Planting a daughter church requires vision
Like most church planters, even before we planted Holy Spirit by God’s grace, my wife Ginger and I had a vision to plant new churches out of our church.
By Clancy Nixon
Like most church planters, even before we planted Holy Spirit by God’s grace, my wife Ginger and I had a vision to plant new churches out of our church. Christians are called to bring people from darkness to light, and we knew that conversion ratios were highest in new church starts. Planting was part of our mission statement that we said weekly. We did succeed in launching a new campus in another town (which I led), a house church (led by gifted lay people), and a campus at a retirement village (led by a priest on staff). However, we never seemed to have critical mass or money to send off a team with a full-time pastor, even though we have averaged about 170 in Sunday attendance for several years. We had vision for planting, which is the most important factor of all, but we did not muster a traditional mother-daughter plant on our own. Money was an issue; but I’ve learned that money follows vision!
Soon, we got help with both. The Diocese piloted a model of “Incubator Church Planting” with our church. The Diocese adopted a funding model of giving $15,000 per year, which we as the Incubator Church matched. The balance of the planter’s salary would come from the planter’s raising of his own support, and from our church budget. That is how we funded Darryl Fitzwater to plant our daughter church, Church of the Ascension, in Ranson, West Virginia. Ascension launched in March of 2018, and is doing well. We will continue this funding level for at least 3 years, as will the diocese. Other churches in our Diocese have now adopted this Incubator Church model.
One key to the success of Ascension is the vision of people from our church who live in our area, but who believe in the mission of Ascension, so they are willing to drive over the mountain to West Virginia every week to support it. When we planted Holy Spirit out of Truro 17 years ago, four families came with us for one or two years until we were established, and then went back to Truro. Martyn Minns, then Rector of Truro, gave me a “fishing license” to recruit whoever would come with me, and I gave Darryl the same encouragement. These families see themselves as suburban missionaries. They caught the vision for church planting. Finding gifted lay people to help start a church is an issue; but people follow vision!
Of course, none of this would have been possible without finding the right planter. In our denomination, and especially in our Diocese, both lay and ordained people can plant churches. Several churches near us were started by lay people. For the incubator model, though, we needed to find a planting priest. I had known Darryl for a few years, as he had applied for a job as our youth pastor, and we stayed in touch, as God clarified his vision for planting. As he came on staff at Holy Spirit, he was ordained a deacon, and then a priest.
We pray every day for leaders who will multiply—we pray Luke 10:2—“to the Lord of the Harvest to raise up laborers for his harvest field.” God sent us Darryl. He sent us our other clergy—Dave Prosser, Dean Schultz, and John Nuzum— who all came to me and asked how they might serve. Finding good leaders is an issue—but leaders follow vision!
If God does not give your leaders a vision for multiplying churches, and if this vision is not embraced by your church body, your leaders will think they do not have the money, people, or leaders needed to plant. Money, people, and leaders follow vision.
Is your church called to plant a daughter church soon?
Why not?
Pray for vision from God to multiply.
The Rev. Clancy Nixon is rector of Church of the Holy Spirit in Leesburg, VA
Dream big dreams!
God has been challenging us to think bigger. This isn’t surprising when you see the trajectory the diocese has been on for the past few years. God has carefully been putting the pieces in place to support this kind of growth for some time.
By Tom Herrick
The subtitle of Mark Batterson’s latest book Chase the Lion is “If Your Dream Doesn’t Scare You, It’s Too Small.” Batterson exhorts his readers, “Dream dreams. That’s the natural, supernatural by-product of being filled with God’s Spirit.” Like Moses, David, and Paul, God encourages us to see what’s possible through his eyes, not our own. By asking “Why not?” our world takes on a different perspective and the possibilities of what God can do through us seem endless. As a fellow church planter, I ascribe to Batterson’s “Lion Chaser’s Manifesto,” which says (in part): “Run to the roar…Set God-sized goals…Go after a dream that is destined to fail without divine intervention…Start creating the future…Fight for your dreams…Blaze new trails…Dare to fail…Quit holding back…Chase the lion.”
I have the privilege of sharing my dreams with others, like Bishop John and the Great Commission Committee, who “run to the roar” instead of running away from it. One of the best times we have every year is our annual planning retreat, where we get away for a whole day and dream together about what God wants to do with us. It might sound far-fetched to call a planning retreat an adrenaline rush, but when you share life and ministry with fellow lion chasers, it’s not ‘business as usual.’ This year we spent a good deal of time focused on the dream of planting 50 new churches in the next ten years. God has been challenging us to think bigger. This isn’t surprising when you see the trajectory the diocese has been on for the past few years. God has carefully been putting the pieces in place to support this kind of growth for some time.
Take for instance our goal of developing a “leadership pipeline,” whereby we can provide opportunities for our high school seniors, college students, and young adults to become ministry interns. This has continued to blossom as we now have wonderful young leaders serving as interns at George Mason University with Josh Kammerer and the Apostles at Mason team. For those who hear the call to ordained ministry, the pipeline continues through a residency whereby seminary students and graduates serve for 12-24 months in a congregation while testing the call to plant a new church. The Rev. David Pennylegion was delighted to find this opportunity within our diocese and is currently serving as a pastoral resident with Church of the Resurrection in the Baltimore suburbs. The pipeline eventually leads young leaders to the opportunity to plant new churches. This is the case for the Rev. Matt Hemsley and the Rev. Deacon Darryl Fitzwater, our two most recent church planters. These two are serving “Incubator” congregations Truro (Fairfax) and Holy Spirit (Leesburg) which are partnering with the diocese to plant new churches in the very near future. This leadership pipeline is part of our efforts to develop a DOMA “farm system” for church planters, much like major league sports teams do. Our aim has been to partner with local congregations to give leaders opportunities to serve and develop their gifts for ministry (read more about Internships and Residencies here). With this pipeline in place, we believe God will be sending us many gifted young leaders to bring in the harvest.
But, despite appearances, the goal of planting lots of churches is not about numbers. It’s more an attempt to raise the bar of our expectations and increase the scope of our vision. By focusing on what only God can accomplish, we remember to whom we belong and recall the goals that he has set for us - namely to reach the nations. Our response to his commission is to head in a decidedly missional direction, plant churches that have a strong likelihood of succeeding, and create a culture where health, growth, and reproduction become the norm. Those are goals worthy of our God and of the calling he has graciously given to us. Numbers only tell a small part of the story, but, casting a vision that is bigger than we are inspires us to dream big and step out in boldness and faith.
As we have dreamed this past year, God has challenged us to begin planning for how we will move forward into our future. The result is the Vision for 50, a plan for church multiplication in the diocese. This plan is still taking shape, but it looks forward the next ten years and forecasts what will be needed in terms of people and financial resources to plant 50 churches.
It’s a big dream, indeed a huge dream, but one that sees God at work in our churches and dares to put our trust in him. Please join our L10-2 Intercessors (read more about our L10-2 Intercessors here) as we pray this vision into being and watch God do what only God can do.
The Rev. Dr. Tom Herrick is Canon for Church Planting for the Diocese of the Mid-Atlantic.