Urban Church Planting – My Ministry Breakthrough

15: Doug Paul – East End Fellowship, Richmond VA

By mmb_admin | January 28, 2019

Breakthrough ideas with Doug:

How does a church begin as an accidental church plant?
If the Kingdom of God were to come to your town, would it look like your church?
Is a church a church until they hold their first worship service?
How does a church formalize a public witness as the body of Christ gathered?
What is our discipleship model? Does it work? – Core questions for every church according to Dallas Willard.
What are the character and competencies of Jesus that are transferrable to every member of your church? Here is one church’s approach.
The Five Fold Skills of East End Fellowship – the core things that every church leader should know and do.
Everybody says we need to make disciples, but in the end, are they just promoting another class or programmatic event? We must move into the marks of a growing disciple.
We signed up for the revolution of the Kingdom of God, and somewhere along the way ended up running a church. Just ask Doug.
Very few people have experienced life on life disciple-making, much less most of our church leaders. Here’s why.
What prompted your pastoral calling to begin with? Was it running more programs or reaching and discipling more people?
Are your people taking spiritual responsibility for being and making disciples? These are.
What if your church “normal” was everyone growing in a disciple-making relationship?
How do leaders move out of a programmatic cycle of ministry administration and into a disciple-making rhythm of growth?
What would happen if your church members did what Jesus said to do?
As it turns out, Jesus is the best disciple maker who ever lived.
If a church is thriving and flourishing, it is always through a team more than one leader.
What happens when the mission of your church moves from being run as an organization to being owned by every member?
Are we about the image of God in everyone or just in those who are most comfortable for us to reach?
Saying no to a lot of what you used to say yes to improves missional effectiveness and fights volunteer burnout.
How do you contextualize the mission of God in your neighborhood? Here’s how one church does it.
What is the most natural next step for your community to become a part of the body of Christ? Is it necessarily attending a service on Sunday morning?
What are the most effective ministry vehicles to carry your vision?
Do you care more about Justice or Jesus? How the missional movement can seem to be sidetracked.
How do you live in the tension of the whole of the Gospel?
Fight for being as passionate about personal holiness as we are communal holiness. Be as moved about your sins as you are societies ills.
Are we as moved to comment about our sin as much as we do government and community?
Are you a church in reaction to something or conviction of something? Here’s the difference.
If we are looking at what the next generation will wrestle with in the gospel… it will be between social justice and personal conviction.
What does a diverse, urban church ministry to reaching the millennial generation look like?
What if everything that you do in ministry up until age 55 was training for ministry from ages 55 to 75?
Stop leading ministry as if you have something to prove and instead becoming living proof of the gospel.
Are you sharing the good news of Jesus or the good behavior of a church member?
Discipleship is not an option… it is central to the good news of Jesus.

Breakthrough resources in this episode:

EastEndFellowship Kickstart Resources Password: NoPlanB

Master Plan of Evangelism by Robert Coleman

The Divine Conspiracy by Dallas Willard

The Best Christmas Pageant Ever by Barbara Robinson

Doug currently helps pastor a team-led church in the inner city of Richmond, VA. He’s the former Global Strategy Director for 3DM, has planted a multiplying missional church, transitioned a mega-church, and was a Teaching Pastor and Multi-Site Director at a multi-site mega church.

Additionally, he has come alongside a myriad of businesses, non-profits, and churches. Doug specializes in re-brands, creating savvy marketing execution and bringing strategic business innovation to increase disciple-making effectiveness. He’s married to Elizabeth, a C-Suite advertising & brand executive for MullenLowe US. They have three precocious and joy-filled kids: Avery, Jude and Sam. And quite recently, they brought a Great Dane puppy into the family!

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10: Chris Driver – Fifth Street Baptist, Levelland TX

By mmb_admin | November 19, 2018

Breakthrough ideas with Chris:

The ethos of six-man football reflects the grit and resilience of small-town life on the west Texas plains. It also inspired this church’s vision.
Who will reach the small town? Who will take the gospel to those places that were once the center of life in our rural communities?
This church of 80 has plans to plant 100 churches, and God is providing in exciting every resource they need. How was your weekend?
Three church planting breakthroughs from the south plains of west Texas.
What does church planting look like in the small towns of west Texas? Learn about Fifth Street Baptist’s disciple-making mission points.
What does authentic and effective discipleship look like in a small town?
Small town residents understand living in community – you don’t have to teach that. But they desperately need to experience Christ-centered community.
You don’t have to teach community and caring for each other in the small town, you just need to connect it to Gospel purpose.
God delights in using small things in big ways. Here is an example from the southern plains of west Texas.
How do we let our people truly invest in each other’s lives? Community is bigger than just having Sunday school or small groups.
What happens when a church has a lot of history but not a lot of legacy?
Years spent in existence as a church do not automatically amount to multiplication influence in the community by the church. Hear the story of one established church leaving a legacy.
This church believes that reaching 10 people in 100 small towns is the way that a church of 80 can reach 1000 people each week.
Relationships overcome geography when discipleship looks like this.
What happens when you really believe that discipleship is for every believer not just the spiritually elite?
Claim ownership of your own discipleship first. Stop waiting for someone to disciple you and start being a disciple maker.
Effectiveness in the small town means that every man woman and child can realistically hear the gospel and have a chance to respond. Here is one way.
A church of 80 attendees has planted five churches in the last 18 months. How is your multiplication strategy working?
Smaller is easier to reproduce. There is something to being a simple church in simple places with simple people sharing a simple message.
Is your operational vision bigger than just more people in weekly worship? It should be.
You can sometimes make people do what you want them to do, but vision ownership like this goes beyond getting what you want to be done.
What happens when a church starts the multiplication process as soon as they start meeting. What does it mean to be “born pregnant” as a church?
God has not forgotten the small town. He has a plan and a purpose to do big ministry in small places.
Get out of the office. You cannot influence people you’re not in contact with.
Busyness in the office does not equate to effective ministry. Ministry “along the way” reflects the way of Jesus.
Irresponsible vision reflects an indescribable God. Be faithful with what He has given you and leave the results to Him.

Breakthrough resources in this episode:

Fifth Street Baptist Church

Exponential Conference

God Dreams by Will Mancini

Download the whole Fifth Street story: Big Vision for Small Places

Real Life Discipleship by Jim Putman

Chris Driver is the Senior Pastor of Fifth Street Baptist Church in Levelland, Texas. Chris enjoys coaching youth sports and is passionate about the sport of six-man football.

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Episode #7: Barrett Bowden

By mmb_admin | October 8, 2018

Breakthrough ideas with Barrett:

How can a church reach Christians who live in the city, from within the city, not just the suburbs?
True fulfillment as a Christ-following leader comes from a deep sense of two key understandings.
Why it is important to bring yourself back to your calling as a leader, not someone else’s.
It is hard to truly rest if people are constantly in contact, and what to do about it.
Every leader needs to know their symptoms of exhaustion and unkempt health.
The importance of every small group having direct contact with this person.
Marry Biblical Gospel rooted purpose with a vocational dream and people are not just looking for a job after school, they are being sent into a calling.
The big problem of never really casting vision beyond week-to-week ministry engagement.
How does the horizon storyline work and why is it important?
Learn the art of “purposed nothingness” and how this makes room for the Holy Spirit.
The one big idea to having a church of deep maturing disciples who are loving caring people reaching the lost.
Three things that, together, are the source of life and effectiveness in ministry.

Breakthrough resources from this episode:

Island Community Church

Zeal Without Burnout by Christopher Ash

M’Cheyne Bible Reading Plan

God Dreams by Will Mancini

Dangerous Calling by Paul David Tripp

New Morning Mercies by Paul David Tripp

Barrett Bowden is the pastor of Island Community Church, a young and thriving congregation in downtown Memphis. Barrett has a heart for leading the church to invest in its unique, urban context and to cultivate missional leaders with a heart for the nations. Barrett is married to Michelle, an adolescent pediatrician in the Memphis area, and they have one adorable daughter, Caroline Jane.

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