StretchyChurch

I got a forwarded e-mail today with the inspiring story that Billy Graham recently led 16,000 people at the New Orleans Crusade on a one-mile walk from the Superdome to Bourbon Street. When they arrived at Bourbon Street, people who were at the Crusade supposedly started sharing the gospel with partiers and other onlookers.

Great story! Sadly, it’s a hoax. Check out this messageboard thread to read the “article” that’s making its way around the cyberverse, as well as an official response to this story from the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association itself.

Kyle posted some comments/questions about my Launch Conference notes that I think deserve being addressed.

First of all, I need to confess that I definitely don’t have all the answers. I never have and I don’t think I ever will.

I’m drawn to the postmodern/emerging/incarnational approach to ministry. And I wish I could say I was 100% there because I think that this movement really is meeting the needs of people in my generation.

At the same time, I’ve begun to discover that there’s still value in some of the older approaches to ministry (funny–by older, I mean 25 years…). There are millions of people in this country who would get a little freaked out by the idea of becoming part of an “intentional community.” I, personally, understand the value of that kind of community, but for many people when someone says “Community,” what they hear is “Commune.”

Anyway, I say this because over the last year or so I’ve realized that it’s not that “seeker” is “out” and “emerging” is “in.” Both are “in,” depending on the context and the culture that a particular church is trying to reach. Heck, even old-school, mainline, traditional is “in” for some people.

So, let me address Kyle’s comments/questions:

1. Yes, the Launch Conference definitely came from a “purpose-driven, seeker-attractive” perspective. In fact, Nelson Searcy was open about the fact that he used to work at Saddleback with Rick Warren and continues to use the purpose-driven aproach with The Journey Church.

2. I, personally, am not planning on planting a church in Northern Kentucky. I am considering planting a church in another metropolitan area in another part of the country. But that’s still up in the air. I’m also in talks with an established church. I had three reasons for attending the conference: 1) Learn about church-planting (in case that’s what I do), 2) learn some things that will hopefully be transferable to an established church situation (in case that’s what I do), and 3) get some clarity on whether or not I’m called to church-planting (which I’m still wrestling with).

3. It’s true that there will probably be a different kind of spirituality in a “seeker” type of church than in an “intentional community” kind of church. But I think one of the reasons is because of the people that each type of church attracts. Regardless of what you believe, “intentional community” kinds of churches attract a certain kind of person. Likewise, “seeker” kinds of churches attract a different kind of person. And regarding a “core” vs. a “launch team,” one of my upcoming posts will explain why they suggest going with a launch team rather than a core.

Like I said, I’m still on a journey. I’m still trying to figure things out. And I think that’s why I still like the word “stretchychurch.” The church fits all kinds–emerging, seeker, traditional, mainline, protestant, Catholic, conservative, liberal, fundamentalist, evangelical, etc., etc., etc.

The question isn’t, “Are they doing it right?” The question is, “Are they helping people become followers of Jesus?”

Exciting news! I just read on Scifiwire that the fourth Indiana Jones movie is set open on May 22, 2008! Woohoo!!!

Set to direct–Steven Spielberg!! I can’t wait!

Ok, here’s the second part of Planning My First Service From Scratch.

3. Secure my Meeting Location.

• Hotel ballrooms (various sizes)
• Movie theaters (various sizes)
• Comedy clubs (approximately 150 seats)
• Public school auditoriums
• Performing arts theaters
• Available church meeting spaces
• College auditoriums
• Corporate conference space

Four Space Lessons Learned the Hard Way:

1. As much as possible, match your space to your target audience. (You wouldn’t want the people of a rural, farming community meeting in a downtown art gallery.)
2. Make sure your space is easily accessible to your target audience. (You don’t want downtown businesspeople traveling to the countryside–or anywhere else not easily accessed by public transportation.)
3. Make sure your space has a reasonable number of seats.
4. Don’t sign a long-term lease.

4. Plan Comeback Events between my Monthly Services.

• “Comeback Events” are those events you schedule between your monthly services to invite those who attended a service to come back for a non-threatening, fellowship-based event.
• Continue to cast the vision of the new church at Comeback Events.

Examples of Comeback Events:

• BBQ at the pastor’s house
• Picnic in the park
• City events
• Dinner in the back room of a restaurant
• Ice skating
• Swimming

[Quick break from my Launch Conference notes…]

Pastors are prone to letting their ego get the best of them. Maybe I shouldn’t generalize. Maybe I should say, “I am prone to letting my ego get the best of me.” (Hence my picture with this post…)

But I do think that what is true of me is also true of many other pastors. I mean, who doesn’t love to hear someone say, “Oh, pastor, that sermon was awesome!”

I love to hear that! I mean I love to hear that!!

Someone said that to me this weekend (I’m letting you know because it boosts my ego…) and it made me think to myself, “Markus… You da man!!!” And then I thought to myself, “Gosh… God sure is lucky to have a servant like me!”

Bad Markus.

So here’s why I’m thinking about this. I followed some links on another blog that led me to the website of Fellowship Church in Grapevine, Texas. Now, I don’t the know the pastor of this church personally, so please don’t hear what I’m about to say as a personal attack. I’m sure that Ed Young loves Jesus and wants nothing more than to see people come to know Him and have their lives and the world transformed by the power of Jesus in people’s lives.

But as I explored their website, this is what rubbed me the wrong way:

1. One of the main menu headings was titled, “About Ed Young.” The subheadings are “Bio,” “Conferences,” “Resources,” and “Television.” (Did you notice all the pictures if you clicked those links?) What bugs me is that a church should never be about the pastor. The church should be about the people. Sure, you can have a short bio somewhere on the staff page, but…put it on the staff page! Put it with all the other staff members who share equally in the church’s ministry, even if they’re not up in front of the congregation each week.
2. Last night they had a promo video for the new sermon series (it’s not there anymore). They don’t tell you what the sermon series is called, they’ve just got a big smiley face. It’s probably about joy or happiness or something. The video was excellent. I mean the quality of the video was like something you’d see on broadcast TV. But it was just sort of over-the-top. It involved Ed Young interacting with a giant smiley face. Again, just way too much focus on the pastor.
3. I followed some links to Ed Young Ministries. I know that there are a lot of ministries out there named for the person who started them–but I just think there’s something wrong with that (even Charles E. Fuller didn’t want Fuller Seminary named after himself, so the board named the school after his father, Charles H. Fuller). I could probably see Paul in the New Testament starting a ministry organization–it just strikes me as something he might do if it meant he could reach more people with the Gospel. But I can’t see him calling it “Apostle Paul Ministries.” If anything, I think he’d probably call it something like “Worst of Sinners Ministries.”

Here’s the thing. I love big churches! I love the energy of a big church. I love the resources for ministry at a big church. I love the fact that big churches are usually big because they’re reaching people who don’t know Christ. My happiest and most exciting time in ministry was when I was on staff at a big church.

But I also think it can be dangerous for pastors of big churches. I think they can start believing that they’re more special to God than other people.

And I have to be honest. I really hope that wherever God leads me next–if it’s not already a big church–I hope that I can be a part of helping it become a big church. I hope that people who didn’t know Jesus become followers of Jesus and grow into faithful disciples of Jesus. And I hope that they begin to reach their friends and bring them to church where they, too, will encounter Christ.

But I hope and pray the God keeps me humble. And maybe… maybe that means that our church will never become a “megachurch.” Maybe I’ll never get a book published. Maybe I’ll never be interviewed on some widely-read blog.

Maybe I’ll just be Markus the Pastor. And maybe that’s ok…

This next section from the Launch Conference is called Planning My First Service From Scratch. It’s actually a pretty long section, so I’m gonna break it up into three parts. This will (naturally) be the first part.

1. Determine my Launch Date!

• Your launch date is the most important decision you will make after you nail down your calling.
• Once you pick a date, stick to it!

Top 3 Best Launch Dates (#1 is best)
#3 - Easter
#2 - Fall: Just after school starts
#1 - February

Why is February the best time to launch you first service?

• You get a second “bump” in attendance with Easter 2 months later
• There’s plenty of time for growth to happen before summer (when attendance tends to drop)
• People are still willing to do something new with the start of the New Year

Top 3 Worst Launch Dates (#1 is worst)
#3 - Christmas (most attenders are visiting family in the area; they won’t be repeat attenders)
#2 - Tie: Superbowl Sunday, July 4th, Labor Day, or any other national holiday
#1 - Any time other than Sunday morning

2. Plan 3-6 Monthly Services prior to your Launch.

• Monthly services are stepping stones to your Launch.
• Do a minimum of 3 monthly services, a maximum of 6.

The Power of Monthly Services:

• Attract a Launch Team
• Build momentum
• Give you practice and allow you to improve your skills
• Give you a chance to grow
• Provide more time for follow-up
• Enable more efficient use of initial resources
• Lower your stress level
• Make your launch day less intimidating
• Build greater awareness of the church
• Build excitement within the church
• Help you stick to your Launch date
• Allow you to test your meeting location
• Allow you to test a worship leader
• Build your database of future weekly attendees

Monthly Service Do’s and Don’ts

Do:

• Teach a message series
• Talk about your future weekly services
• Receive an offering (unchurched people aren’t offended by receiving an offering)
• Collect contact information (send handwritten notes to everyone who visits)
• Hold at least three monthly services

Don’t:

• Only talk about the future vision
• Tell them you are “practicing”
• Ask them to join (wait till after your launch)
• Hesitate to evaluate and improve
• Do more than six preview services

BUT: How do I staff my monthly services?

• First monthly service will be you, the worship leader, and possibly your spouse and/or a friend.
• After the first monthly service, get volunteers from those who attended that service to staff your next service.

After talking about funding, Searcy and Thomas discussed Staffing: Building a Staff from Scratch.

The first thing they shared was a quote from John Maxwell, which they claimed was the “Greatest Leadership Secret” (and I agree that this is critical): “Those closest to the leader will determine the success level of that leader.”

And then they moved on to discuss Three Tenants (sic) for Staffing a New Church (I think they meant “Tenets,” not “Tenants”):

1. Determine my first year staff

• Lead pastor
• Worship leader

The worship leader ought to be a flexible, teachable, moldable person

Someone who believes in the vision of the church

• Who else do I need to staff Sunday Services?

Volunteers or paid (children’s staff, ushers, greeters, etc.)

God will send the people you need to staff your services

2. Decide how I will make payroll

• Staff can raise some or all of their own funds to support themselves financially.
• It’s not a bad idea to pay someone $50 per week to help with certain tasks. This can help develop more leaders in the church.
• But never pay someone to do something that a volunteer could do.

3. Don’t be afraid of the “Big Ask”

• That is, don’t be afraid to ask people for big commitments or to take on big tasks. All they can do is say no.

Following these three “tenants,” they gave us 10 Staffing Lessons Learned the Hard Way:

1. You’ll never have enough money up-front to hire staff.
2. Hiring staff precedes growth, not vice versa.
3. Hire slow, fire fast. One bad apple spoils the bunch. (It’s normal to have high staff turnover early on in the church start)
4. Hire from within whenever possible.
5. Hiring and firing is ultimately the responsibility of the lead pastor.
6. Hire part-time before full-time.
7. Never hire staff when you can find a volunteer.
8. The role of staff is to find additional volunteers.
9. Hold weekly staff meetings.
• Including volunteer staff.
• You have to meet with your staff in order to lead your staff.
10. Clarity and accountability are the keys to an effective staff.

Coming up next: Planning My First Service From Scratch.

One of the biggest challenges of a new church is money!! So it was great that they included a section on raising funds. They opened with a few quotes:

• “Money isn’t everything, but it is right up there with oxygen.” –Zig Ziglar
• “If God is for us, who can ever be against us? Since God did not spare even his own Son but gave him up for us all, won’t God, who gave us Christ, also give us everything else?” –Romans 8:31-32
• “God’s work done God’s way will never lack God’s provision.” –Hudson Taylor

Then they talked about Four Steps to Raising Funds. The only thing that really confused me is that they actually had five steps, not four. Oh, well…a freebie, I guess.

Step 1: Create a budget

• What will the cost of living in this community be?
• What will my salary be? How about salaries for additional staff? (see www.churchstaffing.com–it’s got a pastors’ compensation handbook)
• How much will it cost to rent space for the church to meet in?
• How much will it cost to operate a business in this city (office rent, phones, computer equipment, copy equipment, and so on)?

• The Chamber of Commerce is a great resource for leads on equipment, office space, etc.
• Move to an office after the 2nd or 3rd monthly service. It will cause less conflict with your family life.
• Don’t sign a long-term lease.
• Buy equipment that’s just a little bigger/better than you need. That way it can grow with you as the church grows.

• There are basically 2 budgets to keep track of: 1) Pre-launch, 2) Post-launch annual budget.

Step 2: Prepare my presentation

Focus on:

• My leadership
• My compelling story
• My strategy
• My plan for self-sufficiency

Step 3: Seek funding

Possible sources of funding:

• Option 1: Personal savings
• Option 2: Bi-vocational ministry
• Option 3: Your spouse (i.e., if you spouse earns enough to support your family)
• Option 4: Your launch team
• Option 5: Outside funders (individuals and churches)

A Key Question: Who has a heart for my area?

Step 4: Develop a plan for regular communication

• Share prayer requests
• Seek mentoring
• Make additional requests
• Invite mission team
• Share results and God-stories

Step 5: Plan an annual partners’ meeting

• Host the meeting at your location
• Invite current and future partners
• Invite spouses
• Make the meeting fun
• Ask for the Big Commitment

“And since we are his children, we will share his treasures—for everything God gives to his Son, Christ, is ours, too.” –Romans 8:17