Baptists Committed to World Evangelism » Church Planting Methods

Book Review: Missionary Methods by Roland Allen

Travis Snode — Mon, 19 Mar 2012 10:00:51 +0000

Comparing the Church Planter to the Leader Trainer

Travis Snode — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 17:41:12 +0000

This article was written by my pastor, Austin Gardner, several years ago. As a church-planting missionary, this article has some very important truths for me and other missionaries to consider. God greatly used my pastor when He went to Peru as a missionary, and I think that following this method had a lot to do with it.

Most missionaries are able to start and leave very few indigenous churches during their missionary career. The majority will have to leave their work with a North American missionary when they return to the states on furlough. They can get the people together and have everything that looks like a church but be unable to have trained leadership to carry on the work. It is completely essential to consider the contrast between training leaders and being a regular church planter. Most missionaries go with a pastor mentality instead of a missionary mentality. They want to reproduce what they had in the states but do not know how to go from there to having a national pastor to take the work.

Consider a church planter that can plant a church every year. That means knocking on doors, winning enough souls, getting a place to meet, training the people to be faithful, tithe, pray, preach, and all the other things that make up a church, plus find a pastor and leave in 365 days or one year. He would be doing a better job than most any living missionary today. If he could consistently continue this ministry and take care of his family at the same time he would be able to start and leave a total of only 32 churches in a typical missionary lifetime. That means he started planting churches at the age of 25 and continued until 65 taking a furlough every 5 years (4 years on the field and then one on furlough). Consider that–32 churches. If they really become self supporting, self governing, and self propagating he will have been used far beyond what most modern missionaries do. Almost anyone that has any experience on the mission field will realize that this is near to impossible if not totally impossible. For those of you that live in the states show me any church planter in North America that has ever been able to accomplish a similar feat in the States with all the advantages that the North American church has.

Now consider something far more within the realm of reason. What if a missionary could start a church doing all of the above mentioned and leave it with a national pastor every 4 years just before going on furlough. That would mean that he could start 8 churches in the same time period. In a short period of investigation you will find that few men have been able to consistently carry forth this ministry either.

Finally consider the missionary who approaches the ministry with the mentality of training leaders as mentioned in the article above. He too will begin to plant a church but instead of getting bogged down in the day to day operation of pastoring a church he will search out and prayerfully train leaders. What he can accomplish will be unlimited because the difficult part of planting churches is not the getting people together etc but leaving a trained leader that can carry the ministry forward. It only makes sense to train leaders. II Timothy 2:2.

Before leaving this subject consider the greatest missionary who ever lived. Most consider Paul the greatest missionary and without a doubt he was the second greatest but Jesus Christ obviously has to be rated as the greatest. He spent 3.5 years preaching, healing, teaching, ministering, and doing the work and yet when he left his ministry there were only 120 members in His church and that was the first time they had to count the women to get a good attendance. He failed in the big church planting ministry if numbers are your goal but he certainly won out when you consider that he gave his time to the training of 11 men who would shake the entire world in their lifetime. What was his goal–to rapidly plant churches or to train men who could train others to plant churches. You decide 32 churches, 8 churches, 1 church or train 11 men or as many as you can to reach the greatest unlimited number of churches and souls possible.

Read more helpful articles at bcwe.org.

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Comparing the Church Planter to the Leader Trainer

10 days left to register

Jason Holt — Tue, 22 Nov 2011 03:00:39 +0000

There are only 10 days left to register for the Latin Bridge Retreat ’12! Make your plans today to be a part of this event.

The sessions will focus on cross-cultural evangelism, the role of discipleship in leader training, and strategic church planting principles for the Latin American context. All classes will be taught by experienced church planters.

We are so glad God has given us the opportunity to have two of the best keynote speakers you could imagine. Be sure to register today!

Visit bcwe.org to learn more about Latin American missions

The rest is here:
10 days left to register

Get Training to Plant a Church

austin gardner — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 14:25:44 +0000

We believe in the ministry of the local church. Fact is that the term local church is redundant. It is our goal to see like minded churches started all over the world. Currently our 14 missionaries (all members of Vision Baptist Church) are aggressively being used to do that in several countries and around the world.

The most effective and the biblical way to reach an area is by planting a church. That is how we will reach more people with the gospel message of Jesus Christ.

We have noticed that newer churches reach new people much more effectively.

All churches should grow and reproduce. We have taught for years that for a church to truly be indigenous it must reproduce. If we teach that for our missionaries and churches overseas we must do so here.

We want to invite you to an internship that will prepare you to start a church. We will help equip you biblically, as well as in leadership and hands on experience with others that are actively involved in church planting.

Vision Baptist Church and Missions as well as BCWE use a “life on life” model to prepare men and women to do the work God has called them to do!

You can listen to a recent Church Planting Conference to learn more about church planting.

We are asking God to allow us to plant reproducing churches all over Fulton County, Georgia as well as other parts of the USA. We are also at the same time planting churches in many parts of the world.

We are a local church based ministry. We are very strong on discipleship, team work, Expository Preaching, and World Evangelism.

If you are interested in helping us plant churches we ask you to learn all about us that you can. You can do that via this blog, austingardner.net, visionbaptist.com, and bcwe.org. Listen to the preaching, the music, see the passion, understand the Vision, know our missionaries both staff and strategic partners. Visit our services. Talk to someone on the team but learn all you can.

Pray about coming to Vision. Get involved in a church that is going to plant churches and really wants to help you make a difference with your life

To plant churches with us you must embrace our philosophy, values, goals, and truly have a Vision heart! We want you to have time to get to know us and become a real integral part of the church and team!

We use discipleship and personal accountability in our work. Each of us has to be humble enough to serve and not feel threatened if another teaches and directs us as we learn.

The Our Generation Training Center will become the place that each intern learns the heart, the philosophy and the Biblical methods that are used.

If you are interested you can contact us with your questions. If you feel that God would have you be part of something like this please know that you will be asked to fill out an application and then move to the area and find a job. Then you will get involved in every ministry possible as you prepare to become a church planter!

Check out bcwe.org

The most effective and the biblical way to reach an area is by planting a church. That is how we will reach more people with the gospel message of Jesus Christ.

We have noticed that newer churches reach new people much more effectively.

Vision Baptist Church and Missions as well as BCWE use a “life on life” model to prepare men and women to do the work God has called them to do!

You can listen to a recent Church Planting Conference to learn more about church planting.

We are a local church based ministry. We are very strong on discipleship, team work, Expository Preaching, and World Evangelism.

Pray about coming to Vision. Get involved in a church that is going to plant churches and really wants to help you make a difference with your life

Check out bcwe.org

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Get Training to Plant a Church

Missionaries, Please listen

austin gardner — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 19:48:09 +0000

I want to challenge every missionary to listen to this sermon by Missionary to Kenya Randy Stirewalt speaking on how to do mission work. I am very impressed with him and the ministry. He is preaching on the Biblical Method for church planting.

This man will be speaking at the Latin Bridge retreat January 6-7, 2012.

Make plans to be with us. Register today!

Check out bcwe.org

This man will be speaking at the Latin Bridge retreat January 6-7, 2012.

Make plans to be with us. Register today!

Check out bcwe.org

http://sermons.decaturbaptist.org/20061015PM.mp3

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Missionaries, Please listen

Church Planting Seminar – Atlanta, GA (3-4 November)

Travis Snode — Sat, 24 Sep 2011 12:59:04 +0000

Our home church is hosting a church planting seminar absolutely free of charge on November 3-4! If you are a church planter, pastor, missionary, in full time-ministry, considering church planting, or just want to be learn more about and b involved in church planting, I want to encourage you to attend this event. Dr. Earl Jessup and Baptist Church Planting have been involved in helping both my brothers with their church plants. My pastor, Austin Gardner, has planted many churches. I guarantee you that you will learn a wealth of information from this seminar that will challenge and help you. You can find out more details below or on the website where you can also register to attend.

Pastor Gardner and the staff of the Our Generation Training Center is very excited to host the Church Planting Conference for Our Generation. Dr. Earl Jessup will be our keynote speaker for this practical, motivating conference. The modules are designed to help instruct the students in the Our Generation Training Center and over thirty missionaries on the field that work alongside out training ministry.

We are opening this this Seminar up to the public free of charge. You will be able to join us at Vision Baptist Church from November 3rd & 4th. We will start at 10 am on Thursday and Friday. We will conclude at 1 pm on Friday. There will be a service on Thursday night. At the conference you will be able to spend time with church planters, fellowship, and be benefit from “Questions and Answer Sessions”. We will also be making the workshop available online.

Many subjects will be covered during our seminar. The following list is not exhaustive but will give you an idea of some the topics that will be covered.

The responsibilities of a Church Planter

What jobs to delegate and how

What to do before and after the service

How to organize your launch

How to make noise for the 1st service

How to motivate your church to plant more churches

How and when to start another work

If you plan to join us we would like to know. We are able to provide a list of local hotels and restaurants. Also, there are a very limited amount of lodging options provided by people in the church.

Read more information at bcwe.org.

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Church Planting Seminar – Atlanta, GA (3-4 November)

The Fickle Crowd vs The Faithful Church

Travis Snode — Sat, 13 Aug 2011 06:12:08 +0000

Acts 14:18-23 “And with these sayings scarce restrained they the people, that they had not done sacrifice unto them. And there came thither certain Jews from Antioch and Iconium, who persuaded the people, and having stoned Paul, drew him out of the city, supposing he had been dead. Howbeit, as the disciples stood round about him, he rose up, and came into the city: and the next day he departed with Barnabas to Derbe. And when they had preached the gospel to that city, and had taught many, they returned again to Lystra, and to Iconium, and Antioch, Confirming the souls of the disciples, and exhorting them to continue in the faith, and that we must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God. And when they had ordained them elders in every church, and had prayed with fasting, they commended them to the Lord, on whom they believed.”

The ministry of Paul and Barnabas in Lystra was one of two extremes. Paul, with God’s power, healed a lame man. When the people saw this, they began to make preparations to worship them. Paul and Barnabas ran among them and begged them not to worship them. They said, “We also are men of like passions with you…”

After they had restrained the people from doing sacrifice to them, these same people were persuaded by the angry Jews from Antioch and Iconium to stone Paul. They picked up stones and threw them at Paul. After he was about dead, they took him outside the city and left him for dead. The crowd was very fickle. They went from adoring them to hating them. This is the nature of crowds. The same thing happened with Jesus. One minute they loved him, the next they hated him.

The fickleness of crowds can be very frustrating, but we must focus our attention on the faithful church. When Paul and Barnabas came back through Lystra, they confirmed the souls of the disciples, encouraged them to continue in the faith, taught them that tribulation would come, set up elders (pastors) in every church, prayed with fasting, and then commended them to the Lord.

The crowds came and went, but there were faithful believers who made up local churches. They were the crown and rejoicing of Paul. His heart was so encouraged to see the faithful people who were not fickle, who were willing to endure suffering for the cause of Christ, and who were committed to the Lord.

When it comes to church-planting, there will be days that the crowd is with you and days the crowd is against you. Our focus should not be on pleasing and keeping the crowd; it should be on finding some faithful men that we can train and who can teach others also. What are you trying to build? A crowd or a church? A crowd will eventually turn on you and the Lord, but a church will remain faithful.

Read more helpful material at bcwe.org.

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The Fickle Crowd vs The Faithful Church

We need men

austin gardner — Wed, 03 Aug 2011 13:49:55 +0000

Check out bcwe.org

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We need men

We need men

austin gardner — Wed, 03 Aug 2011 13:49:55 +0000

Check out bcwe.org

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We need men

12 Takeaways From the story of Farmer Fred:

austin gardner — Mon, 01 Aug 2011 14:00:49 +0000

The summation from Missionary Stephen Benefield in Cambodia!

1. If you want to plant a church, first plant yourself.

2. If you want the cream of the crop, you must first plant a crop.

3. If you are reticent to take a risk and invest time, labor, and resources in an uncertain crop, you will never see the cream of the crop.

4. Missionary work is long, hard, repetitious, and tedious.

5. Sometimes the people who take the longest to reach make the most solid Christians and leaders.

6. It does not make sense to say, “God has burdened me for a certain country, but if there are no missionaries there yet, I can’t go.” Maybe the fact that no one is there is the reason God burdened you.

7. You must work with many people who will eventually wash-out in order to find the ones who won’t.

8. If everybody quit their “small” works to be missionaries-at-large, the missionaries-at-large would be out of business. The larger boats float on the “drops-in-the-bucket”.

9. There are no shortcuts in missions.

10. Fast results are a blessing when they are genuine and “of God”, but more often than not, fast results are empty.

11. You will fail many times, but failure is not the end unless you let it be.

12. Just like in farming, there is no true success in missions without investing your life, dirtying your hands, dealing with disappointment, and remaining 100% committed to the cause.

Check out bcwe.org

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12 Takeaways From the story of Farmer Fred: