One of the significant tasks of church leaders is to find, equip and deploy lay people to lead in creating new places for new people. If we are going to produce a multiplicative growth for the new church starts movement in the United States, engaging lay people in church planting is one of the paths to move forward.  We have this great opportunity and solemn responsibility, as leaders of our United Methodist denomination, to empower the lay people of our churches to get out from their church pews into the world to give witness to the amazing love of God by proclaiming the Gospel of Christ and participating in planting new churches.

(more…)

If Hamlet had been a 21st century American pastor, perhaps this would have been a big question on his mind, and on his lips.

In 1997, the church I served began a concerted effort toward planting a second campus. I was chosen to become the campus pastor. By the time I left that congregation in 2002, we were three years past worship launch on that campus, and in the midst of launching a third site. Those two campuses now exceed 1000 worshippers a week, in addition to the people gathered at the original campus. Over the years I have worked with numerous churches developing multi-site ministry – and also worked alongside churches who were simply planting a new church that would be independent of them. Both of these are excellent models for expanding faith community.

(more…)

I was leading a a focus group with a United Church of Christ congregation talking about missional outreach when a middle-aged woman directly across the table from me blurted out, “I could never bring myself to invite anyone to church.  I am just not comfortable doing that!”

She dared to say out loud the oft unspoken (and not so mysterious) reason why so many churches do not reach their potential. She spoke for millions of American church-goers who feel that inviting people to church is an invasive and highly uncomfortable thing to do. However, in this case, the woman added that she shares in the church’s annual mission trip to help Mayan peasants in Guatemala - and that the experience each year is so life-changing that she cannot help but talk to her friends about it.  So she persuaded one of her friends to come on the trip this last year.  Her friend was similarly moved.  The friend made some great friendships with church members on the trip, and ended up joining the church.  I looked the woman across the table directly in the eyes and smiled, saying, “Guess who’s an evangelist and she doesn’t even know it?”  (more…)

The experience across all denominations shows how critical establishing new congregations is to reaching new populations. The United Church of Christ (UCC) has embarked on an ambitious effort to start new congregations to increase their presence and witness among the growing populations in the United States. Some research into their past efforts is helping inform their future directions. In a report studying UCC new church starts over the past fifty years (1957- 2006), researchers found that 1,139 new congregations joined UCC (new church starts and congregations affiliating with UCC) with 824 or 72 percent still active today. The survival rate is comparable to that of other denominations. (more…)

One of the significant tasks of church leaders is to find, equip and deploy lay people to lead in creating new places for new people. If we are going to produce a multiplicative growth for the new church starts movement in the United States, engaging lay people in church planting is one of the paths to move forward.  We have this great opportunity and solemn responsibility, as leaders of our United Methodist denomination, to empower the lay people of our churches to get out from their church pews into the world to give witness to the amazing love of God by proclaiming the Gospel of Christ and participating in planting new churches. 

(more…)