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Part One: In the Beginning |
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Part Two: Church Planting Movements Around the World |
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Part Three: Lessons Learned |
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Part Four: Launch Pad |
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Acknowledgments i
Preface vi
> Chapter One: How It All Began........................................................ 11
You Would Not Believe…"Look to the nations, watch and be utterly amazed for I am going to do something in your days that you would not believe even if you were told" (Habakkuk 1:5).
A New Kind of Missionary This new paradigm of 21st century missionaries is reshaping the world of missions and contributing immeasurably to the spread of Church Planting Movements.
Learning from the Doers In August 1998, a dozen Strategy Coordinators and mission researchers who had experienced Church Planting Movements gathered in Rockville, Virginia. Their purpose: to understand how God is at work in Church Planting Movements.
Chapter Two: What Are Church Planting Movements?...................15
What are Church Planting Movements? A Church Planting Movement is a rapid multiplication of indigenous churches planting churches that sweeps through a people group or population segment.
A Five-Part Definition Rapid, multiplication, indigenous, churches planting churches within a people group. Each term is examined and defined.
What a Church Planting Movement is Not Not a revival, not mass evangelism, not a people movement, not the Church Growth Movement, not just a miracle, not a Western invention, not an end in itself.
Why Church Planting Movements are Important No other avenue so quickly and effectively multiplies the glory of God in the hearts of so many people. No other means has drawn so many new believers into ongoing communities of faith where they can continue to grow in Christlikeness.
Part Two: Church Planting Movements
Around the World
Chapter Three: India............................................................................... 27
In Madhya Pradesh a Church Planting Movement produces 4,000 new churches in less than seven years.
By 2001 a Church Planting Movement in Orissa was seeing new church being started every 24 hours.
A Church Planting Movement among Bhojpuri-speaking peoples results in more than 4,000 new churches and some 300,000 new believers.
Chapter Four: China................................................................................37
A Church Planting Movement in a northern Chinese province sees 20,000 new believers and 500 new churches planted in less than five years.
In Henan Province Christianity explodes from less than a million to more than five million in only eight years.
In southern China a Church Planting Movement produces more than 90,000 baptized believers in 920 house churches in eight years time.
In 2001 a newly emerging Church Planting Movement yields 1,700 new churches and 48,000 baptized believers in a single year.
Chapter Five: Other Asian Movements..............................................49
During the decade of the nineties, Church Planting Movements in Outer Mongolia and Inner Mongolia produce more than 60,000 new believers.
A Church Planting Movement transforms Cambodia's killing fields with more than 60,000 new Christians and hundreds of new churches planted over ten years.
Despite government attempts to eliminate Christianity, a Church Planting Movement in one Southeast Asian country adds more than 50,000 new believers in five years.
Chapter Six: Africa...............................................................................63
Over the last century, the number of professing Christians in Africa grows from nine million to more than 360 million. Each month an estimated 1,200 new churches are started in Africa.
In eight months, 28 Ethiopian evangelists lead 681 persons to Christ and start 83 new churches.
Today, after years of resistance to the gospel, some 90,000 of Kenya's 600,000 Maasai are followers of Jesus Christ.
Chapter Seven: The Muslim World..................................................71
More Muslims have come to Christ in the past two decades than at any other time in history.
In North Africa, more than 16,000 Berbers turn to Christ over a two-decade
period.
A Central Asian movement sees 13,000 Kazakhs come to faith in Christ over
a decade and a half.
In Indian Kashmir, 12,000 Muslims turn from jihad to the Prince of Peace.
In an Asian Muslim country, more than 150,000 Muslims embrace Jesus and gather in more than 4,000 locally led Isa Jamaats (Jesus Groups).
Chapter Eight: Latin America.............................................................87
Every Saturday night, 18,000 youth line up to enter a stadium for worship in Bogotá, Colombia. Each week another 500 youth commit their lives to Christ and the core values of prayer, fasting, and holiness. During the week they gather in 8,000 youth cell groups.
Among the Kekchi of Guatemala, Evangelical Christianity grows from 20,000 believers to more than 60,000 in three decades.
During the decade of the 1990s, Christians in a Latin American country overcame relentless government persecution to grow from 235 churches to more than 4,000 churches with more than 30,000 converts awaiting baptism.
Chapter Nine: Europe......................................................................... 97
In 1999, a Church Planting Movement among refugees in the Netherlands produced 45 new church starts in a single year.
In three decades, the Gypsy Evangelical Movement of France and Spain grows to 30-40,000 church members with 150,000 attending worship.
In 1996 two young Swiss Evangelicals begin a cell church. In just five years the International Christian Fellowship grows to more than 3,000 members meeting in several hundred home cell groups.
Chapter Ten: North America..............................................................106
In 17 years, a Baptist church in North Carolina becomes the mother, grandmother and great grandmother to 42 churches from which sprang 125 ministers.
In 20 years time, DOVE Christian Fellowship grows from three cell churches with 25 members to more than 80 cell church networks on five continents with more than 20,000 members.
Throughout 2001, Church Multiplication Associates saw a new church started every week.
Each week Saddleback Valley Community Church and Willow Creek Community Church shepherd 33,000 members through a network of 3,200 home cell groups.
Chapter Eleven: In Every Church Planting Movement.................. 119
Ten Universal Elements 1. Extraordinary Prayer, 2. Abundant Evangelism, 3. Intentional Planting of Reproducing Churches, 4. The Authority of God's Word, 5. Local Leadership, 6. Lay Leadership, 7. House Churches, 8. Churches Planting Churches, 9. Rapid Reproduction, 10. Healthy Churches
Chapter Twelve: What Does the Bible Say?....................................139
A Church Planting Movement World The first-century world was swirling with new converts and multiplying indigenous churches planting churches-in short, Church Planting Movements.
Origins in Jesus The origins of Church Planting Movements can be traced to the life and teachings of Jesus Himself.
Chapter Thirteen: In Most Church Planting Movements............153
Ten Common Factors 1. A Climate of Uncertainty in Society, 2. Insulation from Outsiders, 3. A High Cost for Following Christ, 4. Bold Fearless Faith, 5. Family-Based Conversion Patterns, 6. Rapid Incorporation of New Believers, 7. Worship in the Heart Language, 8. Divine Signs and Wonders, 9. On-the-Job Leadership Training, 10. Missionaries Suffered
Chapter Fourteen: Seven Deadly Sins...........................................167
Asking the Right Question: What's keeping a Church Planting Movement from happening here?
Seven Deadly Sins: The First Deadly Sin: Blurred Vision, The Second Deadly Sin: Improving the Bible, The Third Deadly Sin: Sequentialism, The Fourth Deadly Sin: Unsavory Salt, The Fifth Deadly Sin: The Devil's Candy, The Sixth Deadly Sin: Alien Abduction, The Seventh Deadly Sin: Blaming God.
Chapter Fifteen: Frequently Asked Questions...........................181
1. What are you calling a church? 2. What is the role of volunteers in Church Planting Movements? 3. What is the role of foreign funding in Church Planting Movements? 4. What is the role of missionaries in Church Planting Movements? 5. What is the role of theological education? 6. What is the difference between cell churches and house churches, and how is each related to Church Planting Movements? 7. Why is it not happening here? 8. If I connect all the dots, can I make it happen? 9. Will they last?
Chapter Sixteen: Practical Handles...............................................195
A Good Definition of Insanity? Keep doing what you've been doing, while expecting different results.
Begin at the End Evaluate all that you do in light of your vision.
Asking the WIGTake Question What's it going to take to reach my community with a Church Planting Movement?
Living the Vision How to live the vision yourself, helping you understand the subtleties and nuances of what you're trying to communicate to others.
A CPM Snapshot? How to view your own community through the lens of Church Planting Movements.
Strategies to Close the Gap How to develop and implement a strategy that will move your community into alignment with God's Church Planting Movements.
Training 4 Trainers Learn how one strategist's remarkable approach to evangelism and church planting resulted in 15,000 church plants and 160,000 baptisms in a single year, producing the largest Church Planting Movement in history.
Chapter Seventeen: A Call to Action...........................................209
Five Stages to Riding a Church Planting Movement: Stage One: Rhetorical Embrace, Stage Two: Catching the Vision, Stage Three: Understanding, Stage Four: Passionate Pursuit, Stage Five: Riding the Wave
Where are You?
Epilogue............................................................................................213
The hinge of history before us concerns the eternal destiny of millions. The question is not whether Church Planting Movements are right or wrong, but whether we will be participants or simply observers, allowing God's movements to pass us by. God's handiwork in these movements is as irrefutable as these movements are inevitable; it is we who are the question mark.
Additional Resources
Appendix One: Training 4 Trainers........................ 217
A close-up look at the evangelism and church planting methods that produced 15,000 new churches and 160,000 baptisms in the largest Church Planting Movement in history.
Appendix Two: POUCH Church.................................233
The recipe for developing your own house church, complete with the DNA for a Church Planting Movement.
Appendix Three: The Qur'anic Bridge.....................235
See the evangelism and church planting methods that have led to 150,000
Muslims coming to Christ and 4,000 new church starts over the past decade.
Glossary: ..................................
239
Biblical Index to Church Planting Movements.........243
Seventeen pages of Biblical references to Church Planting Movements in addition to Chapter Twelve's "What Does the Bible Say?"
Selected Bibliography..............................................251
Nearly one hundred selected books and articles to fuel your further understanding of Church Planting Movements.
Index .......................................................................257