How to Start a Church Planting Movement:
Know the Difference between Teaching and Training
We have all known people who have sat in Bible Studies their entire life, but whose behavior never changes. These people are often very Godly and sincere people but who are ineffective in using their gifts to advance the Kingdom. They are the product of teaching without training.
Ying Kai, The leader of the T4T church planting movement in China was a pastor and church planter who wondered why the Kingdom wasn’t multiplying faster. He realized one day that he needed to stop simply teaching and begin training people for specific behaviors. Then, he later realized that to have a movement he needed to train many people to be trainers of these behaviors. Thus the T4T movement was born which stands for “Training for Trainers.” Training trainers is the key to reaching tens of thousands of people for Jesus.
Here is a brief summary of the difference between teaching and training.
Teaching – Usually done in a classroom setting where the goal is for the student to master some set of knowledge. Good teachers pay close attention to how well they communicate the bit of knowledge they want the student to have. To measure the effectiveness of our teaching we test the student to see if he or she has retained what we have taught.
Training – The goal is not to produce knowledge in participants, but to produce behaviors. To produce a specific behavior we have to:
– Clearly explain the desired behavior
– Provide time in the training to practice the desired behavior
– Acquire agreement from the student to practice that behavior in the next week
– Provide a time for reporting back by the student on how well they did in their attempts at the behavior
– Include encouragement to keep moving forward with the behavior and not give up.
The last Update included a chart that explained the nine behaviors we have to produce in believers to have a church planting movement. Not every believer has to have all nine of the behaviors, but to have a multiplication movement all nine must be present within the group God is using to multiply the Kingdom.
We need to pray specifically that God will call and gift people to train workers for Jesus.
Reports from the Field:
Looking for a Person of Peace in Cadillac, MI.
Submitted by Tom Doherty
Wednesday May 1st we went to Cadillac. I had been praying and asking God about where to go. Nothing seemed to be coming to me. I had a map and I knew the town, I spent half of my growing up years there. So I started typing into the map things like “Micki”, “Bethany”, “Doherty”, and finally “Mason” the name of my grandson who was going with us. There was two small pieces of Mason Street that showed up on the map.
We now had a place to start. We drove over near Mason Street and saw the “First Congregational” Church. We parked in their lot and I went to talk with the pastor. He said that he just got off the phone with a pastor who was doing a ministry for single mom’s in Travers City and was thinking about doing one in Cadillac. This was an encouragement to one of the people in our party who had been sensing God calling her to be a part of putting a school together for unwed pregnant teens. It also gave us a chance to pray with the pastor about this ministry opportunity. I have continued to pray for this request.
We then began to walk up and down streets near Mason Street praying for families, burned out homes and the people associated with them, and workers who we saw. We then we turned on to Mason Street. We immediately saw a man working in his yard. As we came close he greeted us. We talked with him for a few minutes and told him what we were doing. We asked if he had any prayer requests. He said he was a pretty religious guy and didn’t think that he needed any prayer. We talked for a few more minutes and I said well we just thought we would see if you had any prayer needs. As we started to go he stopped us and said, “Well I don’t have a job right now.” So we stopped and prayed about that. I gave him a business card and we left.
We connected with a few more people down at the lake and at an ice cream place and went home. That night at prayer meeting we told the story and someone from our church knew of a company who was hiring near Cadillac and gave me the information.
On Saturday we were supposed to go back. I had a time set in my mind, but things didn’t come together so we couldn’t leave in time to get there when I thought we should. The Lord did put me at ease before we left by saying to me, “You’re right on time.”
So we took one person in our group down to the lake where she thought she was supposed to be and my wife and I went back to Mason Street.
We parked in the same church parking lot and walked over to “Paul” from Mason Street’s home. He was standing in his door as if he was waiting for us. I told him about the job and he said that he knew the owner and would check out the job. We spent about 10 minutes or so talking and left there with a positive connection.
We gave him an information sheet about a meeting we would be having down at the lake on May 13th at 6PM. We gave out a few more of these and tonight I will be going down for the next chapter of the journey.
I’ll let you know what happens. My hope is that the person of peace or a connection to the person of peace will show up.
Building a CPM Strategy in Clifton, NJ
Submitted by Willie Kirchhofer
We are working the mapping and prayer system. We have 4 areas now that I am praying for: Englewood; Villas; North East Bronx; and Battery Park City.
A group has started in Englewood NJ. We have been meeting for 2 months Saturdays at 4pm. There is a core of 5 other than my wife and I. We have had up to 14 at the meeting. I lead the group at present. Two weeks ago one man came to Christ in the meeting. He and a woman in the group will start the training this Saturday before the group meeting. The host of the group will be training them (this is one of the second generation groups I mentioned – He, the host is in one of my long term training groups). The man who came to Christ actually lives in the Bronx and I have already mentioned to him that he can train people in the Bronx – he is very open and is I believe a person of peace. Interestingly everyone who has come to the group is from the Dominican Republic. They are English/Spanish speaking middle class unchurched or Catholic background people.
I was greatly impacted by the T4T principle. I rebuilt our entire discipleship process according to the principles in the book. We still call it the Masters Mile but it is not the same material. We have 9 beginning lessons and then a long term discipleship through the book of Ephesians that takes 12 weeks. After that I will meet probably bi-weekly with those who have groups or are training others.
Right now there are 4 trainers other than myself. There are 3 second generation groups going right now. Two of the groups are people who go to Crossroads but one group is people who do not attend Crossroads. A 4th was supposed to start this past Saturday with 4 people outside of Crossroads but did not come together. We had one 2nd generation group outside the church that stopped and did not progress. No third generation yet. I am mindful of the 25% figure of people who will actually be trainers and realize that the key is to train a lot of people in order to get to multiplication. The number trained so far is insufficient to get to multiple generations. Ying Kai trained hundreds – I have probably trained 15 so far. At present I have 2 groups I am training and trying to start a third. The key is train many people.
Be With Him…
“The Lord will guide you always; he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail.” Isaiah 58:11