Church Planting Round Table

An experienced team of missionaries and church planters take a look at the 400 year history of missions and church planting in The Philippines.  

• Churches with a strong cell strategy see growth.
• A both/and situation:  people group and geo-political saturation are needed.
• Intentionality is key: we can’t just assume a desired outcome will be a by-product of other activities.
• When together with pastors, two questions are often raised:  1) what kind of resources are available to me to help me with church planting?, 2) what groups around me are unchurched or under-churched?
•  The assumption that there would be community transformation when the church reached a critical mass (size) has not appeared to be confirmed.
• Church planters with a coach are 7 to 8 times more effective than church planters without a coach.

You can access more of their insights by watching the video under the ‘Video’ tab in the menu above.

• Ministry should precede evangelism and evangelism must always be the end result of ministry.  Timing is important and necessary.
• Focus on households and families, not individuals.   Jesus did not pre-qualify.  Be careful not to make judgments/decisions about who is worthy or not to receive the gospel.
• Even when you’re using the ‘person of peace’ method, you still have to be careful not to violate culture.  Every culture has a way that families relate to each other.  It’s not about what makes you feel comfortable.  It’s what makes ‘them’ feel comfortable.  Lowering barriers to the gospel.  Have to understand gender issues, age issues, shame and honor issues.  How to identify spiritual leaders.  Church planting is not for the faint of heart.  But church planters have to be people who love to learn.
• Our job is not to teach.  Our job is to ask the right questions so that people can discover the answers from the Bible on their own.
• Small for-profit projects often yield much higher long-term access and goodwill than charity or free services.
• Do we think the disciples felt they were ready to have Jesus leave?  Do we really believe in the Holy Spirit?  If we did, we will walk away from things sooner than we often do.

David Watson continues his discussion about the effects of cultural barriers have on planting churches that multiply.  Click the ‘Video’ tab to watch this latest video.

I was able find an alternative option for audio.  You should be able to access it via the ‘Audio’ tab.  Additionally, the first video, Murray’s presentation of Church Planting Movements and Saturation Church Planting, is available under the ‘Video’ tab.  You can find Murray’s powerpoint under the ‘Resources’ tab.

Wanted to drop you a line and let you know what was going on with the audio and video.  All unedited audio for the conference has been uploaded and is available on the server.  Unfortunately, it looks like there is a problem with the download plugin.  It’s giving users a ‘Page 404 Error.’  I’m working to fix this as we speak.

Video editing and conversion is in progress.  Right now, Murray’s presentation on CPM and SCP is uploaded and undergoing file conversion.  As soon as it is online, I will post it on this site.  Please subscribe to email notifications or the RSS feed to be notified the moment that video is available.

It looks like we will be able to load one session per business day.  That seems to account for pulling the video off the tape, editing, uploading, converting, and posting. 

Thank you so much for your patience.

Blessings,

-Paul.

Reflection Group Report:

• Dean and his team has created an atmosphere of openness, sharing, collaboration.
• Reflection group has met daily to process what has  been said and heard.
• This conference represents a daily a conversation
• Lift our eyes to the greatness of our Commission
• There is a passion expressed:  a passion for evangelization.: Unreached peoples must be reached.
• Specific opportunity to fit together two very important movements: SCP and CPM
• Even though there are 18 organizations represented, it has never felt like 18 organizations, rather one conversation, one passion and commitment.  This is an attitude that will be needed for the completion of the Great Commission:  A oneness of heart and mind
• There are many who have genuine interest, a longing to do something in our generation.  People are ready to take up action for this.
• As far as the CPM process, and the SCP, we have found something to take with us for the fulfillment of the passion that we have.
• God calling us to go back to the simplicity of the Gospel.  The gospel is able to be understood by everyone. Prayer is the key, with the Word of God.
• We are being called to work in unity; the time has come for the body of Christ to work in unity.
• We have different gifting and skills
• He is calling us to take advantage of global problems.  These can open doors.
• He is calling us to take advantage of technology and use it as a tool to disciple the nations.
• As we allow the insiders to lead Bible Studies, we have to empower them with skills, both physically and spiritually.  Mistake made was that nationals were never empowered.  God said “I am raising an army of men and women who will go out and do my work.”  This is the time God is raising us up to fulfill the GC in our time.
• In connecting with other leaders, in general sense that everyone is willing to go back and try to implement what we’ve learned.  It is confusion, a bit frightening, but we are willing to go back to practice what we have learned.
• God bless you David.  God bless you Dean and your team as we move forward.

David Watson, Session 14

• None of us has a corner on anything.  We’re not the only gun in town.  David wants to communicate that he knows that there are lots of things that are working well out there.  He wants to help us.
• The pyramid (see Resource DVD) represents a system.  Take any part out and it weakens the system.  It takes all aspects working together,  We need each other.
• Many churches want to plant new churches, but many simply don’t know how.
• Regarding holiness, it’s not the obedience that matters.  It’s the striving toward obedience that matters.  It’s not how obedient we are but about striving to align myself with God in all that I do.  If the whole church were living out this principal, we wouldn’t be here having this conversation.
• As professional churchmen, we expect other professional churchmen to be kind, virtuous, etc.  Not always like that.  The church is made up of sinners, and the world is made up of sinners square.
• A symptom of lack of vision: going in every direction.
• The person of peace model is a handle, or a way to get a start.  There are other ways, but this is one way.
• Plan to invest two years to implement what we have heard here.
• In CP: instead of struggling to win the fringes of the unsaved world, we focus on winning the heroes of the unsaved world, who would win multitudes of the unsaved world.

David Watson, Session 15

• Resource sites:
  • - www.reachingtheonlinegeneration.com (Paul Watson’s blog)
  • - www.cpmtr.org (Church planting training materials)
  • - www.DavidLWatson.org (David Watson’s blog)

• Top things learned
  • Obedience trumps Knowledge
  •  Invest your life in a small team
  • The concept of “Never”: never teach, never lead, never give answers
  •  Both/And:  Work with existing body while creating space for innovation and celebrate when it happens
  • Outsiders deculturalize and insiders contextualize.
  • Get a vision for the lostness of people – Jesus’ focus was on them
  • Meet the needs of people in a way that proclaims Jesus (partner compassion ministries with CP ministries)
  • Keep disciples in their communities so they can be a transforming influence
  • Church Planter spends time focusing on his relationship with God (beacon), getting involved in community
  • Find person of peace, transfer gospel family to family
  • (other statements on the wall sheets were not shared with the group–sorry)

• Next steps shared by the participants
  •  Share the vision with peers
  •  Start the practice of my team’s hand-writing the Scriptures
  • Begin rethinking teaching curriculum and refine it.
  • Line up seminars to pass on what was learned here
  • Fast and pray for more Godliness/holiness
  • Get pilot projects going in as many regions as possible
  • Read more from the DVD conference materials in order to understand better the process, especially in order to assist in research and evaluation
  • Pray, Share with key mission partners.  Pray specifically on strategy questions (Where, who when)
  • Become a beacon for the man of peace.  Bring our staff into thinking this way.
  •  Be more fluent in God’s language of love, which is obedience.
  • Do paradigm shifting with fellows I’m working with.
  • Network, partner with others in the region
  • Share with two groups of people (in the Philippines)
  • I meet with two young guys who want to do church differently.  I want to share these ideas with them to see where this can go (CPM in the US)
  • Form a discussion group to meet one hour a month to discuss this.
  • Do a pilot project in Europe.
  • Share this information with others from my group who were not able to come to this conference.
  • I’m going to start using the question approach in my church, at the top with my elders, to get to the bottom line quickly.  This may slow things down initially, but I think that this will ultimately speed things up.
  • I will recognize that people who have been drawn to me may indeed be persons of peace.  One of them may be key to starting studies in my neighborhood.
  • The first step is that I need to bring the leaders of existing movements together.  Otherwise, the SCP folks may hinder the CPM folks in my region.
  • Ask myself how to promote CPM even more widely in Indonesia.
  • Remember that we’ve never said “house church” or “cell church”.  This methodology will work for starting any kind of church.
  • We will seek to bring the head of GEM and some other mission leaders together to talk about this and share contacts to expose other workers to these concepts.
  • I will plant 200 churches this year.
  • In Beijing, we want to see open (not underground) churches planted.
  • I, as a person representing a group that has promoted SCP, will no longer see CPM in a way that considers it interference.
  • In North Africa, this is a situation that is just ripe for a process like this.  I look forward to see how God will work.
  • I would like to see the home groups of my local church replicate.
  • I would like to study this more.  The pyramid is daunting.
  • I would like to do some evaluative research.
  • Start valuing obedience more than knowledge
  • Go back to the basics of pouring my life into a few people.
  • In my role on the Asia leadership team, I want to pour myself into our workers in Asia.
  • Ownership a key, and part of that is the voice from which new ideas are heard.  We will invite some of the folks here from India to speak to our partners in Orissa.
  • I want to investigate Internet-related stuff in India.  They have a vehicle but no fuel to run it.
  • Dialogue and take things forward with brothers here from North India.
  • Start a discovery Bible study among women already in my sphere of influence.
  • I will go back and work with a person in my life who I believe may be a person of peace.
  • Make disciples. Multiply churches.  The M & M candies are a simple, straightforward representation of what we’ve learned here.  Taste like Jesus.
  • Pouch of M & M’s.  Participative discussion characteristics (Bible teaching.  It centers on application.)  Obedience to Scripture by members and the group is the measure of success.  Unpaid, often semi-literate lay people co-lead.  Cell groups or small independent churches of about 15 members are usual.  Houses or storefronts are typical meeting places.
  • I will pray and ask God how he wants me to apply this to my own life.  I want to share the Shema principles with my family.
  • Talk to the GEM leadership team and ask how these principles might apply to the context in Europe.
  • I want to look for the person of peace in my neighborhood.
  • I want to spend the best part of every day with my sons, impressing on them how to seek the Lord—in person and on-line.
  • The Lord has given me many relationships with Kergys, Uzbeks, and others.  I want to bring blessing to their lives (healing, etc.).
  • I want to help others discover the CPM process.
  • So many people of peace may have been with me, and I never recognized it.  From now on, I’ll be ready for them. Waiting for them.
  • Obey God without asking questions like “Is that really what He said?” and teaching others to do the same.
  • Becoming obedient to God’s language of love to be a beacon
  • Share CPM with ministry partners and pray about implementation
  • Pilot projects in Europe fields
  • Take question approach to leadership
  • Ensuring SCP doesn’t limit CPM – working to overcoming barriers between the two
  • Set church planting goals using CPM
  • Some fields are ripe for CPM – meetings already set up to introduce CPM
  • Need for the right cultural trainers to gain acceptance – plan to find them and bring them to India
  • Apply at a personal level – family, neighborhood

• Kent Parks, Mission to Unreached Peoples:  Organizational Cast Study- Transitioning an Organization
  • Kent’s wife is a “Staff Utility Player” – his partner in ministry.  Has traveled worldwide with him during the past two months.
  • Curtis Sergeant is 20% of his time to MUP
  • Worked among the Sunda in Indonesia.
  • This is indeed a global sending era.  Even so, if we continue the same kinds of numbers and see the same kinds of results, we will not get the job done.
  • If the job was only about the task, we could do it easily.  But it is about putting the body back together and then engage the task.
  • By serving the greater good an organization will grow.
  • Focus: UPG, Strategy teams, CPM.  Every staff person is focused on these 3 priorities
  • The Great Commission is about putting humanity back together and getting the job done.
  • For a movement to happen all of the many things in the pyramid have to happen, and they take different giftings, so the Lord brings together teams.
  • We’ve been doing CP by brute force instead of by leverage principles.
  • Ethne is a steering committee representing many cultures and orgs to focus on reaching the unreached.  Its composition is more and more reflecting the proportions of the body of Christ worldwide.
  • We need to do things differently, or we’ll never finish the job.  At the current rate, it’ll take until the year +/-2350 if there were no population growth.
  • You need enough structure and enough flexibility in order for reproduction to take place  (Principles in The Starfish and the Spider, Wolfgang Simpson).  Need both leadership and flexibility.
  • If we mandate things, we can cripple their implementation.  If we invest a vision, we can mobilize our entire organizations.  Seek the Lord, set strategy.  Sometimes this means stopping good things to do the best things.
  • The MUP Board has just given unanimous approval to embracing CPM.  It is no longer Kent’s vision, and is now a mission-wide vision.  It is now in a planning process.  The starting gun has just gone off.  They’re going to have to stop some things that the organization has done.
  • Commitments:  1) We will do this well as an organization; 2) We are going to help others do the same.
  • No longer taking people on and saying do whatever you feel called to do. We are not forcing any of our old workers to change.  We’re inviting them to change, and all new people who come on will be committed to this new strategy.
  • Why CPM? Won’t get the job done without rapidly multiplying churches led by indigenous people
  • Why Strategy team? Unity of international teams working together is God’s global story. If the Great Commission was about task we could get it done. It’s about God’s people coming together and then working together on the task, reflecting the Body of Christ. God is raising up and sending multi-ethnic teams – leveraging power of networking, partnerships.
  • Commitment to transnational collaboration

• Next Steps:  A proposal for a Global Church Planting Network
  • Question: Is there a place for SCP and CPM networks globally to cooperate towards completing the great Commission?
  • There was a meeting in London in 2008, in the home of Dr. Stef Nash, to which former DAWN Associates, representatives of the 3P charity, a representative of a prayer network, two OC Area Directors, and representatives of other ministries, to discuss how to nurture and accelerate continued church planting.
  • 4 meetings next year with global focus – CP focus unique – strategy? Or? What will set it apart? Clear rationale, clear expectations of the network. (Diminishing focus on pioneer planting, etc)
  • Observations/Comments/Suggestions
  • Sometimes when you interface with an organizational leader, he sometimes doesn’t even know what’s going on in his organization.  You may want to interface with someone else in the organization.
  • When calling this kind of gathering, need to define the profile of the person you’d like to attend (Gather people through relationships worldwide).  Also, describe what you intend to accomplish at the event.
  • Don’t plan on being a decision-making gathering. It’s a conversation – decisions have to be made by the leaders in the organization
  • In a process like this, a group of people doesn’t simply announce the existence of a partnership.  Rather, invite people to talk and they decide whether there is validity for the group to exist.
  • This is already happening in India (see Rodrick)
  • Don’t leave out local church and denominations in this conversation/network.
  • The non-formal leaders may not have organizational positions but they may have network influence.
  • Be meticulous to connect existing networks.  They need to be talking to each other.
  • We might want to ask, do other related networks exist? We might want other groups (Ethne, Cell Church Missions Network, House Church Network,etc.) to co-call the network gathering.
  • Some of the other groups are not solely focused on church planting.
  • Emerging mission networks globally do also have church planting at their center.
  • Possible continuum of purpose of this event: strategy < ——————— > dissemination of info
  • Network will net clear rationale; will also need clear expectations
  • Will need to keep in mind: What is missing that constitutes the basis for needing this network?
  • Perhaps a larger group would be better – 100 or more

• Evaluation March 20, 2009
  • Things for which we’re grateful:
  • Sheryl’s stories
  • New Internet initiatives
  • Our roommates, special connections with those with whom we’re rooming
  • Coaching specialists among us
• • Research specialists among us
  • etc.
  • Suggestion of Exposure trips:  A “come and see” opportunity. Be highly intentional to see what God is doing.  Eg. 2400 churches in Ethiopia among a Muslim people group.  Look inside a movement.  What is the DNA like at the 3rd and 4th generation?  Also Sierra Leone.  These movements are mature enough that it won’t spoil things to have a different face come by to observe.
  • Rodrick says they receive groups all the time.  Come and do a prayer walk.
  • Oswaldo would gladly receive people in Brazil.
  • It’s amazing what a vision trip can do.
  • Suggestion of Internships:  Do a CPM internship with Paul to the on-line generation.  Not just people good at programming on a computer, but also people with a passion for the lost.  Paul is willing to teach how to do ministry through new technologies (e.g. How to set up a blog, .  Three goals:  follow up those who have exposure to the gospel through other means, creation of on-line communities, and evaluating whatever good tools he finds from a church-planting perspective to make it available more broadly.  Also there are many people involved in Skype coaching (1 to 1.5 hours per week).  For David, he is trying to limit his mentoring to ten people because his schedule is so full, but normally has about 10 people he’s mentoring.
  • For distance mentoring and meeting—Go to www.oovoo.com.  It is like skype but the focus is on video chat.  Three people can participate for free, and for $10 a month up to six can participate.
  • Partnership, strategy, training consultation:  A possible follow-up next year to these meeting.  The only way we’re going to be able to get the job done is to collaborate.  Some collaboration tools are actually quite simple to use.  We have a felt need in OC to do it better.  One way that David Watson does this is to second people for a year or so and then send them back to their own organization.  If you would like to work with us in the planning process for this follow-up, please let Dean know.
  • Learn from organizations doing adult learning.  David Watson would love to see more training of people for key leadership positions (in the whole pyramid) for these movements.
  • Ethne:  A bunch of networks that show to together to do things.  The core of the steering committee changes for each cycle.  It’s a network of movements.  It’s not creating a prayer network; it’s about connecting networks.  Ethne 09 will be in Bogota in November.  Trans-organizational/trans-national. There are a lot of resources on www.ethne.net.  It will be multi-lingual.

• Panel Discussion:  How does it all fit together?
  • Need to bring the 2 streams together to talk, cooperate to prevent one movement hindering the other.
  • SCP was well-received by the church in Indonesia, but CPM is new and needs a new effort.  These two groups need to sit together and work out how to work together or it will be harmful.
  • How would you coach a SCP national task force to adopt CPM.  David says, CPM is extremely difficult and takes a lot of work so people don’t turn to CPM until they are desperate.  If SCP people would get to the point that they aren’t satisfied with planting one church at a time and want to see churches that reproduce and leadership that reproduces, there would be great opportunities to strategize together.
  • Murray says, the denominational leaders who are involved in SCP sometimes feel that CPM people don’t love and accept them (they feel second class).
  • Roy says, that back in the late 60’s the study that started Jim Montgomery toward SCP may have been classified as CPM if the study were done today.  There is significant definition drift on both sides.  The non-negotiables need to be defined and then we need to decide how to work together from there.  There are SCP movements poised for CPM and there are CPM movements that are ready to be joined together into SCP.  There is a need for the body of Christ to work together better, or competition takes over.  SCP and CPM address this in different ways.

• Open time for questions:
  • Question:  21 nations represented here with national task forces dealing with seeing people reached - what should be communicated?
  • Unless people are desperate they don’t adopt CPM – easier to plant one by one. If the SCP people in their mobilization of churches will include CPM a synergy will develop
  • Denominational leaders who are part of SCP sometimes make decisions out of emotion rather than strategically. Important to communicate that those bringing new training/ideas in partnership gatherings love the whole church
  • Nations with either an SCP or CPM movement without the other should be encouraged to intentionally bring the two together. Include the newer organizations on the cutting edge of CPM – include them now.  SCP provides an atmosphere of cooperation rather than competition – this is needed too.
  • Question: if there was a relatively successful SCP movement that wanted to add CPM principles into it, what could be done to help them?  The deal breakers (David):  1) High and structured leadership requirements (Low tolerance for chaos doesn’t work); 2) Moving from a knowledge based to obedience based discipleship; 3) Replications process of disciples, groups, etc. from one system to the next needs to be move over or it won’t work.
  • In Orissa, they’ve seen a similar situation.  You need to appeal to the orgs sense of vision.  Does the current process get you to your vision?  Help them see that the current procedure isn’t getting them there, so they will be desperate enough to go to a new model.
  • Pilot projects will often help denominations be willing to try something new.
  • Denominations need to be willing to live with ambiguities.
  • Question:  Is there a way to access if a region or country or people is ready for SCP or CPM?
  • DAWN came to the conclusion that there needs to be about 2 or 3% of the population Christian in order to be able to gain the modem of a national movement.  There need to be 75% of the denominations committed to it for it to go.  However, David says CPMs succeed in inverse proportion to the number of Christian churches present.
  • Question:  How do you keep heresy from creeping in, like crept in in the early church?
  • In SCP, you invite the Trinitarian churches, but the more liberal ones usually don’t show up.
  • In CPM, the doctrinal purity issue is usually what cause denominations to not want to be involved.  However, if you are teaching obedience from day one, you will have some heresy, because they don’t know the whole Bible yet, but in denominational models, the comply without understanding, while in CPM, as people learn more of the Bible things tend to correct.  They say they need to give two years for this to happen.  If you are about developing your own brand of church CPM won’t work.  CPM will result in some churches that don’t want your denomination.  If the denomination is about Kingdom work, then that’s okay.
  • History shows heresy is not limited to small groups.

David Watson Session 10:

Important lessons learned Yesterday:

1. Deuteronomy 6 can be seen as a church planting passage
2. Mentoring evaluation questions are important.
3. Reinforcement of the need to facilitate, not teach.
4. Consistency in “Doing” the Talk in the private and public realms
5. Obedience vs. knowledge.
6. “Shema” - hear and talk
7. What it means to be a “holy” man - getting our relationships right
8. Partnerships is a life-long relationship
9. Non-replication is also infectious
10. The greatest commandment is to be impressed, imprinted on our hearts. The person who argues the most can be the greatest advocate down the road.
11. An incarnational, God-honoring life is the key foundation for church planting (Always be the same everywhere).
12. Look for, and be, FATR (faithful, available, teachable, reproducing) people
13. God-Appointments- how many do we miss?
14. Forward thinking accountability:  we’re not able to change the past, but we can impact the future (don’t let accountability stop with just confessing - discover ways to help implement change).  Also, don’t let accountability be an individual struggle.
15. Beware of time stealers.
16. There are benefits to handwriting Scriptures (Memory, Depth, Application).  Writing the Scriptures is good (even better than typing them).
17. The Shema is a crucial cornerstone in the character of a CPM facilitator.  The word is the Authority.
18. Insights into strategic vs. Tactical help to positively relate CPM and SCP.
19. The definition of love in John 14 is obedience (Obedience is God’s love language)
20. Obedience is a magnet.
21. Strategic question:  What will it take to reach the entire on-line generation?  Tactical question:  What must I (my team, etc.) do to reach the on-line generation?
22. Group memory is better than individual memory.

David Watson Session 11-12:

• Panel Discussion on DBS (Are there other ways of doing the DBS?):
  • In oral society, they can’t write out the passage, so they dramatize it.
  • For church planter training, they can do the 3 column study ahead and share it during study time. With younger ones in the group let the youngest people go first.
  • In Muslim, Hindu cultures, can do the same study separately, so when they get together afterwards they are talking about the same material.
  • Facilitators have done it themselves, having written it out they have more confidence in being able to lead others to do it.
  • Other components emerge as they discover what pleases God – music, cultural expressions of obedience
  • Tip: When others ask us what we think about…e.g. homosexuality. “Why are you asking me what I think? It doesn’t matter what I think. The only one that matters is God – and the only way to know what he thinks is to read his word, and the only way to really understand is to start at the beginning and go all the way through – then you’ll know what he thinks.” Emphasis on Scripture.
• Person of peace:
  • A person of peace has a spiritual hunger (he connects when there is a spiritual person around).
  • We must be creative in identifying a person of peace.  Just because someone is friendly and well-meaning doesn’t necessarily make him/her God’s choice.  Also, there are those who just like to raise spiritual issues but, in fact, only for the sake of discussion.  Beware, they will waste your time.
  • They can be found in any location - anywhere.  Markets, streets, shops, athletic club.  But it can take weeks, even months, to find a person of peace.
  • Access ministries can help a person of peace to surface.
  • Who it’s not: Friendly people, people of good will, willing to help you but not interested in spiritual things, those who like to talk about God, but only want to discuss, don’t want to look at scriptures.
  • Person of peace is the person in whom you see a genuine interest in knowing the truth.  May not be a peaceful person, but have a spiritual hunger.  A person who is loving their neighbour, doing good things (ecology, human rights - they may also be the gatekeeper) may be that person  – they may also have great respect among their community.  They are the people God has prepared.  As you make more spiritually–oriented statements, they respond positively.  They know their community, are networked already.  Invite others to join the group.
  • Often persons of peace were already philanthropists.  They were already generous leaders in their community.
  • Or, they may be extremely unlikely.  Imams, village chiefs, opinion leaders, and heads of secret societies of traditional African religions have also emerged as people of peace after much prayer.  Sometimes their first reaction is violent and then they experience a change of heart.
  • Church planter must go with prayer, obedience, persecution, vulnerability, going empty-handed.  May go back to a place repeatedly until he finds the man of peace.  Pour your life into the man of peace.
  • If we serve in a place and don’t find the person of peace, yet stay there, we may inoculate against the gospel.  Have a taste of the gospel, Christians, but don’t taste the real thing.
  • Some indication that the rest of the New Testament referenced Luke 10 for church planting strategy.
• Summary: Characteristics of the person of peace:
  • Opens his/her door to you
  • Receives your blessing and shows interest
  • Opens his/her house to you (is hospitable)
  • Offers to sustain you in some way
  • Is worthy of you
  • Has influence in his/her home
  • Receives you
  • Hears/receives your words

Ministry on the Internet:  The Internet as a Nation- Paul Watson (Reaching the Online Generation strategy coordinator):
       Twitter became a communication system (140-character snippets).  Connected to cell phone (text messaging).  A message is called a tweet.. Picking up the threads through ongoing messages from people to try and find a person of peace. Talk about how I do things, not what I believe, opens doors. Go to the darkest place and that’s where the greatest fruit will be. Online connections are real people. Paul connecting with people of peace, bring them together for training (in person), they would do the DSB online with them, and multiply online groups.

• Today 3 million messages are being sent every day.
• Paul started making shama statements via Twitter (affirmed that there is a God, that He loves, etc.)
• Paul did a search for the word “pray.”  A woman asked for prayer for her daughter to see her baby’s face, because her daughter was going blind.  God responded positively to those prayers.
• Post-modern on-line community:  Paul decided to tell them how he believed.  He started talking about his wife and gained their affection as a genuine Christian.
• Go to the darkest place, and that’s where the church will grow.
• Paul found a community of free-lance writers and was able to join a chat with them (It occurred in a Tarot room).  Those interactions resulted in a woman being given a $1000 gift to help her pay transportation costs to Denver from Wyoming when her 23-week premature baby was in intensive care.
• Paul is currently looking for people who are willing to look for people of peace on line.  He wants to find young and crazy folks who have a passion for the lost and who love to spend time on line.

David Watson, Session 7:

Debriefing Time:  Important things we learned yesterday plus David’s commentary:

• Establish the DNA from day 1.  People develop a mindset very quickly.
• Ask questions to let the group discover God’s truth and not my truth.
• Trust the Holy Spirit to make it happen without my knowledge and control.
• The CPM cycle is fractal.  Every segment is a reflection of the whole.
• Obedience-based discipleship.  It’s about life maturity, not knowledge.
• Go to a seeker’s home rather than have them go to you.  Important to demonstrate that church planting can happen everywhere.
• Let the people discover.
• The rate of multiplication is not limited by the availability of Pastors (i.e. an “improvement” on the model of leadership generation: historical churches – Pentecostals- CPM).
• Everything we do as leaders has implications.  We must think before we act.  We are under observation all the time.  Those of you who “wing it” will have more problems.  Those who plan extensively will have an easier time.
• Your spirituality needs to “hang out” (conspicuous spirituality) .  It has to show.  Be intentional
• Asking questions re: application will result in cultural specific obedience.
• The simplicity of getting people engaged.  If it can’t be replicated by anyone in your team, it’s too complicated.
• The growing edge of the church is the unpaid staff.  This does not eliminate the role of the paid staff.
• Starting a cycle, a movement, not planting A church.
• We have to expect some groups to not work.  Part of success is having multiple groups started at the same time.
• Evaluate the reproductive effectiveness of your teammates.  The enemy will put really nice, talented, gifted people in your orbit who will never pass it on to anyone else.  The energy is going into a black hole.  Non-replication is an infectious disease that Satan will use to kill the process.  Hardest thing is evaluating the reproductive effectiveness of your workers and, if they are not producing, cutting them loose - you cannot afford to continue investing in them, because the result of our investment is zero.  In CPM there must be a certain type of “ruthlessness” in releasing or removing non-replicating people from the process.
• In mentoring relationships, a six-point scale (six primary relationships you must maintain)
  • What are you doing to maintain your relationship with God?
  • What are you doing to maintain a right relationship with your family(specifically with each one)?
  • What are you doing to maintain your relationship/reputation with the community at large and your church?
  • What are you doing to fulfill and grow in your call from God?
  • What are you doing to improve and fulfill your responsibilities in your job (relationships with boss/supporters; those things our organizations require of us to get our pay check)
  • What are you doing to keep yourself emotionally, physically, and mentally healthy?
• The role of the outsider is finished as soon as possible, and depends upon the person the outsider is mentoring in the group.  The outsider’s role is to be out of the process tasks as soon as possible.  One key for knowing when the outsider can pull out of the CPM process - when signs are evident that all essential DNA is in place.  For real multiplication you need to be in deep relationship with 10-15 people.  Mentoring relationship is a life-time relationship, as people continue to grow in ministry, can become a mutual relationship.  A mentor should be able to detect three generations of people connected to him or her; if this many generations are not present, there is a problem in the process, most likely in the relationship between the mentor and his/her immediate mentoree.
• Evangelical language and liturgy can be a barrier to church planting.
• “Go” to seeker vs. “Come” to leader.
• Living in such a way that the person of peace finds you (be a beacon).
• Whatever is your expected end, that is how you should start.
• Never, ever, ever give an answer from our own knowledge and experience.  Point them to the Bible.
• Not “how do I get this to replicate?” but “what are the right ways to inject information into the system so that those with the system will replicate themselves?”

David Watson, Session 8 :

• Identify spiritual leader.  You will usually identify the spiritual leader within the first couple of weeks, but sometimes that person is even identifiable before the group begins.
• If discussion doesn’t come easily, ask the group to do a role play to help them get into the passage.
• Debrief:  Thanksgiving; Needs; Discuss how to meet needs; Three column study; With whom will you share; Identify next facilitator.
• When someone wants the facilitator’s opinion, it is good to reflect the question back to the group.  Resist giving your opinion.
• About length of meeting:  Different cultures have different tolerance for meetings.  Urban time tolerance is shorter than rural peoples.  So keep things short at first so that you don’t exceed the group’s time tolerance.
• Even in literate societies, most people are oral learners.  The requirement (in literate societies) to write the scriptures is intended to accommodate the spectrum of learning styles

David Watson, Session 9

• Deuteronomy 6:  The “She-ma” statement:  a passion that is contagious.  The “love” in this passage implies affection and obedience.  The heart is the center of the living being, gives life to everything to do.  These commands of God will be heartbeat to us.  It is also a picture of consistency - in public and in private you are the still person and you are still dealing with your relationship with God.
• We enjoy being around people who are in love.  God wants us to love Him with all our passion.  All our soul (our essence that is recognized by God in heaven, and it is eternal).  It is the core part of our being that outlasts our body.
• MK and PK problem:  they complain that there’s not consistency at home.  Nothing destroys replication of values (love for the Lord, respect for other people’s opinions, etc.) better than inconsistency.  Church planting is not a job - it is a lifestyle.  It is this kind of obedience that makes the next generation of believers impressed with God.  Without this, we will not see CPM.  If we are flawed, the system will be flawed.
• “Wearing it on our forehead”= living in an obviously spiritual way.
• “Wearing it on your arm” = Reminding ourselves who are are.  A by-product of our quiet times is just setting our days right.
• “On the door post.”  The neighborhood should know that you are different.  They will ask “why?”  Part of being who we are supposed to be is to be available to be the answer to someone’s prayers.  This is the kind of lifestyle that replicates churches.  We don’t have to go looking for a person of peace.  They come looking for you.
• John 14:  Jesus defined love very narrowly.  (vs. 15) Obey, have commands and obey them. Vs. 23.  Conditional to being filled with the Holy Spirit is obedience.  If you obey me, I will show myself to you.  If you obey me, my Father and I will come to you and we will make our home with you.
• Matthew 28:  The audience of this command was 11 disciples, and they were doubtful.  The disciples grew up under Roman occupation.  “Go and make disciples of all nations.”  They grew up to hate the Romans.  “Ta ethne” was a code phrase that meant “everybody but us, besides us.”  Go to the people you hate and make disciples of them.
• Notice one key connection between Deut. 6: 4-9 and Matt 28: 19-20  - the “passing on” process is very much about training the follower in obedience.
• 1 Cor. 12:12:  The doorway to the church is baptism.  Discipling is about bringing people to the point of baptism.
• If we are the people we are to be, church planting is not an effort, it is a pleasure.

Tonight’s Assignment:  Come up with ten ways to show people that you are spiritual.

North India Case Study: Rodrick Gilbert

• My father was an orphan who was raised by Anglican missionaries.  My mother prayed me into the Kingdom.  Rodrick didn’t want to lead his own ministry - wanted to take orders and be free from stresses.  Started a ministry in the slums.  But God led him otherwise.  Going in the beginning was slow.  Read Successful Home Cell Groups by Yongi Chi.  Applied the principle to the slums of Delhi.  Later became a DAWN associate.  Curtis Seargent gave him resources that challenged him toward SCP.
• Combined resources from CPM/SCP targeting UPGs, urban, linguistic, geographic areas in M. areas.
• Servant leadership model, with volunteer pastors.
• Present Ministries-  Engaging 31 people groups.
• Tips:  cells planting cells, churches planting churches, multi-layered leadership, volunteers, pioneer planters, master planters.
• Heavy emphasis on indigenous mission (different from cross-cultural mission).  The languages of India are nearly mutually exclusive (can’t even ask for a glass of water)
• Only 15% of mission funds in India are spent on children.
• Training:  should be skills based; deliver the bare essentials - learn a little, use a lot; utilize non-formal training; be constantly developing the training process
• 98% of churches planted involve power encounters.  Healing and deliverance is not a destination, but a beginning.
• Challenges/Prayer points:  Disunity among the leaders in missions; Competition; The intentional hate campaign- Fanatical political parties Indian Movies (depict Christians in a negative way), High cast Hindu mafia, mission compound lifestyle; The massive number of people groups (4635); Old Wineskin factor; Perfecting the Saints

Francophone West Africa Case Study:

• A barrier, a band (front line) between Islamic countries that would like to extend their influence south, and Christians in the south who would like to extend their influence north.  There are “twenty-eight countries on the fault line of Africa between Islamic North Africa and the Christian-influenced Southern Africa.”
• A region neglected because of the language.  The French language has become a threat for many missionaries who don’t want to learn a second language.  The mission force is mainly in English speaking countries.
• CPM Training began in 2005 in Guinea.  Goal: to launch a discipling movement in the 28 buffer countries, 166 million people in 27 major people groups of this area.
• Began training with African mission leaders via tapes, adopted as a process, began to work in Ivory Coast, M. area, slow response, now training missionaries, and preparing access ministry (self-sustaining).
• CPM training influenced the philosophy of CP significantly in the area of funding.  Missionaries are learning to use their gifting and talent to access various groups in ways that provide funding for their livelihood and provides opportunities for sharing and living out the Gospel.
• Central African Republic: initially resistant to the CPM training, seemed too superficial, didn’t want to give commitment to implement, but later decided to try it, resulting in rapid multiplication to the 4th generation in two years. This in the midst of much spiritual opposition, the Lord is freeing people from the demonic, impacting villages. They are adding CPM to their former CP efforts.
• In 48 months, there have been 1,608 new churches and 68,719 new believers.

Addendum from the Research Talk by Roy Wingerd (Some People wanted a copy of the quotes from Mahatma Gandhi and Abdul Kalam that were read by Roy):

• Mahatma Gandhi:  Seven Social Sins
  - Politics without Principle
  - Wealth without work
  - Pleasure without Conscience
  - Knowledge without character
  - Commerce without morality
  - Science without humanity
  - Worship without Sacrifice
• India 2020:  A Vision for the New Millennium: A.P.J. Abdul Kalam (Former President of India)
  Ten-Point Oath (every child in India should live up to)
  1.  I will pursue my education or the work with dedication and I will excel in it.
  2.  I will teach at least ten persons who cannot read or write to do so.
  3.  I will plant at least ten saplings and ensure their growth through constant care.
  4.  I will visit rural and urban areas and work hard to permanently wean away at least five persons from addiction and gambling.
  5.  I will constantly endeavor to remove the pain of my suffering brethren.
  6.  I will not support any religious, caste or language differentiation.
  7.  I will be honest and set an example for others to follow.
  8.  I will work towards becoming an enlightened citizen and make my family righteous.  I will respect all women and support women’s education.
  9.  I will always be a friend of the mentally and physically challenged, and will work hard to make them feel like the rest of us.
  10.  I will proudly celebrate the success of my country and my people.

David Watson, Session 4:

• Debriefing Time:  Important things we have learned (3 from each table):
  • Obedience oriented Discipleship
  • The Insider/Outsider Perspective:  It is the job of outsiders to deculturalize.  It is the task of Insiders to contextualize.
  • There is no substitute for taking responsibility and intentionality.
  • Church planting is an integral part of community transformation.
  • Obedience is the goal and not transfer of knowledge.
  • Paid staff, buildings and personal evangelism can kill a movement.
  • Discovery vs. Teaching/reaching- letting “them” lead.
  • The Outsider does not plant the church.
  • Simple obedience to Christ, authority of Scripture, and Holy Spirit build churches.
  • Develop access ministries­/BAM (Business As Mission/needs based.
  • Target families, not individuals
  • Let the lost facilitate
  • Not professional but lay leaders
  • Culture- we need to be intentional about removing our culure from the Gospel
  • Leave quickly­before everyone thinks they’re ready.
  • We need to discover what it means to be a spiritual person in that culture
  • All churches are heretical at the start
  • Disciple to conversion
  • Look for a “man of peace.”
  • Need for a global/national heart with local engaged hands
  • Focus on the few to win the many
• Teaching time:
  • You may have all twenty-one elements but still not see a CPM happen if they’re not put together in the right way.
  • Romans 12:1-2:  When you become a follower of Jesus, the Spirit begins to transform you from the culture you’re in into something else.  Within two-years you begin to move away from the values, responses, etc. of your culture.  This is an act of God.  There are some who have the capacity to be maturing believers and still stay connected to their base culture.  We call these people evangelists.  They are a very special group of people, and we in missions need to do a better job of recognizing this.  We should have our eye out for them, to invest in them and build safety nets for them in their growth.
  • When someone comes to you with a question or problem about a community church start, you never ever, ever give an answer.  Send them to the Scripture and ask them to pray and ask the Holy Spirit to lead them as to how to address the problem.
  • We are very binary in our thinking.  It is the West that wants everything to be confrontational.  You’re either with us or you’re not.  In other thinking systems, things are in a continuum and there’s room for negotiation.  They don’t see the process of conversion as a “moment” but rather an process over time.
  • In order to find a person of peace, the outsider must be able to communicate that he is a spiritual person, and this must be a constant and continual thing that he manifests.  He must become a “spiritual magnet” that will attract.

David Watson, Session 5:  CPM Cycle

• Appropriate communication:  Our lives, actions and words need to all be flowing in the same direction / consistency in public and in private.  This is especially important in early exposure to insiders.  We have to use the whole communication spectrum (verbal, behaviors, etc.).
• Appropriate evangelism is a discipleship process.  Making disciples ­ begins before people become Christians ­ disciple them to commitment and beyond.  Surprisingly, people started replicating this process even before they became believers.  Disciples make more disciples.  It’s their nature.  Just who they are.  When we live in a obedience-based discipleship world (vs. a knowledge-based discipleship world) it is natural.  By and large, the Western world comes down more on the side of knowledge-based faith.
• Be careful not to expect lost people to act like saved people.
• New people do not join existing groups.  As what is happening is shared with others, and they want to join the group, group members start their own groups, do what they have been doing ­ multiplication is built in from the beginning, based on Scripture, not dependent on trained leader.
• CPM cycle:  If we interrupt the cycle in any place, we inhibit it from replicating in other communities.  Becoming a disciple, becoming a church, starting new churches - all the same process.  Like fractal geometry.  The whole cycle can be done in oral or literate cultures.  This process was actually begun in/for oral cultures.  Oral systems can also translate into literal systems (but not vice versa).
• Starts with finding the person of peace in a community, takes engagement with the culture, based on relationship.
• Lost people lead their group/family who are not believers ­ discussions are based on reading and discussing Scriptures trusting the Holy Spirit to reveal God. Obedience-based discipleship.
• Groups eventually become churches, when they baptize believers.
• Discovery Bible Study (DBS):  A simple inductive Bible study.  The writing process (hand written into a three-column notebook):  You review what you write multiple times.  And, among Muslims, it communicates disrespect for the scriptures if you write in the margins, underline, etc.  DBS begins with relationship; its purpose is to lead a person/family/group to discover God and his salvation; it prepares people to know the Word and share the Word.  First column, simply copy the Scriptures.  Second column, say it in your own words (by doing so, you prepare people to say what they’ve learned in their own words).  Third column (for unbelievers) “What does this passage tell us about God or man?”; for believers “What must I do or be?”, Our goal is thought-pattern and behavioral change.
• Keep the Word central, God the authority, not the leader; be a facilitator of discovery not a leader.
• DBS Elements:  From the beginning group sharing leads to prayer, ministry , worship even before people are believers. Built in are Bible study, responsibility (action-based obedience), accountability.
• Heresy:  Historically has come out of dictatorial leadership.  Heresy comes from individuals, not group.  The group process is self-corrective.

David Watson, Session 6:  Training for meetings:

• Opening:What are you thankful for today?  This week?
• Are there any needs that you have or that you know that our community has?
• Can you think of any way we can meet those needs? (Be brief)
• Reporting (As this represents a first meeting, there is no review session, nor reports of a previous sharing time.)
• Study the passage together using the 3-column method
  • The job of facilitators is NOT to teach.  By third week, facilitators should have become coaches.

Case Study: West Africa

• M convert, working among Ms. Tried DBS experimentally ­ unsupervised, trained and set loose. Rapid multiplication of churches, with a leader who did not believe the method would work!  Did not use all the principles, mostly just finding the person of peace, and it still increased the number of church being planted.
• Surveyed the community in order to find that person. Churches began to multiply rapidly ­ 1600 new churches in 4 years, in an UPG that had been unresponsive before.  Only those who choose to follow the entire process will see the rapid multiplication ­ those who don’t, always see a boost in CP.  Look for 4 generations quickly ­ if that’s not happening something is wrong.

Brazil Case Study:

• Brazil 21 Project:  A Church within Easy Access of every Person in all of Brazil in this Generation
• How did the Brasil 21 Project start?  The roots were formed at the AD2000 Movement:  There were twelve tracks, one of which was Church Planting.  Then, in 1993, a thousand people attended the Brazilian Mission Conference.  Representatives of DAWN ministries were present at that time and helped to galvanize the commitment to church planting.
• Currently, evangelicals represent 24% of the population of Brazil.  Evangelicals are growing at more than 4 times the populational growth rate.  However, there are still 73 cities below 1%, and 112 cities below 5% evangelical.  Also, there are 253 (of 258) indian tribes that still have no translation of the Bible.
• Challenges:  Mega Churches:  The norm is for pastors to try to grow their churches into large churches, as there is much status involved in being the pastor of a mega church.  They are less willing to plant new churches.  There are problems related to growing secularism and nominalism.  There are theologies that discourage mission.  Many pastors have very little Biblical knowledge.
• The Tribal Generation is a movement designed to assist the church in reaching this generation of youth (the emerging generation), which has uniquely similar characteristics throughout Latin America (and, indeed, throughout the world).  It is seeking to reach the fringes of the new generation.  It provides training and coaching for church planters.  It is not a denomination of its own. Nor does it propose a singular methodology.  It is a network of friends helping friends to effectively plant churches that speak to this generation of youth.  Involved in training leaders, discipleship roundtables, stimulating church planting, based on 24/7 prayer.

Indonesia Case Study: Edited from public notes for security reasons.

Roy Wingerd; “Informed Church Multiplication”

• Research:  It’s important to determine how to gather information and which kind we need. It’s difficult to get accurate information.  Most important information is not the statistics themselves (tracking expansion) but being able to determine if extension is happening, and if it is, how?
• Research needs to be cyclical.  It must happen throughout a whole project.  Every worker should be engaged in some way in research.  There is a need to have us change our thinking, that we are all responsible for gathering data.
• Research is motivating, needs to be ongoing to adjust our actions, make our ministries more effective.  Luke 8: Parable of the soils; Meaning of facts.  Part of our responsibility is to determine how we can better prepare the ground for the gospel ­ prayer, spiritual warfare - how to stand strong in the face of persecution, materialism.  Determine where to go next, what to do next.
• Some say that the most effective church planters have no mechanisms for reporting.  They allege that counting happens by and for those who have an interest in the totals (because of funding, constituency, supporters, etc.)
• Two camps:  Church planting camp, and research specialist camp.  How can we come together for benefit and create synergy?
• There are different methodologies of counting:  Estimates, Census, Sampling.  Does it matter which method we use?  When?  How often we use it?  In what contexts?
• Research challenges for CPM:  a) Limited capacity to remember details, b) Bias (researcher and respondent), c) Over use of extrapolating, d) Distinction between expansion and extension, e) Recognizing variation within a group, f) Measuring outcomes and impact, g) What happens if nothing happens?
• We have to be thinking of specific end goals when thinking about info:  a) Helping us make good decisions, b) Give shape to activities we’re already involved in, c) Achieve the vision God gave us
• Bottom line is being obedient to the fulfillment of Jesus’ command to go make disciples of all nations, and not miss any group, where the church both makes disciples and transforms society.  Can we figure out if we can actually do what Jesus asked us to do when He commissioned us to make disciples of all nations?  Precisely?
• Recommends book Mission India, by President Abdul Kalam. We need to understand theology, strategy and God’s heart.