We have been praying for God to begin a Church Planting Movement among the churches, pastors, leaders and lay folks here in the Texas District. One thing I have been learning through my experiences and through my personal reading of leaders like Bob Roberts, author of The Multiplying Church is that a Church Planting Movement (CPM) looks more like a virus than a strategic plan.In fact, the term Church Planting Movement (CPM) came about as more of a description than a prescription. Bob Roberts described how David Watson coined the phrase. Roberts wrote that "Watson then shared about being at the table with a group of other missionaries when the term crystallized. They were trying to describe what they were seeing take place in the East. 'It was never meant to be the key. It was descriptive.'"
Throughout history, when CPM's are truly taking place they are highly organic in nature. They are actually only the result of lives being transformed through the cross of Christ and by the power of the Holy Spirit. Whole families, villages, cities and societies are changed. It is what happened to he jailer in Acts 16:30-34 . Had not whole households been affected, the Gospel would not have spread at the viral rate it did in the early church. The epidemic spread of the Gospel necessitated the planting of churches to disciple all the new believers! It was a Jesus movement first.
Viruses don't happen by addition but by multiplication and fractaling. In third world countries, it has not been that an individual comes to faith in Jesus Christ and then decides to plant a church. Rather it has been true that Jesus revolutionizes the life of an individual who tells their family and friends with so many people coming to know Jesus that churches become necessary to disciple, care for and equip the new believers who go to the next village and do it all over again.
This kind of growth doesn't happen merely by addition, but by rapid multiplication. Individual disciples share what God has done in their lives through Christ, discipling their their friends and families. In that kind of church learning to tell how God's story of redemption in Christ has intersected our life becomes the norm rather than the exception for church members.
Then the Gospel goes viral.
Looking at where it might next plant a church is always on the agenda of the local church rather than wondering if planting a church is something we might do once in our history.
Then church planting goes epidemic. It can happen!
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