Daniel Im's Blog, page 25

A Scalable Residency Model with Kadi Cole [Behind-The-Scenes]

Learn about Christ Fellowship's leadership development pathway and how they use it to train residents through their school of ministry.

Episode 56: Where Should You Plant?

Distance, direction, proximity, and more. Learn a rubric to help you determine where you should plant.

In Episode 56 of the New Churches Q&A Podcast, we talk about determining the location where you are going to plant your next church or campus. Here is Greg Wilson’s question:

Can you share ideas, tips, pitfalls, and things to look for as I find a location to plant?

In this episode, you’ll discover:

A rubric for determining where to plant a church or campus
The relation that distance and direction has on your future location
How facilities can have reputations

Shareable Quotes (#NewChurches):

“I want to go in the direction and distance that people are going.”
“I want to find the public spot that is in the direction and distance that people drive to work, play, and shop.”
“I can reach 10 miles out of town to where we are, and 3 miles in to where we are.”
“You need at least 4-5 rooms to start.”

Additional Resources:

Check out Module 10: Contextualization, Fundraising, and Facilities in the Essential Church Planting Course
Check out Module 18: Your Next 6 Months in the Essential Church Planting Course
Episode 28: Portable Location or Permanent Facility?
Episode 33: Relocating for Church Planting and Ministry
How to Build Your Campus Launch Template

Help us Multiply the Mission:

Please subscribe
Leave a rating and review on iTunes
Ask a question by clicking Send Voicemail on the right hand side of NewChurches.com
If you’re on a phone or a tablet, then go to www.speakpipe.com/newchurches to download the app and record your message
When you’re recording, introduce yourself and your context in about 15 seconds and then record your question for 30 seconds

Dear Church Planter

Beg God to do a work in your heart to love and cherish your wife as unto the Lord.

Episode 55: Unconventional Service Times

What happens when people don’t want to give up their Sunday mornings? Learn how to reach them with your church.

In Episode 55 of the New Churches Q&A Podcast, we talk about having worship services at alternate times. Here is Marcus Throneburg’s question:

What do you think about church plants starting services at unconventional times?

In this episode, you’ll discover:

How to reach those who are working on Sunday or don’t want to give up their Sunday mornings
The why behind alternate worship service times
Different locations to use for your alternate worship service times

Shareable Quotes (#NewChurches):

“Performing arts centers are great to use on Monday nights.”
“We are seeing more and more people use multisite as a way to plant.”
“What is your minimum viable church experience?”
“It’s not just church if all you have is a worship experience.”
“At least have infant childcare.”
“Recruit leaders in advance and cast vision for this new service.”
“Saturday and Sunday nights are the best alternatives to Sunday mornings.”
“Approach your second service as a new church plant.”

Additional Resources:

Episode 42: Should You Start a Second Service?
“The X Factor-Shared Services”: How Multisiters Can Get This Right 
Episode 46: Home Groups, Community, and Campuses 

Help us Multiply the Mission:

Please subscribe
Leave a rating and review on iTunes
Ask a question by clicking Send Voicemail on the right hand side of NewChurches.com
If you’re on a phone or a tablet, then go to www.speakpipe.com/newchurches to download the app and record your message
When you’re recording, introduce yourself and your context in about 15 seconds and then record your question for 30 seconds

Trend #2 for the Future of Church Planting: Bivocational Ministry

Instead of looking down on pastors for being bivocational, we should lift them up as our heroes.

Episode 54: Ed Stetzer and Critical Knowledge

Episode 54 of the New Churches Q&A Podcast is our Final Day of our 5 Days of Essential Church Planting Week.

This means that everyday this past week, we have been showcasing one of the lectures from our Essential Church Planting course and have been giving you the opportunity to purchase Essential Church Planting with a special deal that has changed everyday this week.

Today, we will be learning about The 5 Things Every Church Planter Needs to Know from Ed Stetzer, who is the Executive Director of LifeWay Research, Senior Fellow of the Billy Graham Center at Wheaton College, Visiting Professor of Research and Missiology at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, Visiting Research Professor at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, Church Planter, and Author.

And if you are one of the first 10 to purchase today, April 8 by 11:59 pm CST, you will get a New Churches bluetooth speaker/charger! There’s no promo code. Just go here to purchase.

Shareable Quotes (#NewChurches):

“Teams are essential, systems matter, vision gets hijacked, multiplication takes focus, and family matters.”
“Teams matter, but you need to go and build them.”
“Don’t just do the ministry, but create an administrative structure where ministry can be done.”
“Spend time with leaders and the lost.”
“If you go out and plant a church in your own power and strength, then it’s your church and God’s not honored by it.”
“The reason why most churches never pass 100 in attendance is due to a lack of systems that can scale.”

Additional Resources:

Essential Church Planting Course
Get 25% off Essential Church Planting by becoming a Plus Member first before purchasing
Get Ed’s next session on Church Planting Autopsies by Previewing the course here
Subscribe to the podcast
Leave a rating and review on iTunes

Book Review and Best Quotes: BiVO by Hugh Halter

Hugh Halter, in his book BiVO: A Modern Day Guide For Bi-Vocational Saints paints a picture of bivocational ministry for Western church planters, pastors, and missionaries. Not only does he share examples from his real-life experience of doing this, but he also give us an inside picture of his church and how they operate as a ministry served and led by bivocational leaders.

For example, in one chapter, he actually outlines the bivocational lives of each of his leadership team members. Here are three out of the nine that he shares:

Hugh & Cheryl: As I did my first church plant in Portland, about one third of my income came from personal missionary support, while the other two-thirds came from house painting. Because of our son’s epilepsy, my wife Cheryl has never been able to work until about five years ago. Now, about nine years into the church life, I receive one third of my income from Adullam, one third from speaking and training other church leaders, and one third from Cheryl’s real-estate career. Over the nine years Adullam has been a church, I have averaged about twenty-five hours a week for the actual church leadership roles. The rest of my time has been spent on the road, training leaders or painting as it was in the early days.

Matt & Maren: Matt was my original partner with both the church and with our national ministry platform called Missio. Matt worked with FedEx one third of the time, worked at a golf course for five dollars an hour, and had another one third of his income come from missionary support. As the church grew, Matt replaced his FedEx job with a one-third time stipend from the church and pieced the rest of his income together between church, training, and coaching. Two years ago, Matt gave up his church stipend and set out to start a small but successful publishing company. He remains one of our “elders” and continues to give Adullam about fifteen hours a week as a volunteer. His wife Maren has decided to stay home and be a mom.

Greg & Becky: These two are book agents and writers but emerged as key lay leaders, pastoring almost one third of our congregation with marriage issues. They serve on our leadership council and continue to give about twenty hours a week to the pastoral needs of the congregation without any pay.

Halter’s main premise is to help church leaders understand that their two callings are to work to provide for themselves and their family, AND to see their “entire lives leveraged and in use for God’s kingdom purposes, to live intentionally as a missionary saint.” Living out these dual callings is what he terms as BiVO. After all, “if none of us got paid, God would still expect us to lead and serve the world.”

If you’re interested in bivocational ministry and would like to read through a tangible example of how it can be played out both in a leader’s life and in a church’s life, this book is for you. If you recognize that there may be a day in your lifetime where full-time paid clergy will be the exception and not the norm—like it is in most non-Western countries—then you need to read this book. And lastly, if you’re planting a church, reading this book is a non-negotiable!! I’m not saying that you have to plant bivocationally, but at least pray through and consider this model.

Here are my top 10 favorite quotes from the book:

Full-time vocational ministry (American-style) is not normal (less than 200 years old) and there are exciting opportunities for ministry in bi-vocational or volunteer paradigms.
If none of us got paid, God would still expect us to lead and serve the world.
The goal of our calling isn’t to be bi-vocational, fully paid, or volunteer. The goal of our existence is to learn how to leverage everything God has given us.
God has not abandoned ship, but is pulling us back for a serious retrofit. We need a new model of disciple making, a new model of doing church, a new vision for our lives and what our money and time can accomplish.
Jesus is trying to set us free, which also means he is trying to free the church, but we must let him challenge us at the level of the wallet.
We were sold a bill of goods that told us if we could preach well, organize staff, and run weekend programs, we would be honored, respected, followed, and provided for. But none of that is true. The skills that once gave us meaning have left us yearning for more. But where do we go to learn the new skills and the new way of life for God’s legitimate leaders?
Making disciples is cheaper than making consumer Christians. Put another way, letting God build his church as we focus on the kingdom is much cheaper than trying to build church without the kingdom.
If we view every person as a missionary and only pay those who spend the majority of their time modeling, equipping, and holding God’s people together in mission, then the most costly aspect of ministry is time.
This is a good time to remind you again that bi-vocational shouldn’t be your end goal. It is a means to get to another desired end goal, and that should be about living as large and as free a life as you can.
Find a job you enjoy and work it with joy. Find some friends and divvy up the work. This is where the kingdom always leads, so get back in the game, get ahead, and enjoy some good news yourself.

I rate BiVO a 5 out of 5, since it’s transparent, helpful, and a critical book on the subject.

The post Book Review and Best Quotes: BiVO by Hugh Halter appeared first on Daniel Im.

Book Review and Best Quotes: Spiritual Leadership by J. Oswald Sanders

Spiritual Leadership, with an emphasis on the word spiritual, is definitely an accurate description for J. Oswald Sanders’ book. He covers popular leadership principles, such as, time management and the importance of developing our talents, but the majority of his points and illustrations are all in reference to spiritual leadership.

Sanders introduces each chapter with a scriptural reference, by which he uses to ground his ideas within the chapter, but much of his explanation is rooted in his wealth of experience and/or the experience of other notable figures, such as Charles Spurgeon, A.B. Simpson, A.W. Tozer, and J. Hudson Taylor. Sanders believes that all Christians are leaders and that we should all develop our leadership potential.

Central to this book is the belief that God is the one who calls forth leaders in the church and then subsequently anoints them.

Spiritual leadership is a matter of being chosen, rather than choosing. Spiritual leadership is all about being last, rather than first. A spiritual leader is one that imitates Christ Jesus–the greatest spiritual leader of all. As important as it is for a leader to listen, lead, articulate, and inspire well, what takes precedence over any method or skill is one’s connection to the vine–Jesus Christ.

While this book doesn’t go into a deep treatment on any one subject, it does serve as a broad introduction and primer to being a spiritual leader. Consequently, I would not use this book for an advanced seminar on leadership, but I would recommend it for every follower of Christ who wants to learn what it means to place God first and serve as Jesus served.

Here is a list of my favorite quotes from this book:

The true spiritual leadership will never “campaign for promotion.”
True greatness, true leadership, is found in giving yourself in service to others, not in coaxing or inducing other to serve you.
As we become “empty” of self and dependent on God, the Holy Spirit will use us.
There are only three kinds of people–those who are immovable, those who are movable, and those who move them!
The spiritual leader blends natural and spiritual qualities.
Adding leadership potential to our lives usually requires that we shake off negative elements that hold us back.
The leader must be as willing to accept an appointment with a lower remuneration as one with a higher.
A person’s ability to lead at home is a strong indicator of his readiness to lead in ministry.
Jesus is the chief shepherd; we are assistants and associates working under His authority.
Many who aspire to leadership fail because they have never learned to follow.
To neglect receiving kindness and help is to isolate oneself, to rob others of opportunity, and to deprive oneself of sustenance.
Vision involves foresight as well as insight.
Wisdom involves knowing God and the subtleties of the human heart.
Once sure of the will of God, spiritual leader springs into action, without regard to consequences.
In most decisions the key element is not so much knowing what to do, but in living with the results.
Courage is that quality of mind which enables people to encounter danger or difficulty firmly, without fear or discouragement.
Leadership always faces natural human inertia and opposition. But courage follows through with a task until it is done.
Humility is the hallmark of the spiritual leader.
Prayer is indeed the Christian’s vital breath and native air.
It is not the prayer that moves people, but the God to whom we pray.
The character and career of a young person depends on how he or she spends spare time.
Our problem is not too little time, but making better use of the time we have.
Unless our reading includes serious thinking, it is wasted time.
Not every Christian is called to major leadership in the church, but every Christian is a leader, for we all influence others.
The first step toward improvement is to recognize weaknesses, make corrections, and cultivate strengths.
The true leader is concerned primarily with the welfare of others, not with his own comfort or prestige.
The greatest achievements in the history of missions have come from leaders close to God who took courageous, calculated risks.
If leaders are to survive, they must view the difficult as common place, the complex as normal.
Successful leaders have learned that no failure need be final, whether his own failure or someone else’s.
The true test of a person’s leadership is the health of the organization when the organizer is gone.
No man, however gifted and devoted, is indispensable to the work of the kingdom.
God is always at work, though we cannot see it, preparing people he has chosen for leadership.
The departure of a strong and dominating leader makes room for others to emerge and develop.
When such people learn to rely not on their own power and wisdom, but to depend on God, there is no limit to their usefulness in God’s service.
The church needs saints and servants, not “leaders.
Disciples are not manufactured wholesale. They are produced one by one, because someone has taken the pains to discipline, to instruct and enlighten, to nurture and train one that is younger.

The post Book Review and Best Quotes: Spiritual Leadership by J. Oswald Sanders appeared first on Daniel Im.

Prophets of a Future Not Our Own – Oscar Romero

Here is an amazing poem attributed to Archbishop Oscar Romero. Enjoy!

Wikipedia

It helps now and then to step back and take a long view.

The Kingdom is not only beyond our efforts,

it is beyond our vision.

We accomplish in our lifetime only a fraction

of the magnificent enterprise that is God’s work.

Nothing we do is complete,

which is another way of saying that the kingdom always lies beyond us.

No statement says all that could be said.

No prayer fully expresses our faith.

No confession brings perfection,

No pastoral visit brings wholeness.

No program accomplishes the Church’s mission.

No set of goals and objectives include everything.

This is what we are about.

We plant the seeds that one

day will grow. We water the seeds already planted

knowing that they hold future promise.

We lay foundations that will need further development.

We provide yeast that produces effects far beyond our capabilities.

We cannot do everything,

and there is a sense of liberation in realizing this.

This enables us to do something, and to do it very well.

It may be incomplete, but it is a beginning,

a step along the way,

an opportunity for the Lord’s grace to enter and do the rest.

We may never see the end results,

but that is the difference between the master builder and the worker.

We are workers, not master builders,

ministers, not messiahs.

We are prophets of a future not our own.

 

Archbishop Oscar Romero (martyred on March 24th 1980)

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Multiplication is Impossible Without Intentionality

*My post here was originally published on Nov 10, 2015 in Christianity Today.

Wikipedia – Calvin Teo

Growing up in Vancouver, there were a lot of 7-Elevens around. In fact, one of my favorite things to do as a child was to buy a Slurpee, nachos with cheese, and some chewy coke bottle candies. Ah, the memories. So when my Sunday school teacher offered to buy my friends and I nachos and cheese, in exchange for not making his life miserable, you could’ve probably guessed my response. I was like a child with a halo around his head. Who knew bribing a child could be so effective!

The funny thing about 7-Elevens, and other convenient stores like them, is that they have a strategy for multiplication. They don’t just haphazardly place stores wherever there’s cheap rent, nor do they wait for entrepreneurial leaders to show up at their door step. They are intentional. Incredibly intentional. They do their research on the best location for future stores. They develop leaders because they know that the success of their stores rises and falls on leadership. Intentionality is everything.

The same is true for church planting.

Intentionality Matters in Church Planting

When we conducted the largest and most thorough research project ever done on church planting, we discovered that intentionality was everything. You can download the U.S. version of the report at www.newchurches.com (The Canadian and Australian versions of this report are forthcoming).

We discovered that:

Church plants who were intentional with evangelism had more unchurched people in their congregation
Church plants who were intentional at having a highly public presence had a larger worship attendance
Church plants who were intentional at starting at least one daughter church within their first 3 and 5 years saw a consistent increase in attendance
Church plants who prioritized leadership development saw more people make a decision for Christ

And the list goes on and on. The fact is, intentionality matters.

Leadership Development Leads to Multiplication

While no one will deny that leadership matters, the standard curriculum that shapes the leaders and pastors of our churches doesn’t often do enough to prepare them for the leadership challenges ahead. However, when we looked at the research, one of the common underlying factors for churches that both grew and saw more unchurched people make a decision for Christ, was a focus on leadership development.

Church planters who would mentor leaders of other new churches had a higher average worship attendance
Church planters who would participate in, at least, a month-long leadership training course on church planting also experienced a higher average worship attendance
Church plants who had a leadership development plan for their membership saw a higher number of decisions for Christ made
Church plants who had a leadership development plan for their membership also became financially self-sufficient at a quicker rate

These things are not surprising since maturity generally leads to more sacrificial hearts, and sacrificial hearts leads to greater patterns of financial giving. However, the data is clear — leadership development matters in church planting. So don’t wait until you get larger or more complex to focus on developing leaders. Make this a part of your DNA and culture from day one.

Intentionality Leads to Multiplication

In our research, we discovered that over 4000 churches were launched and 3700 were closed in 2014. So that means, every week, 77 were being launched and 71 were being closed. This means that in 2014, the United States had a net gain of 300 churches.

When I was on missions in China, we had Chinese classes every day. Now, I have to admit, I wasn’t the best student, since I was slightly preoccupied with flirting with my wife-to-be, Christina. However, when the teacher called on me to read from the board, I did it with gusto and confidence. After reading the last word, the teacher exclaimed, “Good!!!” and man, did that ever feel amazing, especially in front of Christina — whom I was trying to impress. The problem was what came out of the teacher’s mouth afterwards. “That’s good Daniel….not very good.”

That’s how I feel about these statistics. They’re good, but not very good.

What we are experiencing is church planting by addition, not multiplication. After all, if we want to keep up with the population growth in the United States and around the world, we not only need individual new churches, but movements of new churches. Multiplication movements of new churches.

Looking across the data of churches surveyed, we noticed a number of things that are present in multiplying churches started between 2008 and 2012.

They are very visible, both publicly and digitally
They are intentional in their programs and activities that are focused on outreach
They are devoted to membership assimilation and leadership development
They have an intentional stewardship plan to move their church to financial self-sufficiency
They are contributing financially to other church plants
They are regularly communicating a commitment to multiplication to their church body
The pastors of these new churches are well trained and prepared
The pastors of these new churches also have adequate provision to take care of them
They are intentional about multiplication and create specific pathways to make it happen

In other words, churches that are engaged in multiplication are relentlessly intentional about it. They prepare, plan, and execute their strategy to not only see a new church begin, but to multiply into other new churches; effectively working toward movement multiplication.

Get this. If every church plant decided to be involved in planting another church within the first 3-5 years of their church, and then they did it again, and again, and again, while, at the same time, those churches that they planted also planted again, and again, and again, we would see a movement of multiplication in our generation.

Conclusion

When I was on missions in Thailand, I remember talking with the pastor of the orphanage we were serving in. He asked me if I had noticed how many 7-Elevens there were in Thailand. Initially, I thought this was an odd question, but after thinking about it for a while, I realized that every community we drove through had a 7-Eleven in it, or close to it. He then shared with me, “That’s my church planting vision for Thailand. Everywhere there’s a 7-Eleven, I want there to be a church.”

May we see a movement of multiplication in our generation.

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