Building Support Systems

Transcription

1 Building Support Systems Sustaining and Nurturing the Church Planter DESIRED OUTCOMES: After you finish this unit you will be able to develop support system plans by: 1. Addressing and facilitating supportive relationships 2. Planning for ways to meet the spiritual and emotional needs of the church planting team 3. Discovering other potential support needs There are a couple of mental pictures that could be developed from thinking about building support systems. The grape vine pictures a living organism that needs a support system in order to bear good fruit. Without the support, the vine would break and collapse under the weight of the ripe clusters of grapes. Eventually, the vine would become weak and unhealthy and would no longer be able to produce good fruit. The other picture is of a young plant that needs support while it develops a root system. Plant a new tree without some support and the elements will blow it over. On the other hand, if you leave the support there too long, the tree becomes dependent on it and never fully develops it s own support system. People that are just getting started in church planting need good support systems. This is especially true for lay people that are getting involved in church planting for the first time. The object is not to provide too much support nor too little. Neither is it to provide support in ways that create dependence or lasts too long. It is, however, to provide just the right kind of support, at the right time and in a way that helps that person to grow deep roots of their own that result in much fruit. 35

2 WHAT SUPPORT IS NOT! The very first image that most of you conjured up when you saw the word support was money. Admit it, in the church planting world, the word support has become synonymous with funding and money. In this unit, we are not talking about financial support! In fact, effective lay strategies do not have funding for people this is what makes it lay church planting. However, there is a real need for support systems that focus on the person. We are wanting to focus on building support systems around the lives of lay people that are involved in church planting. While there are financial needs in a church planting project, the success or failure of the new church is not normally a function of the financial support base. Much more critical is the health and vitality of the church planting leaders. The number one problem cited by church planters is a feeling of isolation and loneliness. Your efforts to build effective support systems that focus on the church planting team will yield great dividends. BIBLICAL FOUNDATIONS The church at Antioch is a great illustration of a church that took their support responsibility seriously. This missionary sending church understood what it meant to commission people to mission activity and send people out with a solid support system in place. Let s do a quick Bible study of this church with an eye to discovering how they supported the church planting team of Barnabas and Saul. As you read through these passages of Scripture, look for how the church demonstrated support for the church planting team. Also look for ways the church planting team supported the home church. Passage Acts 13:1-3 Ways that mutual support was communicated/demonstrated Acts 14:21-28 Acts 15:

3 So, what did you discover? How did the church at Antioch provide support to this missionary team? Write out the key principles you see in these passages. What other forms of support for your church planting team do you believe would be helpful? Mile Posts THE CAST OF THE SUPPORTING TEAM Who needs to be part of the support system you will build for church planting? We want to suggest a general principle here: The support system needs to be large enough to meet the support needs of the church planting team, but not any larger. In other words, it needs to be just large enough. The issue is not size. You need to gather people and organizations that have something to contribute to encouraging and supporting the church planting team. DIALOGUE BOX BUILDING A SOLID SUPPORT SYSTEM Sponsoring church Mentor Partnerships both formal and informal This includes other churches, individuals, the association, state convention, etc Prayer teams Experience has shown us that having a mentor is one of the key factors in the support system we have been talking about. In fact, the early results from some research on the effectiveness of new church plants shows that having a mentoring relationship is a key indicator for the effectiveness and growth of new churches. And, the more often the mentor and church planter meet, the better it is! 1 PRAYER Alongside the mentoring relationship, prayer is the foundation of any support system (the mentor needs to be praying!). Church planters and church planting teams should be going out knowing that there are people committed to praying for them and the Kingdom work they are involved in. We are not talking about casual, occasional prayer but regular, specific, and focused prayer. You know the old adage When it is everyone s responsibility, it is no one s responsibility. This is never more true than it is for prayer. The need for prayer support teams is present SEED PACKET SUPPORT TEAM Prayer Mentor and/or supervisor Primary partner church (Sponsoring church) Partnering churches Association State convention 37

4 regardless of your ministry setting a local church sending out one of her own, an association or a state convention attempting to impact the lostness of some geographic area. It will be important that you think about enlisting pray-ers and mentors for every lay person that commits themselves to church planting. GARDENING TOOLS FINDING MENTORS What to look for: People that genuinely care Good listeners People that invest in others Know how to encourage Committed to pray Celebrate the success of others Where to find them: Pastors with a missions heart Staff members with missions assignments Those with church planting backgrounds Retired pastors Associational & state staff persons Those with church planting experience GARDENING TOOLS MENTORING Most state conventions offer training for mentors. This 12 hour training event will give you the tools to be an effective mentor to your church planter. Contact your state convention office for more information or the Mentoring Team at the North American Mission Board. Gerald Cobert gcolbert@namb.net Steve Reid sreid@namb.net (770) DIALOGUE BOX MENTORING DICK MAY BY DAVID JACKSON One of the most enjoyable experiences I've had in my ministry was the opportunity to serve as mentor for Dick May, pastor of Winthrop Baptist Center in Winthrop, Massachusetts. I'm sure that through the experience he taught me more than I taught him. Dick started out as a layman who had a deep hunger to plant a church in his hometown that would unashamedly proclaim Christ. We talked in the early days about church planting strategies and we prayed together often. During the time I served as his mentor, we would try to get together at least once a month, in order to talk face-to-face about what was going on. We were together at the monthly Church Planter Network meeting, too. In addition, I visited Dick's church when I could after worship services had started. It was so moving to see the way that God was using Dick and the Winthrop church! On occasion, I would go out to eat with Dick and his wife after services just to fellowship and rejoice in the progress they were making. I moved away from the Boston area in early 2001 to assume a new position in ministry. Dick ed me not long after to tell me that, halfway through the calendar year, they had already seen fifty people come to faith in Christ! Nothing he could have said would have made me feel that my investment of time and love had been more worthwhile than that! I thank God for the gift of a mentoring relationship with Dick May; it has changed my life forever. 38

5 The church planter needs to be responsible for enlisting an intercessory prayer team. Even when the church planting team assumes this responsibility, there are things you can do to encourage and facilitate this. Think about how you would communicate this need to church planters early in their work. Consider how you can facilitate regular contact between the support people and those lay people involved in church planting. We would suggest that you help church planting people and their support teams develop written covenants. Covenants are extremely helpful tools in building these kinds of support relationships. GARDENING TOOLS Ways to have contact: Face to face meetings On site visits to the church planting setting Phone calls Web based chat rooms Help for developing covenants: Visit and download the Mentor Selection Guide. Talk with your state convention church planting leader about Mentor Training in your state. REFLECTION QUESTIONS What kind of support system do you need for a healthy church plant? What kinds of support are needed for the lay church planting you need to begin? How will you personalize the support system for each church planter or church planting team? How will you enlist and train mentors? How many mentors do you need? How will you enlist and train prayer teams? How many of these will you need? What can you do to help the church planter and the support team maintain regular communication and contact? How will you help ensure that covenants are a part of the support process? Are there other kinds of support needs you have to address? How will you insure that the support that is offered does not produce dependence? How will you insure that the support system is reproducing? Could you do this again and again if God were to move in a significant way in your midst? PRAYER Now would be a good time to pause and lift all of this up in prayer. We have raised a number of issues that may be new to you and asked questions that you may not have answers for. Place your lack of awareness and unanswered questions before the One that knows everything and has all of the answers. Ask Him to reveal all of this to you in a way and in a time where you will be able to respond in obedience. Spend some time in prayer as you begin to create your mile posts. 39

6 MILEPOST QUESTIONS Now it s time to put the next section of the puzzle in place. You have been jotting down potential mile posts as you worked your way through this unit. Collect all of the Post-It notes you have generated. Take the large chart pack page you have used in the last couple of units and begin adding the mile posts you have generated in this unit. Prayerfully put them in order. Arrange and rearrange as necessary. Some of the mile posts from this unit may overlap mileposts you generated in previous units. This is OK. As you begin to place your new mile posts on the sheet, use the following questions to guide you: Are there any mileposts missing? Do you need to add some additional mile posts? Are they in order and is there a natural flow from one to the next? Are they written with verbs, in the past tense? Are these mile posts appropriate and doable for your ministry setting? Will your mile posts result in effective supports systems being created for lay people involved in church planting? Will your mile posts address all of the support needs of lay church planting teams? Are all of the components discussed in this unit dealt with in some way? Is there anything else that God s Spirit has impressed on you that needs to become a mile post? 1 Ed Stetzer Ph.D dissertation, Southern Seminary; unpublished 40

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