By unSeminary: Welcome to this week’s unSeminary podcast! This week I’m chatting with a repeat guest, Danny Franks, Pastor of Guest Services at The Summit Church. The Summit Church has twelve locations around North Carolina and the heart of the church is set on sending. They continually want their people to be asking: how does God want to use me and send me?

As a church grows, it’s not uncommon for the culture and DNA to get watered down. The Summit Church realized that as they launched more campuses and moved to a central model, the guest experience looked drastically different from one campus to another. Listen in as Danny shares how to examine your church’s DNA and replicate it by developing high-capacity volunteers that will in turn invest in others.

We can’t send people that we don’t keep. // In order to be a good sending church, we first need to learn how to be a good receiving church. For The Summit Church this meant taking a good look at their guest services experience at each of their campuses. Guest services covers a person’s visit from the street to the seat and everything in between. It’s about making sure the church is doing everything it can to help its guests know that they’ve been expected, planned for, and that the church is excited to have them return.What is your DNA? // To create a uniform guest services experience at each of your campuses, first ask: What is our DNA when it comes to caring for guests? It will be a process to talk through who the church is and what it looks like to welcome guests well and help them take their next step toward the gospel. After a lot of prayer and discussion through these questions, Danny developed a High-Capacity Volunteer Cohort to help communicate the church’s DNA surrounding guest services clearly to all the campuses.Identify your high-capacity volunteers. // The High-Capacity Volunteer Cohort is an eight-month journey where a small group of two to five volunteers from each campus come together. At The Summit Church there are about thirty volunteers that are a part of the Cohort at one time. They meet each month for an hour and a half to discuss books and principles that help everyone understand what the church’s DNA is. The books cover a wide swath of topics and serve as a springboard for the monthly conversation and there is always a practical component to what they teach. Ultimately the goal of the Cohort is to equip volunteers to be better leaders.Invest and Influence. // As the Pastor of Guest Services, Danny has a dotted line relationship with the Guest Services Directors at each campus. They report directly to the campus pastor and may be responsible for guest services as well as things like small groups and membership. Sometimes all of their responsibilities feel like an impossible task but when they are identifying high-capacity volunteers who are in turn trained, they are replicating themselves in a smaller group that can then go on to invest in and influence others. The Cohort process has allowed the Directors to be more like shepherds and less like administrators. And it’s empowered volunteers to find areas of need where they can pitch in and help with specific problems.Where to begin? // You don’t have to be a multisite church or a mega church to start a High-Capacity Volunteer Cohort. Any leader should be looking for who their high-capacity people are and invest in them. The first question to ask as a leader is what’s the win? What are you trying to accomplish with this cohort? What is your timeframe? Your cohort doesn’t have to last 8 months – you can do a smaller, focused version over six weeks. Next define the parts of that DNA that you want to clearly communicate. If you have trouble identifying who your high-capacity volunteers are, that may indicate there is a problem with your leadership pipeline. Something needs to shift to make sure you are regularly identifying and bringing in those potential high-capacity people. Also be aware of not having a clear end goal in sight. For more tips on how to begin, download this PDF: High-Capacity Volunteer Cohort: A How-To Guide.Resources for your cohort. // Danny has a wealth of resources on his website, including articles, workshops, training events, a coaching network and more, that you can access by visiting dfranks.com. In addition, a great book to read with your cohort would be “People are the Mission: How Churches Can Welcome Guests Without Compromising the Gospel“. In it Danny shows churches how to take a balanced approach to hospitality by developing ministries that are guest-friendly from the outset and gospel-centric to their core. Churches will learn not only how to effectively bring people in and convince them to stay, but also why our hospitality to honor the stranger doesn’t stand in opposition to honoring the Savior. Lastly, download this PDF for an overview of The Summit Church’s High-Capacity Volunteer Cohort: Guest Services 2020.

To connect with Danny Franks, reach out to him on Twitter @letmebefranks, and learn more about The Summit Church by visiting their website.

Thank You for Tuning In!

There are a lot of podcasts you could be tuning into today, but you chose unSeminary, and I’m grateful for that. If you enjoyed today’s show, please share it by using the social media buttons you see at the left hand side of this page. Also, kindly consider taking the 60-seconds it takes to leave an honest review and rating for the podcast on iTunes, they’re extremely helpful when it comes to the ranking of the show and you can bet that I read every single one of them personally!

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Thank You to This Episode’s Sponsor: Risepointe

Is your church ready? Are you re-opening? Ready to welcome MORE people to worship and grow with your church? Are you out of space or are your interiors dated and needing improvement?

The architecture and design team at Risepointe want to help you align your facility with the mission and vision that God has given your church. That’s why Risepointe developed The Needs Analysis. The Needs Analysis is a comprehensive look at your site to seat experience through the lens of your first time guests. Learn more by visiting www.theneedsanalysis.com. Let them know you heard about The Needs Analysis on unSeminary for $500 off!

Source: Practical Strategy for Developing High-Capacity Volunteers with Danny Franks

The post Practical Strategy for Developing High-Capacity Volunteers with Danny Franks appeared first on Passion for Planting.

By Ken Adams: I remember many years ago learning my multiplication tables. You probably do as well. I started with 1 x 1 and then continued to recite them all the way to 12 x 12. The repetition drove those tables into my mind in such a way that I still know them decades later.

Learning how to make and multiply disciples is also something we need to learn, it doesn’t happen automatically. The best way to learn how to make and multiply disciples is from the Master Disciple Maker. Jesus is the perfect model of what it means to make and multiply disciples. He took twelve unschooled and ordinary men and turned them into world-changers. Jesus led these men to be disciple makers in three years. Let’s identify some of the key steps in Jesus’ approach to disciple making that we need to follow today.

Recruit a group of people to train

There are lots of different ways to state this first step, but at the end of the day, Jesus made and multiplied a movement of disciples because He selected twelve men to come and learn from Him. Jesus spent a majority of His time with the twelve and He used that time to teach and model for them what He wanted them to be and do. In its most basic form, disciple making means identifying a handful of hungry people who are willing to commit to being trained and taught how to be more like Jesus.

Train that group of people to be like Jesus

Jesus calls us to make and multiply disciples who look and act like Him. During the time you commit to training your disciples, be sure you are training them in the character and conduct of Christ. The end goal of disciple making is that those you recruit will become more like Jesus and know how to help others become more like Jesus. Keep it simple. Train your disciples to be like Jesus the same way Jesus did. Spend time with them. Model for them. Teach them. Give them experiences, and then send them out to do the same with others.

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Challenge them to reproduce more disciples

People are slow. They need help understanding what the true outcome of disciple making really is. I know this to be true because of how many Christians have actually ever made another disciple. Very few have! Christians are very good at sitting in small groups, filling in blanks, and placing our notebooks on the shelf before finding another small group to join. We are very good at consuming. We are not so good at reproducing. We need to be challenged to make more disciples and held accountable to do so. When you make disciples, don’t stop at the training phase and assume they will reproduce. Go the extra mile and hold them accountable until they repeat the process you did with them with someone else.

Making and multiplying disciples is not complicated. It is more a matter of obedience than anything else. If you study the life of Christ and are willing to make disciples who make disciples, you already have the plan and power to accomplish the task. All you need is the willingness to go and do it.

By Ken Adams

Used by permission. Originally posted here:

The post How Do We Multiply Disciples? appeared first on Discipleship.org.

Source: How Do We Multiply Disciples?

The post How Do We Multiply Disciples? appeared first on Passion for Planting.

By Jay Fast: I’ll never forget the moment when I was struck with the fact that Jesus intentionally used short-term, cross-cultural mission trips as part of his disciple-making process. It was the spring of 2013, I was sitting on a bench made from rough-cut logs on a beautiful day at the property of the Latin America Multiplication Center in Heredia, Costa Rica. I was living there as a missionary, overseeing FUSION, Sonlife’s short-term missions process for teenagers.

Consider What Jesus Actually Did

As I sat on that bench, evaluating the investment of time, energy, and resources that churches (and student ministries in particular) pour out every year toward short-term mission trips, I was struck with a frightening thought: What if I’ve moved my family overseas to invest our lives in something that Jesus never did? At that point in my life, I had participated in and led numerous mission trips, but I had never stopped to consider if this whole “short-term, cross-cultural mission trip” thing was something that Jesus had done. And if Jesus didn’t do it, I didn’t want to either.

Of course, I knew the impact that short-term mission trips have. Like many of you, I first participated in a short-term mission trip as a teenager. It had a profound impact on me, and God used that experience to change the course of my life. After college, I served as a youth pastor for 13 years. During that time, I took students on dozens of short-term mission trips. I had the opportunity to see God work in, and through, the lives of students over and over again. Most (if not all) of us would agree that short-term mission trips are generally good experiences, but maybe you’ve found yourself asking similar questions as those on my mind that day:

Are short-term mission trips worth all the hassle?
Is the work being done actually accomplishing anything?
Are the mission trips we plan actually just glorified exotic vacations for our students?
Is the money being spent really the best investment of Kingdom resources?
Do our mission trips teach and equip our students to engage with the mission of Jesus and live as disciples in their own culture and context, or just when they go overseas?
Would it be more beneficial if we simply wrote a large check to a missionary instead of taking up a week of their time and adding significantly to their workload, hoping that we make some sort of impact?
Does anything about the way we do short-term, cross-cultural mission trips need to change?
Did Jesus model taking his disciples on short-term, cross-cultural mission trips?

We Have a Model for Short-Term, Cross-Cultural Missions

In studying the life and ministry of Jesus, I’ve discovered that the answer to that last question is a resounding YES! Additionally, a careful study of Jesus’ use of mission trips actually informs all of these other questions as well. In our blog post entitled “Equipping Cross-Culturally,” we saw that Jesus took his disciples on short-term, cross-cultural mission trips on at least 6 different occasions. Not only did Jesus take his disciples on multiple short-term, cross-cultural mission trips, but as we study them, we find a model for how we can and should do likewise.

This study of Jesus’ model for short-term, cross-cultural mission trips and how he used them as a disciple-making tool has led to the development of Sonlife’s FUSION process. FUSION is a short-term mission experience that strategically partners churches in North America with churches in Latin America for the purpose of multiplying healthy, disciple-making student ministries. It’s a four-step process that’s specifically modeled after Jesus’ ministry strategy and how he did short-term mission trips.

Although there are four short-term mission trips throughout the process, FUSION is anything but a typical mission trip experience. The primary purpose of FUSION is not to construct a building, lead a vacation Bible school program, or do street evangelism. Instead, we ask our FUSION teams to incarnate, invest and multiply. This is a reflection of Jesus’ strategy of entering our world, pouring his life out into a few, and reproducing his character and priorities in them. Students on FUSION teams have the opportunity to enter the world of Latino teenagers, invest their lives in building relationships with those students, and help them build a healthy, disciple-making student ministry by reproducing the character and priorities of Jesus in them.

Jesus Used the Trips to Develop the Disciples’ Hearts

Looking at the short-term mission trips that Jesus did with his disciples, it’s clear that his focus wasn’t solely on the people where they were going. He used these trips as a tool to develop his disciples’ hearts and to teach them necessary skills in disciple-making. In the same way, FUSION is designed to be a tool that can be used by youth pastors to develop a disciple-making ministry. As students engage with the mission cross-culturally, they develop both the heart and skills necessary for making disciples back home in their own culture and context.

Throughout the process, there are a number of key ingredients that make the experience fruitful. FUSION is student-led, which means that once a team arrives in-country, the students are responsible to take the lead in building relationships, group training experiences, English classes in the local public schools, living as disciples in their host homes, and various outreach opportunities. The emphasis during the entire process is developing relationships between students in the partner ministries so that disciple-making DNA can be shared. The adults who are part of the team (youth pastor, volunteer leaders, etc) serve in the role of shepherds during the process, praying for, caring for, and encouraging the students by reminding them of the training they’ve received to prepare them for their cross-cultural disciple-making experience.

The FUSION Process

Each step in the FUSION process involves a short-term mission trip, and each step has a different focus.

STEP 1 focuses on the foundational priorities from Jesus’ life and ministry. Students lead the training, looking at how Jesus built a disciple-making ministry and what it looks like for us to do the same.
STEP 2 shifts the focus to targeted ministry training and outreach. Students equip their peers in the partner ministry to share their testimony and the Gospel with a spiritually lost friend, and then both groups go on an outreach retreat together where those lost friends hear the Good News.
STEP 3 is all about transmitting the DNA of cross-cultural missions and equipping a team of ministers. In this step, things are reversed and students are challenged in a new way as the student ministry from Latin America does a mission trip, traveling to their partner church in North America.
STEP 4 focuses on multiplication. The student ministry from North America returns and travels with their partner ministry to a third location where the students “pass the baton” and the four-step process begins again. In this way, both student ministries are learning to make and multiply disciples like Jesus.

Regardless of where your student ministry finds itself in the process of becoming a disciple-making ministry, we’d love to talk with you about how cross-cultural, short-term mission trips can play a significant role. If we’re serious about following Jesus’ example, we have to recognize that we can’t build disciple-making ministries without taking our students out of their comfort zones and across cultural barriers. That doesn’t necessarily have to be a trip to the other side of the world, which is why we’re currently developing the FUSION process domestically as well. We’d love to talk with you about what it might look like for you to engage in the process, and how we can serve you as you continue investing in students.

By Jay Fast

Originally posted here:

The post Jesus-Centered Missions appeared first on Discipleship.org.

Source: Jesus-Centered Missions

The post Jesus-Centered Missions appeared first on Passion for Planting.

By NewChurches.com: In Episode 538 of the NewChurches Q&A Podcast, Daniel and Todd discuss why it is important to be an equipper who develops equippers.

“My team is full of doers, not equippers. What do I do?”

In This Episode, You’ll Discover:

Where to start in shifting from doing to equipping
The difference between A players and B players

 Shareable Quotes (#NewChurches):

“You reproduce what you are. So if you are a doer, you are going to reproduce doers.” – @toddadkins
“Audit your story of what your church is about and what your specific ministry is about and how you develop people.” – @toddadkins
“People have to have a heart shift as much as a mind shift.” – @toddadkins
“It’s up to them to think about who they are recruiting and they have to put a plan together for themselves on their own personal development.” – @toddadkins
“Understand what the competencies are of an A player and get working on that.” – @toddadkins
“The first step is recognizing that and saying what is my development plan in light of that.” – @danielsangi
“People don’t quit organizations, they quit leaders.” – @toddadkins

Recommended Resources:

Listen to Episode 534: Rebuilding Culture After COVID
Listen to Episode 536: Raising Up Coaches

Help us Multiply the Mission:

Please subscribe
Leave a rating and review on iTunes
Ask a question by clicking Send Voicemail on the right hand side of NewChurches.com
If you’re on a phone or a tablet, then go to www.speakpipe.com/newchurches to download the app and record your message
When you’re recording, introduce yourself and your context in about 15 seconds and then record your question for 30 seconds

The post Episode 538: Creating Equippers appeared first on NewChurches.com – Church Planting, Multisite, and Multiplication.

Source: Episode 538: Creating Equippers

The post Episode 538: Creating Equippers appeared first on Passion for Planting.

by Daniel Im:

How should you train your core team?

This week we are giving you a preview of our Developing a Core Team Course. This week we have focused on building a solid core team as you prepare to plant a church or campus. In today’s episode, Pastor Ronnie Parrott talks about training your core team and specifically answers the following:

Why is it important to train your core team in spiritual devotion and theology?

In this episode, you’ll discover:

What priorities you should have in place when training your leaders.
Why you can’t assume your leaders have solid spiritual devotion.

Shareable Quotes (#NewChurches):

“What we need is faithful, dedicated disciple-makers who can carry us forward.”–@ronniep
“Sanctification, justification, and the role of the devotional life in the Christian should be at the forefront of your training.”–@ronniep
“In order to do hospitality well, there first needs to be heart transformation in your leaders.”–@danielsangi

Additional Resources:

Learn more about the Developing a Core Team Course.
Read Christians Don’t Exercise, They Train.
Read The Activeness of Prayer.

Help us Multiply the Mission:

Please subscribe
Leave a rating and review on iTunes
Ask a question by clicking Send Voicemail on the right hand side of NewChurches.com
If you’re on a phone or a tablet, then go to www.speakpipe.com/newchurches to download the app and record your message
When you’re recording, introduce yourself and your context in about 15 seconds and then record your question for 30 seconds

The post Episode 185: Training Your Core Team appeared first on New Churches.

Source: Episode 185: Training Your Core Team

The post Episode 185: Training Your Core Team appeared first on Passion for Planting.