MINISTRIES
Center for Spiritual Renewal
Church MultiplicationFrequently Asked Questions
FAQs for Church Planters
FAQs for Multiplication Leaders
FAQs for MAP (Multiplication Assisting Process)
FAQs for Simple Church
FAQs for Church Planters
What kind of financial support does Foursquare offer church planters?
Foursquare is a bi-vocational church planting movement that is empowered by the local church and invested in by the local district office. We like to call our financial support for church planters a partnership. Support is extended in response to a written proposal and first year budget projections submitted to the district office. Pending approval, funds are allocated based on the district available funds and the needs of the church plant model. In addition, you may receive support from parent churches or other sources you have identified and developed.
What kinds of models of church planting are exemplified and/or 'allowed' in Foursquare?
The short answer is Foursquare appreciates any model that God directs a particular planter to take that will reach their community effectively. Foursquare seeks the answer to this questions, "What does a biblically faithful Foursquare church look like in my context?"
You will find plants in Foursquare that:
- Start in homes and apartment complexes.
- Meet in small groups first, then come together for celebration.
- Are large or small 'hives' sent out from a parent church in the same community or out to another part of the country.
- Do extensive community outreach prior to launch and open with a high impact launch.
- 'Parachute into a community' with a couple or individual from outside who build a team from the ground up and begin connecting with pre-Christians. The community of faith takes shape more gradually.
- Are started through the 'import and impart' method. A couple or individual wants to plant a church and a parent church 'adopts' them, provides support, mentoring and modeling, and sends them out.
- Begin in the facilities of the parent church and after a period of time the new church is launched into another part of the community with a core group of people already established.
What is my next step if I am interested in planting a church with Foursquare?
Begin a conversation! Fill out the online Church Planter Inquiry form. Once you have filled out the inquiry, it will be submitted to the district of your choice and the Reachmore Office. The district you selected should contact you shortly about planting a church. After applying to plant, you are welcome to contact your District Missional Coordinator and follow up with your district office.
How can I find a church that would be willing to send me out to plant a church?
First, give your senior pastor an opportunity to become a parent church by sharing your dream with them. Second, contact the District Missional Coordinator in your area. Ask that they help connect you with a parent church able to take you in under a limited time of mentorship. This relationship to a parent church can be developed with the help of your district office.
How long does it take to walk through the process of preparing to plant?
It will take a potential planter from six months to several years to walk through the church planting preparation process, depending on the leader's stage of development, life situation, planting model and work pace. We recommend a minimum of 18 months under the MAP sponsorship.
FAQs for Multiplication Leaders
Parent Church Pastors:
How large does a church need to be to become a parent church?
Size is not the issue, health is. A healthy church can give away approximately ten percent of its 'body weight' and experience a fairly quick recovery. Churches have given away more people than that, but the recovery period for the parent church is longer and may delay or hinder future efforts in sending out church planting teams. In Foursquare, churches of fifty to one hundred members have parented multiple churches that have gone on to grow beyond the parent church size. Most of our largest churches are also parent churches. Our parent churches range in size from 40 members to 9,000 members. We applaud them all!
What are the responsibilities of the parent church toward the church plant and planter?
Parenting happens in a variety of ways, but effective parenting involves numerous aspects. The following are some responsibilities to consider:
- Prayer: Mobilizing the congregation for strong prayer involvement.
- Core team members: Which families do you see the church being able to send?
- Finances: Monthly support given during the first year? Second year?
- Resources: Offering the use of church space, equipment, phone, office help, etc.
- Emotional support and care: Remembering the church planter's family birthdays, anniversary, Christmas and other special celebrations. Keep in regular contact with the church planter for the purpose of encouragement and accountability.
- Mentoring: Offering ongoing mentoring in the pastoral leadership process.
How do you find planters to send out?
You can find planters in a variety of ways, including:
- Reach, raise and send them: As people come to Christ in your church, some of them will have start up leadership gifts. Identify them, develop them and send them out.
- Import, impart and send: Invite/recruit potential planters from other places to come, serve and be sent out from your church.
- Equip and send existing staff: Identify those on your leadership team that have start up gifts, offer preparation specific to church planting and send them out.
- Adoption: Adopt a church plant without a parent.
What would the next step be if I am considering parenting a new church?
Have some conversations!
- Have a conversation with God about His desires for your church in this area.
- Have conversations with your leaders one on one, sharing the idea, and listening to their thoughts, perspective and ideas about planting churches.
- Have conversations with other parent church pastors and learn from them. Ask questions!
Assessment:
I need someone in my district assessed, what should I do?
The Missional Coordinator in your district is a trained assessor. The National Church Office supplies booklets and materials to conduct an assessment. If you are a parent pastor of a church plant or supporter of church multiplication, contact your district office for more information.
Do assessors get paid?
Most districts try to gift assessors around $50 to $75 per assessment. This usually comes in the form of either cash or a gift card. An additional $200 is suggested to cover the cost of refreshments and other incidentals, such as travel expenses.
Please check with your district’s budget for assessments as values vary per region and is based on available funds.
A pastor in my district wants to plant a church, does he or she need to be assessed?
Yes! If a pastor has never planted a church before, how do they know if they have what it takes? This is what the assessment is meant to discover. Why cheat someone out of a process that is meant to help them?
MAP (Multiplication Assisting Process):
What does Foursquare offer for coaching of church planters?
The MAP is a church planter training tool created with the intention of allowing for flexibility and creativity. This requires an environment where relationship and context determine design. Senior Pastors and Sponsors of church planters can help assist in this training process. The MAP is an 18 month relationship with the church planter and sponsor as they walk through administering the plan and vision imparted to the planter.
Foursquare offers the resource and is here to be a consultant to the Districts in fostering an environment that encourage relationship and understanding of the context prior to determining the design.
Are there Church Planter Training Events or Intensives?
The MAP process is so easy and takes place along side current relationships. Context and relationship determine design, and so we steer away from intensives and events with the hopes of developing more of the dreams and visions in the planter and less of repetitive form and function.
There are MAP orientations available to the district leadership. Contact your district office for availability if you are interested in becoming a sponsor of church plants.
If you are a planter, contact your district office and let them know of your interest in planting.
MAP notebooks are available through the district offices and supplied by the National Church Office.
How are church planters and district leaders funded?
Funding is based off of a district specific budget and varies around the country. To find out more of the available options in your area contact your district missional coordinator.
Can the parent church pastor be the planter's sponsor?
Yes, as long as the parent church pastor allows the planting couple to cast their own vision, even if it is different than what the parent church pastor likes. Make sure that the parent church pastor and the planting couple have a good relationship before making this decision.
Who pays for a church planter coming from another district to plant in a new district?
The district sending the planter is encouraged to sponsor the planter to their new location. For ways to bless a planter in your area or out of your local church, read the article Ten Effective Ways that You and Your Church Can Bless a Church Plant.
FAQs for MAP (Multiplication Assisting Process)
What is the MAP?
The MAP is a church planter training tool created with the intention of allowing for flexibility and creativity. It is a tool for the sponsor to walk through with the church planter. It is designed to be relationship, rather than event, based. It is designed as a shared devotional (shared between the sponsor and planter) to discover the entirety of what God is designing in and through the planter.
What is a sponsor?
A sponsor is the individual responsible for designing and facilitating the preparation process for the planter. This may be the parent church pastor, the church multiplication leader, divisional superintendent or another individual designated by the leadership of the district.
Is the MAP the same format at the CPI?
No. As was stated above, the map is designed to be relationship, rather than event, based. It is intended to take a minimum of six months to walk through the process. Is is a time of discovery, dreaming, designing and then delivering for both the church planter and the sponsor.
Are districts expected to do both a CPI and the MAP?
No. The MAP is meant to be another option to the CPI. Some districts may prefer to continue doing the CPI and that is fine. Also, other districts may want to use a form of the CPI along with the MAP and that is fine as well. The Church Multiplication Office wants districts to "own" this church planting process and adapt it how they see fit for their district.
How does our district get started with the MAP?
The best place to start would be for you to contact the Church Multiplication Office for a free copy of the MAP. You can tell us of your interest of having your district trained in the MAP tool. We will arrange for a National Team member to conduct a one day MAP training seminar in your district or region.
How quickly can our district roll into the MAP?
The MAP has been field tested and is ready for use. It is up to your district leadership to determine how quickly or slowly you begin using the map. Since it is a relationship based program, it requires minimum training and a committed sponsor to get started.
FAQs for Simple Church
Are simple church pastors licensed Foursquare pastors?
Yes. Simple church pastors are licensed through the Foursquare licensing procedures as outlined in the Guides to Licensing manual available through your ARC or local district office.
Are simple churches registered on Ezra with Board approval?
Yes. Simple churches are registered on Ezra through their local district registration procedure following Board approval.
Are simple churches under the care of a district office?
Yes, simple churches have the same covering and resources available to them as all Foursquare churches.
What's the difference between simple churches and cell or home groups in a more traditional church?
Cell or home groups relate to a central, traditionally structured church whereas simple churches are individually a complete church. Each simple church is itself a fully functioning church. Healthy simple churches do network with one another and may come together on occasion for larger gatherings, but the primary church is the simple/home church
Why simple churches?
- Change is afoot in the body of Christ. The North American church is learning from the church in developing nations that simple, small group meeting are a viable expression of the local church. For decades, house churches have been a major part of the body of Christ in many parts of the world. Now the church has "come home" to the United States too.
- A number of researchers, Christian and secular, have noted trends in both church and society that indicate a growing interest in simpler, more relational forms of church. Regardless of whether we agree with what the research uncovers, we would be like ostriches with our heads in the sand if we ignored what God is up to in our culture and the church.
- The trend towards simple church is accelerating at a remarkable pace. A recent Barna Group update showed a jump from 1% to 9% in house church involvement over the past decade. And in May 2005, leading organic church planter, Neil Cole, estimated that the number of house churches in the United States had doubled from 2,500 to 5,000 in the previous 18 months. These are only two studies that alerts us to this trend.
- Currently developing is a much healthier, "friendlier" breed of house church leaders who are not antagonistic towards the traditional church and who wish to partner with traditional church bodies to see the kingdom extended.
- Historically, our Foursquare family has led in the embracing of new things God is doing in the church. That, plus the mandate from God to reach the cities, where new strategies are absolutely required, means that it is appropriate for us to be the first major denomination in the United States to fully embrace the simple/house church movement at a national level.
What is Foursquare's intention for simple churches?
The joy of simple/house church is that it is organic and grows all by itself when it's healthy. Thus, our role is more to discover, connect and bless rather than to initiate, plan and promote! It is appropriate then that our Foursquare family's response should:
- Focus on catalyzing a movement, not creating a major structure to be managed.
- Build networks and proven models, connecting them to our present infrastructure of districts and divisions.
- Provide training, resources and help to fuel this awakening opportunity.
- Monitor the results and build into our processes learning communities and breakthrough strategies.
We will do this by forming a competent and diverse national simple church team. Together the team will:
Collect
- We will begin researching and collecting best practices, discovering what's already out there in terms of the Foursquare Church's involvement or practice in simple church and seek to discover those who are interested or potentially interested in simpler forms of church.
- Begin with various Foursquare leaders to research what needs to be done structurally to bless this movement.
Connect
- We will begin networking existing and emerging Foursquare simple church networks.
- We will create connections between existing CMI (Church Multiplication Initiative) endeavors and this new expression.
- We will intentionally connect and co-labor with existing, healthy expressions of simple church life.
Communicate
- We will come alongside supervisors, pastors and other leaders to help them understand and embrace what God is doing with simple church.
- We will also endeavor to keep communication flowing with the entire Foursquare family and beyond via writing, e-lists, etc.
Coach
- We will deploy ongoing coaching relationships for those simple church models already emerging within Foursquare and ...
- We will prepare coaches for emerging simple church networks.
Resource
- We will intentionally and consistently mobilize a growing prayer movement on behalf of this adventure and will have Luke 10:2b at the core of our praying.
- We will develop various discovery based training options for existing and emerging house church leaders.
- We will explore partnering with existing training options among healthy simple church movements. For example, Dawn Ministries of North America of North America is planning to launch a Simple Church Institute in 2007.
- We will discover how to identify and develop leaders as they emerge and how we can maximize their development and support as they launch new simple church networks.
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