A popular methodology for planting is the campus model. In my book “The Genius in the Kingdom: How Discipleship Impacts Church Planting I write:
“I have observed that when churches plant churches these days, they choose to either hard–wire them or soft–wire them as a way of bringing sustained support and maintaining culture:
(a) When the mother church hard–wires the new church being planted it means that the new church operates by the governance process of the mother church and adopts its vision and values. These things are discerned and adopted at the centre and the existing culture in the mother church and its whole approach to mission and church life then extends intact to the new church. This hard-wired approach is particularly relevant to the campus planting methodology. One of the emerging aspects of this research recognised this situation. However, the research was not clear on its value in terms of assisting the viability of the church because only a few of the participants had any experience with it. The research found that “the choice of a multi-site model does allow a new Church to plant a greater level of support than would be the case if a team was doing this kind of work on their own. A greater level of support in this case gives a greater guaranteed viability in the first five years.” This method did gain in popularity consistently in the churches in my research that had been established since 2000; and,
(b) The other option is for the mother church to soft–wire them in. This means that while they initially offer a full range of oversight including governance and compliance, the daughter church is empowered to choose its own culture and approach and may, at a time of their choosing, go out on their own.”
What troubles me though is that I still find people doing this method and treating discipleship as a side-issue. That is a habit that we must break!
The book is now available on paperback and Kindle from Amazon.
Peace
Colin
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