Models for Church Planting

Open Bible embraces a variety of models for starting new churches. The stages listed above may seem to presuppose a congregational approach to church planting, but we do work with plants using other models. For example, two of our current projects involve the planting of house churches which reproduce themselves. This plan requires a minimum of financial resources and relies heavily upon relational evangelism. The planter chooses to be bivocational so that he or she can work each day with the very people he or she is trying to reach. Since the “stuff of church” happens in the homes, no official church facility is needed. 

In short, we do not advocate a specific model. Instead, we help planters determine which approach best suits them in light of their personal, ministerial identities, their launch team members’ gifts, their ministry contexts and their target groups. This often requires prospective planters to step back from their “strategic plans” (filled with goals based upon other pastors’ models in other parts of the country) and take time to study the people groups they are going to reach. 
A church planter’s greatest enemy can be his or her own assumptions about the people group being reached.

Well-meaning planters spend more time studying planting models, looking for the latest “grow a church quick” scheme, than they do researching the people group they are called to evangelize. Consequently, they enter the community with false assumptions about what it will take to reach them with the gospel message. When we work with planters, we try to bring them back to basic missiological principles and develop an appropriate model from there. 

Practically, this may mean the planter spends the first six months living among the people group learning everything he or she can about them. During this time, particularly if he or she is new to the area, the planter looks for the networks of relationships that exist within the community. He or she discovers who the influencers in those networks are. Then that pastor builds bridges into the lives of those influencers by using what they have in common as a starting point. 

In other words, this planter’s initial goal revolves around developing strategic relationships with influencers that could later result in a people movement, something that pastor desires more than just a series of individual conversions. He or she does not try to see how quickly a Bible study or church meeting can be started. Instead of trying to get people to come to his or her meetings, he or she fulfills the great commission by going out where the people are, living with them and participating in the community’s pre-existing small groups (PTAs, bowling leagues, etc). Once the influencers receive Jesus, those whom they influence likely will follow their lead. 

Obviously, this describes just one model for how to apply the missiological principles. Regardless of the method or approach, we long to see these principles applied in each plant. We want people to understand the power of networks of relationships, homogeneous units, contextualization, bridges of God, and so much more. 

In summary, we advocate a principle-centered approach to planting rather than a model-driven approach. 

If you are interested in becoming an Open Bible church planter, please contact:
Randy Loescher
Church Planting Director, Central Region
PO Box 702558
Tulsa, OK  74170-2558
(918) 814-8181
randytulsa@aol.com

Becoming a Church Planter * Models for Church Planting * Regional Support * Church Planter Responsibilities * Forms * Getting Your Church Started * Church Planting Resources

Open Bible Churches Central Region

2500 Casady Dr.
Des Moines, IA 50315
515.282.6491
info@openbiblecentral.org

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