by Warren Bird: Who mentored you or believed in you before you believed in yourself? That person is your Hero Maker!

If you pick a recent day from your calendar, and review the ways you spent your time that day, how much were you the hero and how much did you make heroes of others? It’s easy to let the spotlight come to ourselves, but it’s so much more strategic to make heroes of other people that God is using on the front lines of ministry. Everybody wants to be a hero, but few understand the power of being a hero maker.

In Hero Maker: Five Essential Practices for Leaders to Multiply Leaders, you will learn how to bring real change to your church and community by developing the practical skills to help others reach their leadership potential.

Drawing on five powerful practices found in the ministry of Jesus, Hero Maker presents the key steps of apprenticeship that will build up other leaders and provides strategies for how you can activate gifts, help others take ownership, and develop a simple scorecard for measuring your kingdom-building progress.

Besides rich insights from the Gospels, Hero Maker is packed with real-life ministry stories ranging from paid staff to volunteer leaders and from established churches to new church plants. A practical tool accompanies each of the five practices, with several illustrations for how to use it.

Whether you lead ten people or ten thousand, Hero Maker will not only help you maximize your leadership, but in doing so you will also help shift today’s church culture to a model of reproduction and multiplication. The book, which has already made #1 ranking on three Amazon bestseller lists (see below), makes a compelling case that God’s power and purpose are best revealed when we train and release others, who in turn do likewise.

Become that rare breed of leader who brings change into our world by sacrificially investing in others who become the heroes. By becoming a hero maker, you will join a movement of influencers that are impacting hundreds, thousands and perhaps millions of people around the world.

Dave Ferguson is lead author, and I got to be his co-author. Besides being a board member at Leadership Network, Dave is lead pastor of Community Christian Church with 11 locations across Chicago, visionary behind a church planting network of 1,200+ churches, and president of the Exponential church multiplication conference.

Both of us feel this is our most significant book to date. For free materials to use with the book, see HeroMakerBook.com.

The post Are You More a “Hero” or “Hero Maker,” According to Your Calendar? appeared first on Leadership Network.

Source: Are You More a “Hero” or “Hero Maker,” According to Your Calendar?

The post Are You More a “Hero” or “Hero Maker,” According to Your Calendar? appeared first on Passion for Planting.

by Patrick Bradley: Free is a church planter’s love language, right? Why wouldn’t you want to eat for free at Exponential?

Kidding aside, there will be lots of great church planting groups, tribes & organizations at Exponential East 2018 from Feb 26 – Mar 1 in Orlando. I kept seeing these invites for free info-meeting meals and thought I’d put together a directory so you can connect with the right group:

Listed chronologically:

Stadia Church Planting

Tuesday dinner
6:30pm
Register for the Stadia Party

Acts 29

Wednesday lunch
11:45am-1pm
Register for the Interest Lunch

Forge America

Wednesday lunch
11:45am-1pm
Register for the Informational Lunch

Move NE

Wednesday dinner
5pm-8pm
RSVP for the Vision Dinner

NewThing Network

Wednesday dinner
6pm-9pm
Register for the House Party

Did I Miss One?

DM me (@plantingtactics) on Twitter and I’ll post it!

The post How to Eat for FREE at Exponential East 2018 appeared first on Church Planting Tactics.

Source: How to Eat for FREE at Exponential East 2018

The post How to Eat for FREE at Exponential East 2018 appeared first on Passion for Planting.

by Sean Cronin: Last week the Passion for Planting team traveled to Orlando, Florida for the Exponential East Church Planting Conference. During our time there, we taught several workshops, and promoted our church planting resources and services to thousands of church planters.

One of the highlights of our week was the countless individuals who came thank us for our ministry. Church leaders from all over the country descended upon our booth. They stopped by to express their appreciation for our free downloads and project management software saying they couldn’t imagine planting a church without those tools.

The main sessions were another highlight. We heard from speakers like Louie Giglio, Matt Chandler, Albert Tate, Dave Ferguson, and Wayne Cordeiro. Each speaker challenged us to Dream Big and take risks for God’s Kingdom. Here’s are some of the tweetable takeaways:

Louie Giglio: “Big dreams annoy some people, but they attract the right people.”

Matt Chandler: “The drift of the human soul is always towards self-reliance.”

Albert Tate: “Don’t get stuck in the math and miss the mission.”

Dave Ferguson: “If you don’t have a dream that causes you to depend on God. You need a bigger dream.”

Wayne Cordeiro: “Faith is living in advance what you can only understand in reverse.”

Close to five thousand people attended the conference this year! And each of them were challenged to Dream Big, pray big, and trust God to do immeasurably more than we could ever ask or imagine.

Believe it or not, the conference is just getting started. Over the next eight months, Exponential will host five more events mirroring last week’s conference – one of which we’re hosting at the nZone. We’ll need your help to pull it off, so put September 11th-12th on your calendar and plan on joining us for Exponential DC!

The post Passion 4 Planting’s experience at Exponential East appeared first on Passion for Planting.

Helen Keller once said, “The only thing worse than being blind is having sight but no vision.” Today’s main session speakers challenged conference attendees to discern and pursue God’s unique vision and calling for their lives.

Here are some memorable quotes from each speaker:

“Don’t get stuck in the math and miss the mission.” -Albert Tate

“We are kept from our goal not by obstacles, but by a clear path to a lesser goal.” -Will Mancini

“The drift of the human soul is always towards self-reliance.” -Matt Chandler

“Don’t lose your child-like wonderment of God.” -Harris III

“Too many people are willing to wait for a pipe dream, but won’t wait for God’s dream.” -Ed Stetzer

“If you don’t have a dream that causes you to depend on God. You need a bigger dream.” -Dave Ferguson

The challenge to dream big reminds me of the vision Bill Gates dreamt about in the mid-70s. His dream was to put a computer in every home in America. This dream compelled and propelled him to start Microsoft to pursue his dream. Today it’s hard to find a house in American that doesn’t have a computer in it.

Our world has and will continue to be shaped by dreamers. What dream does God have for you to pursue?

If you’re dreaming big, your dream should scare you. It will take you outside your comfort zone. It will require you to take some risks and will probably demand significant sacrifice. However, all the heartaches, hardships, and hell you go through will be worth it when God’s vision for your life becomes reality.

Pray. Dream Big. Plan Smart. Then Take A Risk.

The post Exponential East 2017 Day 1 Main Sessions appeared first on Passion for Planting.

Such great content and wisdom being shared with us church planters at the Exponential East 2017 pre-conference day 2:

Generosity & Fundraising Strategies

Phil Ling

Step 1: BUILD THE LIST

People you need to add to your list:

• Start with your ‘Christmas card list’
• High capacity givers
• Positional leaders
• Tribal leaders

Step 2: INVITE THEM

Thoughts on making the invitation to meet:

• Be intentionally vague in the initial invitation.
• Get a volunteer to schedule your meetings so you aren’t tempted to make ‘the ask’ on the phone.
• People will ask their important questions 1-on-1. The only people that ask questions in front of others want an audience, not an answer.

Step 3: MEET WITH THEM

Thoughts on where to meet potential supporters to make ‘the ask’:

• Office space or small, quite room is best
• Restaurants/coffee shops are too noisy
• Meeting in their homes makes them feel obligated to entertain you, which can turn a 45-minute meeting into a 3-hour meeting

Step 4: MAKE THE APPEAL

The step-by-step process:

1. 1. say thanks for coming
   2. explain why they’re in the room
   3. cast the vision
   4. how we’re going to pay for it financially (design a giving chart with parameters)
   5. give them a deadline
   6. challenge them to pray about it- “put in on your fridge and every time you walk by, pray that you’ll make the biggest gift you’ve ever made to ministry, then pray if that’s God’s number or your number.”
   7. end with gratitude

Opening Day

Launch Larger than You Though Possible

Ron Sylvia & Chris Causey

Thoughts on launching large:

• It’s easier to turn a crowd into a church than a [small] church into a crowd.
• Don’t pick & choose parts from different church planting models – you’ll end up with a Frankenstein.
• Launching large can bring credibility in your community
• Launching large facilitates the church becoming self-supporting faster
• It can create excitement & enthusiasm
• “Large” is relative – 200 in Boston is huge
• Launching large is very stressful, but it lets you choose your stress
• It has a higher cost
• We can all ‘lead large’, as if our church were 150% larger that it currently is

The post Exponential East 2017 Pre-Conference, Day 2 appeared first on Passion for Planting.

It’s hard to believe, but we’re just about to wrap up 2016! This has been a fantastic year on many fronts and we want to take a moment and say thanks to all of you for being part of this incredible journey we call church planting. Thanks for what you do every day to bring the love of Christ to cities, to neighborhoods and to people all around the world.

We are humbled to do our part in providing resources to support your faithful work and the calling God has placed on your heart. We’re looking forward to an even better 2017 as we work together to launch healthy, multiplying churches.

Merry Christmas and thanks for a great 2016! 

We ended the year with a HUGE announcement:

Mid-Atlantic Christian University (MACU) is partnering with Passion for Planting to provide a Graduate Certificate in Church Planting. So starting in the Fall of 2017, we’ll now offer two church planter residency training options.  You can learn more about these offerings on our Residencies page.

The post Thanks for a Great Year! appeared first on Passion for Planting.

Welcome!

Residency Program

The goal of our 10-month program is to train and equip a small group of those who are called to plant a church by walking them through the process. Through the course of the residency our cohort will write vision and mission statements, develop their launch plan, preach and teach; basically everything needed to get started before stepping out. We take advantage of technology since most of our cohort (4 out of 5) are hosted by other churches. This distance learning format allows us to learn from each other during our weekly video conferences. We’re building our class of 2017 now, so please pray that God brings the right people to join our Fall cohort! Take a few minutes to checkout our video below.

The thought of Church Planting is overwhelming. The thought that you are going to be responsible for planting God’s church can stun and even numb you to the point of not going through with it. The Passion for Planting Residency has taken away that numbness. This program has given me the tools I need to carry out this church plant. With careful planning and a detailed syllabus P4P has made the preparation for church planting palatable and manageable. I don’t think I would feel as prepared as I am to plant if it were not for the residency program at P4P.

PlanterPlan Tip: Adding Team Members

Here’s a short video tutorial on how to add team members to your PlanterPlan project. It’s really important to get some help on all the tasks required to plant a church, so we’ll show you how to add members to your team, assign them tasks and see how they’re doing at a glance.

New Website is coming!

We’ve redesigned our website and are putting the final touches together to help you get access to pages and resources that are most often downloaded or visited. That should be up and running next week, so check it out and let us know what you think. We really appreciate your feedback!

Joel Pazmino’s Book Recommendation

Center Church: Doing Balanced, Gospel-Centered Ministry in Your City by Timothy Keller

This is the ultimate book on urban church planting. Tim Keller explains Redeemer’s approach to church planting from both a practical and theological perspective. This book helped me understand how to be both faithful to the Gospel and missionally minded when it comes to urban ministry, and more importantly, how the Gospel is relevant to the particular needs of the city. If you are planting a church in a city this is the one book you need to read. Link on Amazon

Here are some more recommendations from our friends at
The Gospel Coalition: Must Read Books

News Flash! Exponential just announced Regional events!

The Regional events are intended to expand the impact of the main theme content from the national Exponential conferences in Orlando and LA. The Regionals will be reduced in scope when compared to the full programming at our national events but we will seek to bring the full impact of the main stage programming. They will also feature 4 sessions with facilitated breakout conversations between the 5 main stage sessions.

The post Newsletter – March 2016 appeared first on Passion for Planting.

Passion for Planting is offering a high-energy learning lab that features church planting experts presenting a series of fast-paced, TED-style talks, followed by a panel discussion and audience Q&A. It’s a conference within a conference! If you can’t make it to the pre-conference, take advantage of our church planting workshop track.Church Planting Lab Topics

Each talk will cover a topic that is essential to church planting followed by a panel discussion on 1-2 related burning issues (key takeaways). Talks will end with time for audience Q&A and one-on-one interaction with an expert panelist.

Talk topics include:

• Establishing Your Vision/Mission
• Essential Preparation Steps for Planting
• Planning and Strategies for Staying Focused on People
• Fundraising and Generosity
• Why Every Church Planting Leader Needs a Coach
• Preaching in the Formative Years of a Church Plant
• Church Planting Impact on You and Your Family

The post Launch Healthy: An Equipping Lab for Church Planters appeared first on Passion for Planting.