people this week.  You can control that; so work toward it.  But to see five people come to faith this week … that’s a desire.  Be praying for that.
  2. Pursue the God of grace, not the grace of God. To paraphrase John Piper, grace is a means to God, not vice versa.  Be humble enough to realize that you don’t love God as you ought, and ask for grace that you may love Him better.  Also keep in mind that the very purpose of your ministry is to connect people of the same God of grace.
  3. Remember that the way up is the way down. Very often the solution to waking up a floundering ministry is to get to the heart of the minister’s pride and self-reliance.  This again is a very humbling experience.  Be honest where you have sinned and repent.
  4. Also remember the priority of people over programs. Most gifted church planters are visionary when it comes to organizing a working ministry based on effective programs.  But those some men and women can also struggle not to let people get lost in the margins.  If your programs aren’t producing mature disciples, then you need to take another look at them.  A ministry that is perfect on paper is meaningless when people are not being effectively shepherded.
  5. Process living versus product living. I’ve heard this stated alternately, “Life is a journey, not a destination.”  You’ll be a lot happier in the ministry if you’re not always focused on the next thing that you need to do – the next milestone you need to reach or program you need to implement.  The alternative is a life spent devoted to “the cult of the next thing.”

So what is “The Main Thing.”  It’s not the ministry.  The main thing is loving both God and people.

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Foundations: Finances

Thursday, January 28th, 2010

GCA was pleased to have Fred Marsh come in and share with conference attendees some strategies for fund raising.  This module is a necessary part of the “Foundation” curriculum because, in many denominations, church planters are responsible to raise their own support.  Without funding at the denominational level, the planter is responsible to “drive the funding process.”  Coming from the Presbyterian Church in America’s Mission to North America, Fred’s material assumes this “independent” fundraising model.

Here are some goals for church planters to set for themselves as they seek to formalize a financial plan:

  1. Use your church planting plan in fund raising.  Some potential donors will want to know that you have your act together.  You should be able to explain your vision and mission to anyone who asks, including donors.  This is probably common sense to most of us, but it bears mentioning.
  2. Determine your initial financial Financial Support Model.  This model will vary depending upon your denomination, whether you have a “parent” church, and a host of other factors.  Exhaust all of your options before you decide on a course of action.  For instance, you may consider a bi-vocational or “tent making” ministry early on.
  3. Develop a financial budget for the next 2-3 years.  This is where the “rubber” of your Financial Support Model meets the “road” of your actual donor network and financial needs.  Thinking this far ahead will help you understand how realistic your vision is.  It will also show donors that you’re serious about seeing your church planting plan put to action.
  4. Identify prospective donors.  Again, this is common sense.  If you’re going to be doing any amount of fund-raising, then you need to figure out who you are going to approach.  There will be some donors who are able to give a lot.  Others will be able to give less.  Everyone deserves your attention.  Keep in mind, though, that it’s not wrong to give large donors personal attention.  If you don’t do this, they may never understand the difference that their generosity can make.
  5. Design a structured, personalized process for contacting and following up with donors.  Remember, your donors will be with you for many years.  Very generous donors will also want to know that their gift is making a difference.  So it’s imperative for church planters to be communicating with donors and telling them how their gifts are being used.
  6. Develop the necessary policies for financial management and accountability.  Church planters have found themselves in hot water in the past because they were the sole parties responsible for making a myriad of financial decisions.  It’s in everyone’s best interest if some plan for management and accountability is put in place.  I know a church planter who has a whole financial team consisting of regular attenders helping him make important decisions.  That’s just one option.
  7. While you need to have a detailed budget, it is generally unwise to make it public.  It’s too detailed for most donors.  Instead, let them know how much money you need to raise (excluding your core group).

One more thing: There are people out there who are blessed with wealth and a spirit of generosity who are looking to get involved in funding a ministry – one that they can get behind and in which they can believe.  Those people are the one’s to seek out.  You are not trying to persuade people to give against their wills.  The goal in fund-raising is to mobilize generous, godly people and to give them an opportunity to come beside you in ministry.

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Foundations: Styles

Thursday, January 28th, 2010

How does the church do ministry in this culture?  How do we do ministry in a cultural context through the lens of the five Ministry Purposes?  Andre Rogers helped us think through these questions, and shared many examples from his own ministry.

The church planter must help determine how these biblical purposes should come to expression in the unique Ministry Focus Group being served.  This means that one of a church planter’s tasks is to discover the stylistic expectations of his culture and, as appropriate, embrace them, adapt them, critique them, or reject them.  At the same time, we should be using our own stylistic decisions to serve the cause of the gospel.

A church planter from Ukraine shared a story with us about planting a church in the western part of that country.  The culture is more traditional there than in the east (which is near Russia).  Even though both areas can be broadly called “Ukrainian,” they have different needs.  A more traditional style of worship resonated with people in the western part of the country, while more contemporary services worked in the east.  On the other hand, in the west a contemporary service seemed disrespectful, while the east would have found a traditional service out of touch.  The different cultures necessitated different styles of worship.

So we need to adapt our style to the culture of our Ministry Focus Group.  The goal is “contextualization without compromise.”  Where this isn’t being done, we’re probably guilty of one of two errors.  The first is under adapting to the culture.  The root cause here is probably ethnocentrism.  We feel that our own style preferences are best and seek to impose those views upon our Ministry Focus Group.  The second error is over-adapting to the culture.  This is called syncretism, and involves embracing all of the style preferences of your Ministry Focus Group (including preferences that might hard your proclamation of the Gospel).

So how can we know what to embrace and what to reject when it comes to style?  The Lausanne Covenant has some helpful words: “Because man is God’s creature, some of his culture is rich in beauty and goodness.  Because he is fallen, all of it is tainted with sin and some of it is demonic.”  In other words, there are no easy answers here.  Church planters must be able to determine what stylistic elements they can pull from the culture in order to serve in the proclamation of the gospel.

Keeping the following points in mind can help us determine what styles to embrace:

  1. Go where the wind is already blowing.  If there are already successful churches in the area you hope to reach, then find out what they’re doing right.  Don’t be afraid to “jump on the bandwagon” so long as those styles can be adapted to serve your Ministry Focus Group.
  2. Choose ministry styles that serve your Ministry Purposes.  We’ve already discussed the importance of having a clearly defined set of purposes for your ministry.

One more tidbit that a veteran pastor shared with us during the conference session: “We should not be defined by what we are against, but what we are for.”  This doesn’t mean that we never critique culture.  It just means that we should be known for the cause we serve and not the things of which we disapprove.  Keeping this in mind will help us reach those who disagree with us with the gospel without compromising our integrity.

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Foundations: Purpose

Wednesday, January 27th, 2010

Why do church planting?  Most of what you will read here assumes that you agree church planting is something that we should even be doing.  Yet, even if you do support church planting as a worthy cause, it’s worth taking a moment to back up and give this question some thought.  After all, we have churches already.  Why start new ones?

Before we can answer that question, we need to take another step back.  Why does any church – young or old – exist at all?  Put another way, what are the church’s priorities in ministry?  Answering these questions puts us well on our way understanding the purpose of church planting.

As I write this, GCA Director of Training Bob Orner is still teaching the Foundations module.  He began by giving us the biblical reasons for the church’s existence, based on Acts 2:42-47 (via the Redeemer Acts Curriculum).  Practically speaking, Bob gave us five reasons:

  1. Worship & Prayer (v. 42).
  2. Learning & Discipleship (v. 42).
  3. Fellowship & Community (v. 42).
  4. Outreach & Evangelism (v. 47).
  5. Mercy & Social Concern (v. 44).

So a healthy church (biblically speaking) does not have the luxury of picking some of these and rejecting others.  Rather, it will balance these five things as it reaches out to its Ministry Focus Group.  This doesn’t mean that every healthy church will look the same.  Pastor’s and church planters should prioritize and emphasize the above purposes based on the following factors:

  1. The unique gifts and ministry philosophy of the church planter.
  2. The emphasis of the church’s core group or leadership team.
  3. The unique needs of the Ministry Focus Group.

The end result is a ministry that is “serving out of strength.”  That is, the church both effectively balances and prioritizes the five ministry purposes and, at the same time, knows its own strengths and passions in order to do those things best.

With all of this in mind, the purpose of church planting in particular should be clear.  It’s to produce healthy churches.  Actually, it’s to produce more healthy churches.  Actually, it’s both.  And for church planters, keeping our purpose in mind helps us better understand how to move forward in our communities.

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Essentials: Worship

Wednesday, January 27th, 2010

Note: Casey Johnson is an M.Div. student at Reformed Theological Seminary in Orlando.  He is at the GCA Conference this week and is going through the “Essentials” course.  He shared his thoughts with us on the Worship module, which was taught by Jason Sears.  In very brief, bullet-point form, here’s what Casey learned.

Last night’s worship session was very enlightening. Here’s some of the highlights I took from it:

1. Don’t let others determine your vision. What he meant by this was not that you shouldn’t figure out what style of worship would hit your target group, rather, once you have a vision in place, don’t let the people who don’t agree with the vision determine your vision. (In my words, “the vision’s not for sale”).

2. When planting a church, don’t look for the rock star to be your worship leader. Too often new churches look for the rock star in skinny jeans, white belt, hair product, etc. to fit the look and sound they desire, but they don’t really hire a worship leader. Look for someone who has vision for this ministry and a heart for the church. Here are five things to look for in a worship pastor.

i. Ability to play and sing.

ii. Relational/Pastoral

iii. Teammate with you. Someone you could go to the movies with. You must have his back.

iv. Musician. Find someone who is passionate about music. Don’t look for someone who learned the beginning of a couple Coldplay songs, look for someone who loves music.

v. A Learner. Someone who is constantly reading magazines, books, listening to new music, going to hear other musicians. Always wants to get better themselves.

3. Without giving the whole talk away, here’s one last thing: The Four Stages of Presbyterian Hand Raising. You’ll have to ask Jason about this yourself. Go hear him next time he teaches.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts, Casey!

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Church Planting: Using Technology and Social Media

Tuesday, January 26th, 2010

This year’s conference consists of 13 sessions.  In keeping with past years, there are two tracks.  The Foundations track is for church planters who are just getting started.  They may still be in the planning stages, or in the first year or two of planting.  The “Essentials” track is for planters who are a little bit further along (3-5 years) and is designed to help them determine the next steps in the development on their churches.

I’ll be blogging my way through the “Foundations” track.  Because of the density of the material and the pace at which we’re moving through it, there’s just no way for me to cover everything.  So I’ll only be sharing one module with you today.  I’ll try to cover two on both Wednesday and Thursday.

Technology and Social Media

This session was presented by the duo of Tim Brister and Drew Goodmanson.  It’s actually not part of the “Foundations” track proper.  But it seemed like such a unique module that I couldn’t resist sharing it with you.  (And, of course, as a blogger I’m probably a little biased!)

Technology is changing.  It’s more immersive.  It’s all around us.  And if we want to reach the culture around us, we will have to learn to speak in their technological language.  In other words, the Church needs to be using all avenues of communication to share the gospel.  In America today, this means websites, Facebook, Twitter, and blogs just to name a few.

This doesn’t mean we should accept technology uncritically.  What it does mean is that we shouldn’t react against it per se.  We know that technology – and social media in particular – impacts the amount of time we spend directly interacting with one another.  So what we need is to have a theology of presence such that we can understand the positives and negatives of technology and its affect on relational intimacy.  Where this hasn’t been done, we have yet to fully comprehend our relationship with the gadgets that surround us.

With regard to social media, church planters need to understand that they have four audiences that they are trying to reach: non-Christians, new Christians, regular church-goers, and church leaders.  In some sense, it’s unrealistic to expect a one-size-fits-all approach to reach and inform all four of these groups.  So a good approach to a church’s online presence is going to be multi-faceted.  It just has to be.

The project of managing any organization’s online presence is called Internet Presence Management.  This involves first figuring out which online services are being used by the people you want to reach (be they an un-reached group that you want to evangelize, or the average attendee at your church).  There’s no doubt that there are a lot of options here: Facebook ads, clever domain names, and private member portals (e.g. the “unifyer” service) only scratch the surface.  It’s easy to get exhausted trying to consider all of the options.  I could feel a collective sigh of relief as Drew stressed that the goal isn’t to keep up with everything going on here.  Just find out where the people are that you want to reach online and do those things well.

If you’re willing to put in some time (or hire an expert), search engines make it possible to speak to people who you otherwise wouldn’t.  Instead of finding them, they might come into contact with your message on Google. Doing this well entails presenting your material in such a way that it will rank high in search engine results.  For example, a church in Orlando would do well to tailer their website such that it ranks highly (i.e. within the top five results) for someone searching “Orlando church.”  This process is called search engine optimization (SEO), and it’s a process best left to the experts.

Here are some interesting tidbits that Tim and Drew had to share. Traditionally, web site design has convinced almost no non-Christians to attend a particular church.  For Christians new to an area, on the other hand, the website has replaced an ad in the phone book as the first filter in determining what church to attend.  43 seconds is the average length of time that a visitor spends on a website.  That means that, if all of the important information on your website can’t be reached quickly, then visitors will simply move on.  Aside from the homepage, the most popular page visits tend to be “I’m new” pages.  Visitors will not come if your website is outdated (77% say this is somewhat to very important).

Talking with Tim and Drew after the session, it was clear that they do not support the use of all of this technology for its own sake.  Rather, they recognize that these are the media that people are using today to gain and share information.  As church planters, leaders and evangelists, who naturally want to seek the lost, we need to go where they are.  As it turns out, they’re online.  That being the case, the gospel needs to get online.  And it needs to “go viral.”

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North American Church Planting Conference Starts Today!

Tuesday, January 26th, 2010

Conference RoomToday we’re excited.  Today marks the beginning of our North American Church Planting Conference in Orlando, FL.  We have spent awhile getting things ready and even now attendees are showing up to register.

We’ll be updating this blog periodically over the course of the conference with lessons our attendees are learning from the trainers.  So be sure to check in with us over the course of the next few days.  Even if you couldn’t make the trip to Orlando, we want you to stay informed!

If you’re the type of person who is interested in statistics, the following might be of interest to you.  Here is who will be attending this years’ conference:

  • Over 200 People
  • 28 States
  • 10 Countries
  • 20 Denominations
  • 23 Trainers

Even if you’re not down here with us, please feel free to keep in touch with us over the course of the conference.  You can always reach us at our Twitter and Facebook pages.

We’ll be sure to update you tonight on some of the things we learned today.  In the mean time, please be praying with us for everyone at this conference.  We hope people leave here feeling refreshed and with a renewed sense of focus and vision.

For the nations!

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Research Findings on Church Planting Wives: 6 Primary Sources, 8 Secondary Sources

Sunday, September 13th, 2009

UnhappyWoman2

The following factors provided the greatest sources of satisfaction or stress for church planting wives. These findings are taken from a research study conducted in North American among PCA church planting spouses of various ethnicities in both urban and suburban settings. This research was conducted by Parakaleo—a gospel-centered ministry that is highly recommended by GCA and represented at all North American GCA training events. Parakaleo exists to strengthen the gospel spreading impact of church planting
by coming alongside church planting movements and church planting couples.
Through coaching, connecting, caring, and celebrating they facilitate training,
encouragement and care of church planters and their spouses. For more information contact Parakaleo staff Shari Thomas, shari@parakaleo.us or Tami Resch, tami@parakaleo.us

Six Primary Sources

1. The Husband

The greatest source of satisfaction or stress for the church planter spouse was the person and work of the husband as he is involved/uninvolved with his wife. The lack of a support system not only increases loneliness and isolation for the wife, it puts added pressure on the marriage. If a clergy couple is relying primarily on each other for support, the marriage may function well most of the time, yet a narrow support system will become a problem when either one is not able to fulfill that role (McMinn 2004).

“We have a strong marriage and I know my husband is committed to me. If I weren’t called to do this type of work, he would quit. We both have a profound respect that God has called us together as one flesh and He will not pull us in different directions. My husband practices the scripture of laying down his life for me as Christ laid down His life for the church. I can submit to that kind of husband.”

2. Support System

The major factor which restricts clergy spouses from experiencing the support they need is that their primary support system comes from their husbands-men who tend to be absent from the home evenings and weekends. The study also indicates that wives do not talk about their husband since this could jeopardize his career (McMinn, 2004).

“It would have been most helpful if I had connection with other church planting spouses early on.”

3. Sabbath Rest

“The highest levels of exhaustion were caused by overextending ourselves because of perceived expectations that we feared we were not meeting. Overall, we were not trusting the Lord.”

“We did not take regular days off or vacations. Nor did we know about keeping boundaries. So a lot has been learned and changed over the years.”

4. Reliance on Christ

“I attribute my spiritual and emotional health to daily repentance, and to understanding how great my sin is, to the ability to laugh, and balancing my heart for the church with the fact that the church is not my life or my significance.”

“…it is God alone, salvation, prayer, his goodness, his very presence in the Spirit.”

“While I give head assent to relying on Christ, my life style shows my functional belief system which is in myself and human effort”.

5. Boundary Ambiguity

Ambiguity is endemic to ministry. To the clergy family, the system is not clear. All members of the family participate either directly or indirectly in the church. There is some role expectation of the congregation which must be fulfilled by the minister, his spouse, and even his children. This level of ambiguity causes high levels of stress for clergy spouses (Lee, 1988).

a) Role Ambiguity

“My greatest challenge has been how the ambiguous role of the cp spouse would affect me. The struggle of knowing church planting was my passion, being trained in ministry, and yet not knowing how to interface this without having a defined position was difficult. I often functionally operated as an assistant minister yet without title, pay, or decision making power.”

b) Emotional Ambiguity

“How much should my husband tell me? I realize I am his primary support, but it’s hard to love people well when I know how they have hurt him.”

c) Physical Ambiguity

The constant unknowns of facility and where we will be located coupled with the constant unknowns of who will stay and who will leave the church plant has been my biggest challenge.”

6. Physical health

Having balanced or unbalanced health

60% of church planting spouses reported leading more than one major ministry in the church plant or community along with being involved in 2-3 other ministries. It is no surprise they report exhaustion and often burn out in ministry.

Eight Secondary Sources

1. Changed lives

“Walking with people in their journey and seeing their lives changed because of the existence of our church is incredibly exciting.”

“Transformed lives, mine and others, have been the greatest source of satisfaction.”

2. Commitment and sense of call to church planting

“What is our major calling if we have other passions? How do we balance this with the demands church planting places on us?”

“I feel just as called to church planting as my husband. We are both in this together.”

3. Family Time

“My husband keeps his day off and is intentional about building a relationship with our boys. We work hard to build a family focus, identity, and history.”

“I don’t show the kids my unhappiness with their dads lack of participating in our family life. I feel like he spiritually takes care of the church and I take care of the family.”

4. Raising kids

“I really suffer here…often my husband is not a part of what we do as a family. When the church is struggling, the less my husband does for and with the family and the more he wants me to focus on helping him with the ministry.”

“He helps us apply the word to our lives as we go…in devotional time, in the car, around the table.”

5. Church growth

“Having come from a large church it has been discouraging to see the slow growth.”

6. Expectations- from/of self and others

“I didn’t realize how high my expectations were of others. It took me time to realize not everyone has the same calling I have but also that some may not be passionate about seeing others come to know Christ.”

“I have been disappointed with the lack of responsibility and loyalty some people have”.

7. Finances

“Church planting is like starting a business only after the hard work we don’t get the financial payback. It’s hard to give our blood, sweat, and tears to this type of work and not have some sort of financial outcome that we can then pass on to our kids.”

8. Use of gifts and abilities

“I thought I would have an opportunity to use my gifts but with the exhaustion my husband experiences, the needs of our kids, and without having other leaders, most of my time is spent in areas the church needs but not where I’m passionate.”


head_shari_drinkingShari Thomas (GCA Blogger) has been involved with her husband, John, in church planting for over 25 years both in North America and abroad. Shari serves on Mission to North America’s church planting staff as the Director of Parakaleo, a ministry primarily to church planting spouses. Shari and/or Tami Resch (also on staff with Parakaleo) lead the Women’s Forum (6 Sessions) at the North America GCA Conferences & Seminars. John is the director of global training for the Redeemer Church Planting Center in Manhattan, NYC. They have 3 children who amazingly still claim them as parents. They love sailing, only do legal drugs, and are known coffee snobs.


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WHAT PEOPLE ARE SAYING, TWEETING & BLOGGING ABOUT THE JULY 09 GCA CHURCH PLANTER TRAINING SEMINAR

Wednesday, July 29th, 2009

get-hands-on1WHAT PEOPLE ARE SAYING ABOUT THE JULY 09 GCA CHURCH PLANTER TRAINING SEMINAR:

  • “Amazing insights; great resources; gospel-centered focus, top-notch material both written and presented!”
  • “This conference could replace all the other books, videos, classes and conferences I have encountered while preparing to plant”
  • “I went to another training that focused on some theory and included a lot of inspirational stories. The training wasn’t very practical and not gospel-centered. I wondered “Where can I learn practical and applicable theory that is gospel-centered and where God is present?” Well, God brought me to that place when my wife and I came to GCA!”
  • “It lays the foundational core for planting before you begin laboring at the plan. It gets your head and heart straight before you dive in.”
  • “Intensely practical from people who’ve been there and done that!”
  • “No other conference provides such intense training. This is truly a “bootcamp!”
  • “All the trainers speak from the experience of their failures, which is encouraging!”
  • “You only think you know what you are doing until you attend the conference! Hello, grenade-sitting-under-my seat! More than this, the love and riches of the gospel brought it all into focus.”
  • “Call my denomination and tell them here is a place to train!”
  • “This seminar surpassed my expectations. It’s like a grenade of useful information was dropped on me.”
  • “Most valuable thing was getting the “ball rolling” by having time in class to work through exercises.”
  • “Networking with others. GCA Must advertise more! Not many people know about it.”
  • “The encouragement and coaching, not so much in the skills, but in the ‘faith!’”
  • “Too much to list all, Relationships and Encouragement, Clearer Picture of the way forward.”
  • “Talking about finances, launching, planning …”
  • “The intentional nature of the conference was tremendously helpful.”
  • “The overall orientation in foundations track was excellent. I think I walked away with a macro view of just what a church planter is!”
  • “Encouragement from those who have been there and relationships with those who are going through it now.”
  • “I love to be here because we can talk and we can dream together of church planting…”
  • “Go tell others so they can come BEFORE they plant/start worship as a plant!”
  • “There’s no doubt that I need to come back again.” 

 

childers-vision-trainingWHAT PEOPLE ARE TWEETING ABOUT THE JULY 09 GCA CHURCH PLANTER TRAINING SEMINAR:

  • “God loves to manifest his presence and pour out his power on those who will dare to align their purposes more with his.” @stevechilders
  • “Missions exists because worship doesn’t” -Piper. For the younger generation, this is not Scripture. @stevechilders
  • Phenomenal 1st day @ the #_gca seminar. Met some great church planters. Listened to teaching on vision, focus, & prayer.
  • “Our greatest danger is not liberalism, modernism, postmodernism…but the church doing ministry in the power of the flesh” –Francis Schaeffer
  • “The irony of the gospel is that the only way to be worthy of it, is to admit you’re completely unworthy of it.” – Tim Keller
  • “Does “love” mean giving a person what they want, or giving them what they need?” #_gca
  • “Don’t let your living for tomorrow slay your living for today.” -Elizabeth Elliot #GCA
  • Leaving Orlando & the Global Church Advancement seminars more equipped, overwhelmed, missing my wife & trusting Christ more! #GCA

 

dsc00569WHAT PEOPLE ARE BLOGGING ABOUT THE JULY 09 GCA CHURCH PLANTER TRAINING SEMINAR:

 

 

 

 

Sharing a Contextualized Philosophy of Ministry: 
http://churchplanting.sojournchurch.com/church-planting/sharing-a-contextualized-philosophy-of-ministry-gospel-church-and-culture/

Staying Healthy as a Church Planter: 
http://churchplanting.sojournchurch.com/church-planting/staying-healthy-as-a-church-planter/

bob-nathan-steve

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Connecting with Global Church Advancement (GCA) by Tim Brister

Wednesday, May 6th, 2009

Tim Brister at PaneraPosted on Provocations & Pantings, April 27, 2009 by Tim Brister

As I mentioned in my last post, I was unable to attend the Gospel Coalition National Conference.  However, in God’s kind providence, I was able to go up to Orlando for a couple of days to network with other church planters and network leaders, most notably Scott Thomas (Acts 29), Gary Rohrmayer (ConvergeUSA), and Steve Childers (GCA).  These three men I have much to learn from and am grateful the opportunity the Lord gave me this past week.

If you can remember back in January, I attended the GCA National Church Planting Conference in Orlando for a week, and it was by far the most thorough and helpful church planting training I had ever received.  What is different about GCA conferences than typical bootcamps is that they are very hands-on, practical, and seeking to engage your church planting needs in the context of where you are.  Bootcamps are really important to attend as well, but they generally tend to focus on core values and guiding principles of a network rather than targeted training.  In other words, bootcamps shape the culture of a network, and GCA training provides all the nuts and bolts for a church planter.  Both are certainly needed!

During my time in Orlando last week, I was able to attend Steve Childer’s 3-session seminar on developing church planting networks.  That seminar, along with a host of other free resources, are available here.  At the close of the final session, I endeavored to ask Steve a question about the beginnings of something I’ve been a part of which ended up in six hours of fellowship, most of which was enjoyed at a local Panera.

It is often joked that GCA is “the best kept secret” in the church planting world.  I told Steve that it is not right to be kept a secret when so many guys could and should benefit from their training.  As a result, I am working to help them get networked online, beginning with social media.  If you are on Twitter or Facebook, let me encourage you to get on board with GCA and follow the developments in the future.  Here’s the links:

@stevechilders (Steve Childer’s Twitter)
@_gca (GCA’s Twitter)
GCA Facebook Fan Page

Furthermore, if you are in the church planting process–pre-launch or post-launch–let me encourage you to check out the GCA National Conference coming up July 21-24, 2009 in Orlando, Florida.  The pre-launch track called Foundations is specifically geared to address all issues pertaining to the start of a new church, including the development of a solid church planting proposal.  The Essentials track is a post-launch track addressing crucial components to a healthy, reproducing church.

Whether it is on Twitter, Facebook, or at one of their training seminar’s (or all of them!), let me encourage you to connect with GCA and benefit from years of gospel-centered labors of Steve Childers and his solid staff.  You will be blessed with their passion for the gospel, their love for the church, and their commitment to train men for the mission!

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