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How do we do it?
Some people ask, “How do you plant so many churches? What’s your secret? What program do you use?” The answer is simple — we show God’s love to people. We wouldn’t say we have a lot of talents or special abilities, but we rely on the love of God to show through our lives and speak to people. Together we have a passion to preach the gospel to those who have never heard. I have been blessed to see thousands come to know Christ during services. Miracles of the deaf hearing and the lame walking have drawn crowds of unbelievers to salvation. Hundreds of young people have responded to the gospel because Heather reached out to them. No perfect formula exists to plant a church, but we apply a few fundamental principles to help lay a solid foundation for any new work.
The early years
During the early years of our church planting ministry, we would go into a village, promote a crusade and see hundreds of people saved. Little strategy was involved because the need was everywhere. As we worked with the new believers, we identified leaders and conducted quarterly leadership training seminars to help them grow spiritually. But the lack of a church planting strategy caused our efforts to plateau. We needed to become more proactive and strategic in our approach.
Developing a mother church
Our work now involves targeting the most populated and least evangelized areas of Siberia. These areas may or may not have a “mother church”. A “mother church” is a church, reaching, impacting, and influencing their community; disciplining and equipping the saved; and empowering people for ministry. If a mother church exists, we work closely with the pastor or regional superintendent to start training and sending workers and pioneer leaders into the surrounding areas to establish new works. We have found that if leaders stay within their local regions, they are more likely to succeed because of the support base they receive. They already have a model of a healthy local church, giving them the necessary tools to be successful.
If there is no mother church in the area, we take a more aggressive role. Our first goal is to develop a model church, taking into account the culture, customs and traditions. With no existing model for potential leaders to follow, we must establish a healthy church so believers can see how it functions and touches its community.
The Church Plant
There are several ways to evangelize and start a church in Russia. Since each area of the country is different, adhering to only one method would set us up for more failures than successes. These are five ways we reach out within communities to share the gospel with the goal of planting a church:
- Show the Jesus film in the national language, followed by an altar call.Begin a church with those who respond.
- Identify the needs of a community and find ways to meet them. We bring in doctors or humanitarian aid workers three days before a crusade to help meet the community’s physical needs. After the third day, we invite people to the crusade and present the gospel.
- Meet felt needs. We do this through friendship evangelism. We help people in the community by cleaning their homes or working in their vegetable gardens. Once a relationship is developed, we invite them to a service.
- Saturate a community with posters, tracts and fliers that invite people to a crusade. The service could focus on healing or present a special message.
- Establish home groups to create a core group of new believers. This encourages fellowship and Spiritual growth.
All church planters present brief monthly progress reports that outline how they are tending their churches.
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