Harbor Network
Planting Passionate Churches
05/02/2010
03/25/2010
The Point of the Spear
Tom Elenbaas and I are attending the North American Network conference in Miami with Dr. Tim Keller, the staff of Redeemer City to City, and representatives from a number of church multiplication networks from around the U.S., Canada, and Mexico.
Often the question of church planting vs. revitalization comes up. "Why plant new churches when there are so many to revitalize?" or "In these tough economic times, we need to care for the poor and hurting rather than plant new churches." Al Barth from Redeemer City to City put it well yesterday when he said: "Church planting is the point of the spear when it comes to wholistic, gospel transformation in a city."
Church planting is the "lead discipline" in a gospel movement. Revitalization, reaching children, connecting with the broken and needy, making deeper and more devoted disciples...are all necessary and God is calling us to all of them. But the point of the spear...must be church planting and turning the hearts of people to Christ and his gospel of grace. The Kingdom of God comes when the church is vital and alive and growing as a sign of the Kingdom!
In my experience...churches that plant churches...are more likely to be doing all of these other things as well.
03/20/2010
Viral Churches
We tried to create a standard for measuring a church multiplication movement. We define it as when a movement of churches has a 50% reproduction rate each year with 50% of the people coming to the new churches as new converts and then seeing that pattern through the third year. In other words, if one year there were 100 churches, the next year there'd be 150 churches and half of the new people in those churches would be new converts and that goes on for at least three years. We consider that to be a church multiplication movement.
03/19/2010
03/07/2010
Ed Stetzer - A LifeWay Research blog on theology, missiology, missional church, church planting, church revlitalization, and innovation.
It's natural. It's normal. It's essential. And we all know how to do it. But somewhere along the way, church reproduction and multiplication became unusual or strange in North America. And I am not happy about it.
03/02/2010
02/25/2010
Interesting Observation from Tim Keller's Blog
Just came across this blog post from Tim Keller from Redeemer Presbyterian Church in NYC. I have included his fourth point here...the full post can be read at www.redeemercitytocity.com
We must develop a far better theology of suffering. Members
of churches in the west are caught absolutely flat-footed by suffering and
difficulty. This is a major problem, especially if we are facing greater 'liminality'--social
marginalization--and maybe more economic and social instability. There are a
great number of books on 'why does God allow evil?' but they mainly are aimed
at getting God off the hook with impatient western people who believe God's job
is to give them a safe life. The church in the west must mount a great new
project--of producing a people who are prepared to endure in the face of
suffering and persecution. Here, too, is one of the ways we in the west can connect to
the new, growing world Christianity. We tend to think about 'what we can do for
them.' But here's how we let them do something for us. Many or most of the
church in the rest of the world is used to suffering and persecution. They have
a kind of faith that does not wilt, but rather grows stronger under threat. We
need to become students of theirs in this area.
02/01/2010
The Suburbanization of Poverty - Brookings Institution
By 2008, suburbs were home to the largest and fastest-growing poor population in the country. Between 2000 and 2008, suburbs in the country’s largest metro areas saw their poor population grow by 25 percent—almost five times faster than primary cities and well ahead of the growth seen in smaller metro areas and non-metropolitan communities. As a result, by 2008 large suburbs were home to 1.5 million more poor than their primary cities and housed almost one-third of the nation’s poor overall. Midwestern cities and suburbs experienced by far the largest poverty rate increases over the decade. Led by increasing poverty in auto manufacturing metro areas—like Grand Rapids and Youngstown—Midwestern city and suburban poverty rates climbed 3.0 and 2.2 percentage points, respectively. At the same time, Northeastern metros—led by New York and Worcester— actually saw poverty rates in their primary cities decline, while collectively their suburbs experienced a slight increase. In 2008, 91.6 million people—more than 30 percent of the nation’s population—fell below 200 percent of the federal poverty level. More individuals lived in families with incomes between 100 and 200 percent of poverty line (52.5 million) than below the poverty line (39.1 million) in 2008. Between 2000 and 2008, large suburbs saw the fastest growing low-income populations across community types and the greatest uptick in the share of the population living under 200 percent of poverty. Western cities and Florida suburbs were among the first to see the effects of the “Great Recession” translate into significant increases in poverty between 2007 and 2008. Sun Belt metro areas hit hardest by the collapse of the housing market saw significant gains in poverty between 2007 and 2008, with suburban increases clustered in Florida metro areas—like Miami, Tampa, and Palm Bay—and city poverty increases most prevalent in Western metro areas— like Los Angeles, Riverside, and Phoenix. Based on increases in unemployment over the past year, Sun Belt metro areas are also likely to experience the largest increases in poverty in 2009. Over the course of this decade, two economic downturns translated into a significant rise in poverty, nationally and in many of the country’s metropolitan and non-metropolitan communities. Suburbs saw by far the greatest growth in their poor population and by 2008 had become home to the largest share of the nation’s poor. These trends are likely to continue in the wake of the latest downturn, given its toll on traditionally more suburbanized industries and the faster pace of growth in suburban unemployment. This ongoing shift in the geography of American poverty increasingly requires regional scale collaboration by policymakers and social service providers in order to effectively address the needs of a poor population that is increasingly suburban.
01/30/2010
Planting Passionate Churches: An Update for Fair Haven
Top Ten Things that Everyone Needs to Know About Church Planting at Fair Haven:
1. Rock Harbor is about to launch weekly worship on February 14, 2010 under the direction of Campus Pastor Louis Ford, this new worship venue is designed for people who are looking to connect to God and each other in a welcoming and high energy environment, while being challenged to commit their lives to Christ and his body the church resulting in life change and the opportunity to live and work as world changers. This Connect. Commit. Change. strategy is the DNA of church multiplication that we will use to plant passionate churches that fuel a passion for God. For more information go to www.myrockharbor.org
2. Rockhills Church in San Antonio has completed their move from a popular movie theater to a local public school building. They have had worship attendance above 200 throughout the month of January with 281 on Sunday the 24th. You can check out their website at www.rockhills.com
3. We are in the process of beginning our first off-site worship location. This new congregation will be located 5 to 10 miles from the main Fair Haven campus and will seek to serve the larger West Michigan community and reach those who outside the body. We are in the process of building a new launch team that we hope will be fully functioning in June of 2010.
4. Lighthouse Village Ministries is in the redevelopment process right now and we look for some important developments to come about in the spring.
5. Harbor Network is the church multiplication arm of Fair Haven. You can get updates and information on Planting Passionate Churches on the Harbor Network blog at www.harbornetwork.typepad.com or follow the network on Twitter at www.twitter.com/HarborNetwork
6. We are beginning to work with the South Grand Rapids Classis of the Reformed Church in America to plant a church among the Bhutanese and South Asian refugees who are coming to the Grand Rapids area. This project will be done in coordination with Words of Hope and Spotlight Radio and will have a global element as we support efforts to win Bhutan and Nepal to Christ.
7. Why is this relevant to the "average" Fair Haven family member? Because new churches reach new people and the very DNA of Fair Haven includes church multiplication. To be a part of Fair Haven means involvement in Church Multiplication and Mission and Outreach. Our dream is that every Christian would be spiritually passionate and spiritually reproducing; that every Life Group would be spiritually passionate and spiritually reproducing; that every ministry and our entire church would be passionate and reproducing!
8. Lighthouses of Philadelphia just opened their third worship center in their three years of existence. They also have over 30 house churches and a homeless ministry in the greater Philadelphia area. New churches are changing the world around them!
9. The Reformed Church in America, our denominational family, is focused on Church Multiplication for a 10 year period. Our Call has as one of its five elements the goal of starting 400 new churches in 10 years in a 900 church denomination. We are almost six years into this project and have planted over 200 new congregations! The General Synod 2010 is focused on Church Multiplication when it meets in Orange City, Iowa June 11 through 15. Doug McClintic our Pastor of Mission and Multiplication will attend as a delegate as well as a long time member of the denominational Church Multiplication Team.
10. Prayer is what drives a movement of spiritual multiplication. The 938 project is all about praying for the harvest and multiplication. For more information about how you can get involved in this key prayer initiative just send an email to the938project@gmail.com
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