Before I started pastoring, I knew the call of God was on my life. Like most young pastors, I felt it was my time or my season, as some say. Like most young pastors, God had given me great confirmation and assurance that this was his leading in my life. However, once I got into the deep waters of pastoring, I quickly realized I did not know how to swim. It almost appeared that God was not fair, blessing some but allowing others to suffer. Well, now I know that’s not true. Many pastors waste precious years learning, not knowing what to do. Due to a lack of training, tutoring, and teaching, they are stuck in the week-to-week cycle of just going to church. Join me for a journey in church growth principles, giving you the ABCs of church growth. All you need is a little information.

This program will work for any denomination or independent body. It is a step-by-step approach and you can make it work for your church. All you will need to do is to change the name and/or fit the information to correlate with your church. I have laid out in this book with the philosophies and methods I personally followed. I hope you will allow this program to help you for my only intention is to help men of God start churches for the glory of God and the salvation of multiplied thousands. Many pastors have used this program. It has also been used by Home Mission groups and taught in Bible colleges.

Church Planting from the Ground Up is a visionary guide for the critical task of new church multiplication. Share in the wisdom of these field-tested veterans as you gain insight from their stories, practical ideas, and real-world experiences. Book jacket.

What exactly is the Church Growth movement? This timely volume in the Counterpoints series addresses the history of the movement that has become such an enormous shaping force on the Western church today, and it explores--in a roundtable forum of leading voices--five main perspectives on the classic Church Growth movement: Effective Evangelism View - presented by Elmer Towns Gospel in Our Culture View - presented by Craig Van Gelder Centrist View - presented by Charles Van Engen Reformist View - presented by Gailyn Van Rheenan Renewal View - presented by Howard Snyder Each view is first presented by its proponent, then critiqued by the co-contributors. The interactive and fair-minded format allows the reader to consider the strengths and weaknesses of each view and draw informed, personal conclusions. Evaluating the Church Growth Movement concludes with reflections by three seasoned pastors who have grappled with the practical implications of Church Growth. The Counterpoints series presents a comparison and critique of scholarly views on topics important to Christians that are both fair-minded and respectful of the biblical text. Each volume is a one-stop reference that allows readers to evaluate the different positions on a specific issue and form their own, educated opinion.

Jim Griffith and Bill Easum draw from decades of personal experience in planting new churches and consulting with supervisors and planters in new church starts. They have condensed their vast experiences down to ten points that account for the great majority of failures among church planters. For each point, the authors provide examples of the particular mistake and ways to avoid it. They speak in special sections to coaches and supervisors, showing them how to work with church planters to avoid the mistakes. The ten mistakes point in most cases to plans made on the basis of past experiences or unrealistic models that do not fit either the particular church planter or the mission field where the church is planned. the church planter must take the initiative to do God's work as directed by the Holy Spirit, not copy a religious superstar's methods or approach the works as defined by outside sources.

Imagine an organizational model for church leadership that enables the entire team to unleash their full potential. The joy and vigor coming from a collective strength, intelligence, and skill in the community of leaders not only brings greater potency but better yields for your ministry. What would it be like to see this kind of healthy leadership reproduced into the second, third, and fourth generation, on multiple strands? Leveraging the metaphor Ori Brafman popularized in his NYT best-selling book, The Starfish and the Spider, Rob Wegner, Lance Ford, and Alan Hirsch show: How to take a close look at your church's organizational structure and how to adapt instead of simply adopt a certain kind of structural approach. How churches can function without a rigid central authority, making them nimbler in reacting to external forces. How seeding starfish networks inside today's churches will prepare the church of tomorrow to be agile while maintaining the accountability to be effective. The Starfish and the Spirit is about creating a culture where church leaders view themselves as curators of a community on a mission, not the source of certainty for every question and project. It's about creating a team of humble leaders "in the middle" of the church, not at the top--leaders who naturally reproduce multiple generations of leaders, from the middle out.