Love To Multiply
It’s February and love is in the air! At least it seems that way here in the United States as marketers remind us that Valentine’s Day is just around the corner. One thing I think about when Valentine’s Day rolls around every year is the power of love.
According to the National Retail Federation, Americans will spend nearly 20 billion dollars expressing their affection to loved ones on Valentine’s Day. While the frugal ones amongst us may scoff at how much money is spent celebrating Valentine’s Day, it should also remind us of the truth that you can give without loving, but you can’t love without giving.
No, this is not an appeal for donations, but it is an appeal to consider this: your love for God affects how much of him you’re giving away to others. As followers of Christ, we’ve been called to make disciples. We will make disciples as a result of falling more intimately in love with Jesus and growing in our love for others. The more you fall in love with Jesus, the harder it will be to keep him to yourself.
As you celebrate Valentine’s Day, think about what you’re doing special this month to grow in your love for Jesus. Just as intimacy is a key ingredient in human reproduction, so intimacy with Jesus is essential to disciple reproduction. How are you growing in your love for Jesus today?
This month we’ve highlighted several resources to help you make disciples and saturate with world with the love of God.
-Dale Spaulding, Director
February 2020 – Contents
- MissionHub
- Boot Camp Training
- Well-Rounded Disciple Making
- Best 2019 Church Planting Books
MissionHub
Could you use some help mobilizing your church to take the gospel to the places they live, work and play? CRU (formally Campus Crusade for Christ) figured you might, and created the MissionHub app as a way to spur your congregation on towards living a life as an ambassador of the gospel.
Encourage your church to see themselves as everyday missionaries equipped and empowered to share their faith with people in their sphere of influence. Whether that’s by encouraging them to pray for a friend, invite a co-worker to coffee to share their faith journey, or personally growing in their love for God and their neighbors, MissionHub can help you mobilize your church on mission seven days a week.
Boot Camp Training
Are you sensing God’s call to plant a church? If so, don’t venture off on this journey alone. Learn from experienced church planters at our next Church Planter Boot Camp and equip yourself with helpful tools, ideas, and resources to start a multiplying church.
Our next boot camp is happening on May 11-15 outside of Washington, D.C. Space is limited and rates will increase at the end of February, so sign up today! To learn more about how attending a boot camp like ours can help you accomplish your mission to make disciples and start new churches, read Ed Stetzer’s The Value of Church Planter Assessment and Boot Camps. Take advantage of the February Early Bird Discount, and register today!
Well-Rounded Disciple Making
One of the greatest joys of a church planter is seeing people come to faith, grow spiritually, and reproduce. We love it because that’s our mission as followers of Jesus. We’re not just called to start new churches that get people into heaven. We’re called to make disciples who reproduce.
Think about it for a second. God desires every single member of your church to mature in their spiritual development. He desires for them to become spiritual parents and grandparents.
Knowing that well-rounded, spiritually vital disciples reproduce themselves, the Navigators developed a tool that disciple-makers can share with their disciples to help them grow in their spiritual vitality. It’s called The Wheel Illustration. Check it out and then share it with someone you’re discipling to help them evaluate their spiritual health and vitality.
Best 2019 Church Planting Books
As one church planter put it, “A leader is a reader.” Leaders are constantly pouring themselves out and in need of refueling. Reading is one way they can fill themselves up with ideas, insights, and encouragement. The problem many leaders face, though, is not knowing what books to read. To help with that, Daniel Yang, Director of the Send Institute, compiled a list of his top 10 books related to church planting leadership published in 2019.
The books on Daniel’s list explore how church planting leaders are responding to the challenges and opportunities of our ever changing world. Check out Daniel’s list of books here: Top 10 Church Planting Related Books from 2019.