I found out something very interesting a few years ago. You know, the key for us always to see the kingdom of God grow as people come to faith in Jesus. I  found that the best way, the most effective plan, to see people come to Christ for evangelism, is actually church planting. And my friend, Dr Peter Wagner, is now  going on to be with the Lord. And he said like this, and he said, there's a  research done by Fuller Theological Seminary where he taught for many years.  And they found if a church is 10 years old or more, only one person is led to  Christ for every 85 people. So church 10 years older, one person comes to  Christ for every 85 people in the church. However, listen closely if the church is  between between four and seven. If that's how old the church is four years to  seven years of age, one person led to Christ for every seven members. So the  newer the church, the more people come to Christ in that local church. But listen to this, if the church is less than three years old, in other words, it's a new  church, brand new church plant, one person is led to Christ for every three  members. See church planting. And Dr Wagner has said this many times. He  says the most is single most effective way to evangelize is to plant new  churches. And house churches is the simplest form of church to plant. So I  believe so much the house church the beauty of starting house churches. You  can start a house church and become in start other house church, become part  of a house church network, which we've been talking about throughout whole  course. Or you can set a house as God could lead you for that house church to  become a community church or become a mega church. And but my strong  encouragement is, if you do that, make sure that in the system, so to speak,  there are strong small groups, strong House Fellowship, strong relational based  church. So we following the book of Acts. Tim Keller, renowned Presbyterian  pastor from New York City, says this, he's from Redeemer Presbyterian Church.  He says it like this, the vigorous, continual planting of new churches, new  congregations, is the single most crucial strategy for the numerical growth in the  body of Christ in every city. In other words, for the kingdom of God to grow, the  best way can grow is the plant and start new churches. Couple years ago, I  have some friends who are church planters from all over the world. Just to give  their story, how do they plant their church? And is a great little book we call the  invitation, inviting people to become part of planting churches, to see more  people come to faith in Jesus Christ. Then in the back of this book, I list just 20  things to do. You say, Well, I think I might be called a plant a church. Well, here's some things that you can think about, if that's on your heart. That's how God's  called you to do. I believe many of you taking this course. That's why you took  the course developing house churches. What would that look like? And let me  quickly tell you what these 20 things are very, very simplistic. I'll be this. This  could help you, first of all, pray and pray and pray and pray. Because obviously  prayer is the bottom line. Through pray, God gets our heart, he be fills our heart  with with with faith for the future, for that which God's called us to, to see people 

come to faith in Jesus. It also prepares a way for others who could join us in  seeing this church plant happen. The number one, we pray. Secondly, you have  to wait. You can start right now focusing on leading people to Christ, asking  Jesus to help me, help you to who's somebody I can lead to Christ. See, it's  really hard to plant a church if we haven't even been involved with leading  people to Christ. Perhaps enter in the church were involved in now it, and  hopefully most of you are involved in churches now, unless you're a brand new  believer, taking this, obviously, taking this, this teaching, and there's no church  available in your city. And find a church somewhere, find somewhere where you  can connect now, before you plant the church, think and if there's no church  available that, obviously you'll start the church that's in your village or your city.  But if you can become part of a church, here's why you learn so much by being  under someone else's spiritual oversight in this whole process. Third thing is  disciple a new believer. And we're going to talk a little much more about that in  this session and following sessions. But learn to disciple new, new believers.  That's what it's going to be like when you plant your house church. Number four, help lead a small group. If there's some kind of small group, whether you're in a  university campus or whether you're involved in some kind of parishes, ministry,  local church be just get involved in a small group somehow. And many help lead it. Ask the leader, could I assist you and help you in this process of leading  people in this small group? And then number five is it be great to lead a small  group yourself talking about a church plant, but you're with another ministry, with another church. You're getting experience, you're learning from others who've  been down this road, even though the church you plant might look much  different than the church you're involved in right now, but you can, you can  simply be. Learning from others in this whole process. Number six, be great if  you could multiply a small group. This is not something you have to do, but it  would really help you when you plant your own church. If you could take a group of people and see them disciple and multiply this small group, this cell group,  this, whatever you want to call it, House Fellowship, it's going to help you in the  process, when you plant a church in the future, and then after you get to that  place, they give you some experience. Then my encouragement number seven  is discuss what you're sensing from the Lord about church planting with your  spiritual oversight, with your pastors or people that God's placed in your life. And some people say, well, our church doesn't want to plant churches within  hopefully there's a church somewhere in your city, somewhere in your area, and  you can connect with who would be willing to release you to do that. And so as  much as possible, let's have good relationship connection with our local church  and discuss that. So it's not just your vision. Comes more of a corporate vision  with others who help you with that vision. And then, number eight, learn how to  lead some kind of a Bible study. There I mentioned a few times in this course,  discovery, Bible studies, and many different kinds of Bible studies, learning how 

to lead Bible studies that bring other people into the process where they're all  processing together. What is God saying? Read through a clear Bible story, a  story of Jesus and performing miracles, or whatever it is, whereby you're  bringing, you're leading a Bible study where there's life. And that's why I gave  some teaching, and how to teach with confidence that brings life. And then  number nine, meet with others who may be called to plant new churches. So  you're doing this yourself. You're doing this with others, and they're used praying with them and saying, What could God be saying? See, this doesn't just happen  just like this. There's a process in God, and we're walking through God's  process where he's preparing us, preparing the way whereby we can see this  church planted, because we want to see healthy churches planted. Number 10,  receive training, and I have commend you. You're doing that right now with CLI,  you're right now here in this Christian leaders Institute, you're taking this, this  course on developing house churches. That's part of the training. Dove  International has training also in planting house church. If you want more  training, and that's online training, you can get there if you want to in the future,  go to dcfi.org and we can help you with with even extra training, and there's lots  more training available through CLI, I love this school, and I love what God's  doing through CLI number 11, discern if you're called this is important. Discern if you're called to lead a church plant, or if you're called to help somebody else  who will lead a church plant. See, some of us are called to primary leadership.  Some of us are called to secondary leadership. Some of us are called to  secondary leadership now, but in the future, we'll be involved in primary  leadership. So you need to discern that in this season of your life, what's God  saying to you right now? Are you called right now to be in primary leadership?  Are you called by God to be in secondary secondary leadership, supportive  leadership. I should say number 12, discern the type of church you'll plant. You  feel like long term, it's going to be a community church or going to be a house  church. Now I assume, for most of you who are taking this training, it will be  house church, because that's why you signed up to take the training. Well, you  need to discern, and it's okay to change. I mean, when I started many years  ago, 40 some years ago, you know, it started ministry. Then we planted a  church, and you are our first church, and about 30, whatever, six, seven years  ago, you know, I thought we'd be a house church network first, and that's where  we started. We weren't sure what it's gonna look like. And then we started  bringing people together. And then we had more of a multi, you know, multi site,  you know, 120 House Fellowship Church. That's the way that worked, a couple  1000 people, but and then later we started help people plant house churches  and let a house church network. So in this, in this period of time, it seems  discern, what do you think God's saying? But be open for him to change, to  change that. So he discerned that number 13. Meet with others who have a  heart to plant the type of church you feel called to plant. So if you feel called to 

plant a house church, ask God to bring other people in that can help you build a  team. Jesus sent them out two by two. And I encourage you to do the same. Do  not try to do it yourself. Build, Build a team of people. I met with a group of  leaders recently, and there's one young couple said, We're called to plant a  house church. Whoever do that. And my first advice to them was, we asked God to give you a team. And now God's brought some people into their lives. They  were commissioned out of their own local church this past weekend, and there's  there in this process of starting this brand new house church, but they're  following a process of God to do that. So build a church planting number 14.  Build a church planting team, or become part of a church planting team,  depending on your call. 15, develop a prayer base, a team of intercessors. So  much happens in the spirit through intercession. And those who will stand with  you. My wife Lauren and I have a team of personal intercessors. They're praying for me right now as I am giving this teaching right right here in Western Michigan that's going all over the world, and they're praying for me right now. You need  intercessors, people who will stand with you. And they may not be involved in  your church plant, but they believe in you again, if they're those kind of people  available. Ask them to pray, to pray for you. Number 16, find ways to partner  with others in this new vision, and maybe there's a way to partner with another  ministry, another some people in another church. And I mean, I just got an email  a few minutes ago from someone who's gonna plant a brand new church, and  he told me, and I'm going to be visiting another pastor in the area just to see if  we can partner together. He knows what we're doing, and he and I know what  his vision is. We learn, is there a way we can partner together? 17, discern who  will be your this is important. Discern who will be your primary oversight, your  primary spiritual connection. When you plant this church. Do not do it alone. In  order is that. And there's possibilities through CLI there's possibilities through  Dove Intgernational. There's possibilities in your own city, in your own area, a  local church or someone else, you could maybe just be there for you, even  though what you're doing isn't part of what they're doing. God is raising up  spiritual fathers and mothers today in the nation of the world who say we want to help another generation plant churches. And though those kinds of people who  are available. And so that's number 17, number 18. Discern who will be your  possible mentors when you start this new endeavor. So you have some  oversight, but there could be others who are mentors, people gone down the  road before, who've done that, and and you find those kind of mentors now you  have to do all these things but I just had written down when I did this book a few  years ago, I was asked to write that. What are some things we should look at,  be clear about before we start this new church, I'm just giving you the whole bit  at one time, number 19 discern the Lord's timing with your team and your  spiritual overseers and your mentor so you have three groups of people you will  work with your team. Whoever God brings to help you your team, they're your 

spiritual oversight, maybe a pastor or somebody that's oversee you in this  process. And number three, your mentors, other people are mentoring you, and  then together you'll hear the voice of God on. When do you start? And you don't  have to be in a hurry allow God to unfold this vision before you in his time.  Habakkuk 2 says The just shall live by faith. You may need to wait for it. You still  wait for the timing of God for this and then 20 you continue to pray and take a  step of faith and expect the Lord to bless you, and expect the Lord to do  amazing things through the church that you plant now, in light of all that and all  we've been talking about and what house church looks like, I want to take some  time in this session and in some other sessions to talk about the heart behind it  all, because we've used the term being a spiritual father being a spiritual mother  a few times, and the the text that you'll be reading from here throughout the end  of this course is from a book I written many years ago called the cry for spiritual  fathers and mothers. See, here's the heart cry. The heart cry is God wants to get his heart, his father's heart, in you, so that when you start a church, it's not just  starting some new vision or some new idea or some new program, but you're  simply expressing the heart of God and saying, I want to help you in this new  house church every person fulfill your dreams and your vision, because I want to be a spiritual father or spiritual mother to you. So if you take your Bibles and turn to your Bibles, to Malachi 4, Malachi 4, your Bibles, and we will simply take it  from there, Malachi 4 and the last few verses of Malachi 4, he says this, verses  5-6, see, I'll send you the prophet Elijah, before the great and dreadful day of the Lord comes and have come the hearts of the fathers to the children and the  hearts of the children to the fathers, or also come and strike the land with a  curse. So what is Malachi prophesying the last two verses of the Old Testament. He's saying, look, he says, before the Lord comes back, I'm gonna do this  amazing thing. I'm gonna turn the hearts of fathers to children, hearts the  children to fathers, both naturally and spiritually. And then he says, At the end of  this, these two verses, he says, or else I'll come and strike the land with a curse  that God promises he will do this turn the hearts of fathers to children, hearts of  children to fathers. And you know, I see it happening all over the world today in  an unprecedented way, where God's changing the hearts of leaders. And rather  than just building their thing, they're simply saying, I want to be obedient and to  build what God's called me to build by His grace. But at the same time, I want to  help a younger generation fulfill the visions and the dreams that's in their hearts. I want to be a spiritual father, spiritual mother to the next generation. So but  here's bottom line, every nation I go to, I find there's this curse. There's still, you  still see the residue of this curse is a lack of fatherlessness, a lack of spiritual  mothers. And I see it in every nation I go to. I remember speaking at a Bible  school, at a one of America's amazing mega churches, and I was front row as a  young man, intensely listening. I just mentioned the need for spiritual fathers  and mothers. After it was over, I was walking out. He said, Could I talk to you for 

a minute? He said, I'm on staff in this church, and the pastor of this church and  my personal friend, a great guy. He said, I'm leaving this church. I said, Why  would you do that? What is it great church? He said, I'm leaving because I need  someone to Father me. He says, just one elder, one leader, one pastor. Would  take one hour a month and sit with me and drink a cup of coffee with me and  talk to me and ask me questions. I stay, but he said, I'm leaving because he was looking for a father. I sat with a I sat at a breakfast table few years ago with a  pastor of a very popular denomination, and he wept. He just wept. He said, 35  years ago, my natural father committed suicide. I've never had a father in the  LORD. Ever since I'm part of a system, but I've never had a father. You see,  there's such a need for spiritual fathers. I meet young men. You say, I see  someone, a new in the Lord, someone, yes, I love the books and I love I love  sermons and all those things. I love worship, but it's asking someone to Father  me. So a heart and a heart cry every generation back in your heart, you're  looking for fathers, you're looking for mothers, and we're called to be fathers and mothers, and we're talking about how we do it, because this is the heart cry. This is the underpinning behind house church, and really for any kind of church, any  kind of believer. But that's where this that's where the focus of this whole course  is, is helping you develop, how do you develop a house church? How do you do  that and a house church network. The heart cry must be, we're called to be  spiritual fathers, and we're called to be spiritual mothers. I was on an airplane  flying from East Coast, USA to West Coast, USA. I picked up an airline  magazine, and I saw that in the state of Oregon, in Portland, Oregon, there was  a businessman who was so concerned about the lack of parents in his city. In  Portland, he gave $2 million to pay people to be parents to the kids in that city.  Now that's just in the natural he was concerned how much more of it is in the  spiritual See, often spiritual leaders have become Christian CEOs, spiritual  CEOs, rather than spiritual fathers and spiritual mothers and God, who says, in  the last days before I come back, I'm going to change that. Now. How's going to  change it? He's got to change our hearts. And our hearts. We were saying, I'm  going to be a spiritual father, spiritual mother to the next generation. I'm going to  say this again and again, because I want you to get it. You might say, I don't  have a spiritual father. How can I be a spiritual father? You cast your bread upon the waters and it shall return. You become a spiritual father. You become a  spiritual mother, and God, by His grace, then will pay his head back and you, he  will be, you'll become, you'll find, you'll have spiritual fathers and spiritual  mothers in your life. So who needs spiritual moms and dads? Everybody, new  believers, older Christians. There's always areas to grow. I'm blessed. I have  some two spiritual fathers in my life. They're wiser than I am. They're older than I am. And your spiritual father or mother does not be older, maybe older in the  faith, but in my case, they are older in the faith, and also they're older, older  chronologically. And I'm a blessed man, because I didn't always have that. 

Here's the bottom line, we all need spiritual fathers and mothers, but we're all  called to become spiritual fathers and mothers. So we'll continue on in the next  session and talk more about how this works, practically in our lives. 



Last modified: Monday, October 7, 2024, 7:56 AM