These notes are based on a workshop I recently ran with the Birmingham Collective, a group of churches committed to encouraging and supporting one another in church planting, re-planting and revitalisation. One of our aims is to plant churches that go on to plant churches. So how do we encourage that? Well, one way is by encouraging churches to take planting seriously by having planting in their culture, in their DNA if you like, right from the very beginning. Here are some ways we can do that.
Vision and Mission
A churches’ mission might be described as “Matthew 28:19-20 with a date and postcode.” This is important because, we want to be careful about importing worldly business terms into the church. Mission and Vision can seem a bit like that at times but when we remember that these are Bible words and that our mission and vision are not decided in committees but come to us from God vbia his word then we will want to pay serious attention to them.
When we talk about vision, we sometimes encourage people to describe what your church and community might look like in 5-10 years’ time as a result of your Gospel mission? We ask what God has given you faith for? How will the results of Gospel growth be seen in the life of the church? How will your neighbours’ lives have changed?
So, if you want to see church planting as being in your DNA, then your mission and vision are the first places to look because these will affect the life of the church, its priorities, its values, its culture. This does mean as well that if priorities change, then you may lose some things from your mission and vision as well as gain something.
Does your vision describe one church growing large or does it describe multiple churches reaching out into the community and into other communities?
Does your mission statement describe an intention to make disciples of Jesus by multiplying? Is there a “Go” dynamic as well as a “make” dynamic” to your obedience to the Great Commission?
What now?
What does it mean for your church to have planting in its DNA now? This is a question you should be asking, even if your only in the early stages of plating or replanting. What I’d be encouraging the leaders of a church to be thinking about is “where and what might God be putting on our heart next?”
So, I’d encourage you to think in terms of either a different geographical area which would be clearly different to the area which your church currently serves. I would encourage your church members to see this as part of the church’s mission commitment. Start by researching the area and get people praying for it. You may even be able to start evangelistic work there even before you have enough people to send there as a traditional style church plant. This is particularly true if you are thinking in terms of pioneer church planting.
Alternatively, you may conclude that your current geographical area needs more than one church to reach it. Think about why your church and other local churches are not able to reach everyone. It may be as simple as capacity. If your church was full, there would still be thousands of people not hearing the Gospel. Alternatively, there may be segments of society that you are currently ill equipped to reach.
Stepping Stones?
Building planting into your DNA is really about building multiplication into it. I would usually advise that before you are ready to multiply outwards, you need to get into the habit of multiplying internally.
This means that you multiply leaders, both from within the church and by drawing in people from outside. This can include staff, interns, trainees or people who join with you as potential pioneer planters and are self-supported. You may want to look at multiplying ministries and ministry teams. This might also include starting outreach and mercy ministries into areas where you hope to see a church plant one day.
In some cases, you can multiply by adding congregations which continue to meet as part of your church in the same building. This is what we did in Bearwood moving from one Sunday meeting to 5 across the weekend. Eventually one of these became the Nueva Vida church plant. Some churches take a similar approach with multi-site. A lot will depend on your outlook and polity.
What I would definitely be encouraging you to do is to multiply small groups as this is a way of multiplying gifting and leaders. A new small group may well evolve into a mission a community which then grows into a church.
On your own?
It may be that you want to pursue these things but feel that it is beyond you at the moment. This is where outside help from people like The Birmingham Collective and City to City help. As our vision for the mission field grows we realise that we are do better together than alone. We learn to reach out for help and partnership.
Faithroots 