Steve Timmis is the director of Acts29 Western Europe. This particular church planting organization was started by Mars Hills Church in Seattle, WA, a church founded and pastored by Mark Driscoll. Timmis is the co-author of Total Church along with Tim Chester. He recently had an article posted on the Resurgence website that I found interesting and caused me to think about what we having been doing in our adopted city here in Western Europe. I thought is would be good to interact with Timmis’ ideas on How to Plant a Church.

Timmis list 5 principles for planting a church; 1) Preach the Gospel, 2) Understand the Context, 3) Connect with People, 4) Connect with the Right People and 5) Train and Appoint Leaders.

1) Preach the Gospel – I wish starting a church was as simple as moving into a city and beginning a worship service and preaching strong Gospel-centered messages. Timmis isn’t saying this is the first thing you do, but is saying it must be done. I would propose it be done throughout each of the principles. The Gospel must be central to everything we do and say. In other words it must be woven so deeply into our message that it can’t help but seep forth from our topics of conversation. So, even in our connecting upon first arrival into a city, region or country we must be able to express why and how the Gospel has brought us to town. Definitely at the point at which people begin to meet in homes, public spots or in a corporate gatherings the Gospel must be clearly spoken.

2) Understand the Context – This is a process that has no ending point. In a new culture you must “ramp up” quickly to learn the cultural cues in which you live. Whether it’s in the city of your birth or in another state, region or country. Everywhere is different that where you are today in someway. Everyone thinks different, dresses a little different and not everyone has the same practices. What are the things that make where you live unique and how does the Gospel speak to the people who live there. The only way in which learn these things is to go to number 3.

3) Connect with People – This seems like the easy thing to do. Go find people and get involved in their lives. But depending on the context you live in and the context you came from this could be difficult. If the place you are coming from is vastly different from you present surroundings you may draw a crowd quickly, but will you communicate clearly and effectively in a way that people will understand and not be offended. For the one who is “planting”  or “starting” a new work the connecting can seem to take too long. Taking time and learning to connect with the people and culture you now live in is vitally important to starting a new work. We presently are involved in various social groups, we are involved in our kid’s school and we meet with people individually weekly to listen and ask questions.

4) Connect with the Right People – I agree with Timmis on this point. We must be willing to let people know who we are and why we are in the city. For our team we have chosen to meet with local religious leaders from various Christian backgrounds to introduce ourselves. We want the local leadership to know we mean them “no harm” and we are not interested in “their people” being in the new work. We are here to bless the city by serving, growing the Kingdom of God by living, speaking and teaching the Gospel in both word and deed. We also want to be a blessing to their churches. How can we serve your local body through partnering together? We must work with people who have tenure in the city we have been sent to work and live in. We must learn from their history and wisdom. We also continually ask the Holy Spirit to guide us toward “persons of peace” who will lend their wisdom and influence to us for the sake of the Gospel in the city. We also continue to look for people who are influential in the local communities we live to develop relationships with people who influence the city.

5) Train and Appoint Leaders – As part of a city with existing churches we are seeking to bless the existing churches and para-ministries through partnerships and training. As we work together for kingdom purposes we model and train as we are allowed influence. Only through relationship will partnership with existing churches happen effectively. By allowing others to speak into our vision for a new church in the city with sending and multiplication in the DNA we are then given opportunity to train others. We seek to model missional living, effective evangelism, relational outreach and biblical models of community for those we walk among. Even as we are developing relationships with those who will one day cross the line of saving faith in Christ we seek to give them opportunity to serve and lead in ways that are appropriate.

These five principles for planting a church are solid, proven and effective. Thanks Steve for the opportunity to dialogue with your ideas.

What are the critical training components for a team?

Training is definitely church and team specific….one size does not fit all.
The beauty to Sending Church…the church is taking an active role and part in the training.

Equipping

1. Spiritual Maturity  growing in community (Catholic, Islam, Christology, Personal Evangelism)
2. One Year together in community worship and study

This would allow us to grow together, learn together, serve together, get into arguments and resolve them, families get to know each other

FriendRaising

1. Kent Jones of To Every Nation (TX) www.toeverynation.net was our trainer
2. Books -
3. Getting Sent – Peter Sommer
4. People Raising – William Dillon
5. Friend Raising – Betty J. Barnett

Purpose to communicate the vision and need for a reproducing sending church in the countries we are sent to.

Team Building

1. StregnthFinders
2. Counseling (Marriage/Financial)
3. Serving Together (great team building)
4. Arguments/Resolutions
5. Team Traveled to Brussels together

If team/personnel issues are the #1 factor for people leaving the field…we wanted to spend lots of time working on our team dynamics. If we are a strong team we can work through the other stuff. Whatever it is…

Language Training

1. 5 months of basic language for orientation (local tutor)
2. Many purchased Rosetta Stone, used podcasts and other resources
3. Commitment to learning French while on the field

major value for our team…we are relational and if we cannot communicate it will be more difficult.

+++there is more that goes on in language learning than learning a language…the Lord shapes you..dependence, struggle, sufficiency found in Him

Outside Training Partner

1. Upstream Collective

Expertise in Western Europe Context to help us think through Strategy and make suggestions to our team
Our church thinks intentional, missional, strategic, but we knew we needed to have someone with the exper. on the field where we were going. Plus filling in the gaps and blind spots and challenging our thinking in many areas.

They visited with our team every 4 months and prepared us for our scouting trips as a team.

Pre-Field Training for Adults and Kids

1. Designed by church and training partner

So huge to have a partner that we could trust as we both designed the elements to our pre-field training.
Kids training was incredible – mk2mk.org

What are other essential trainings you would add for a team being sent by the local church?

I believe in it.

But, this tag-line carries a lot of meaning. Obviously, one of the first questions must be what do we mean when we say church. The church as we mean it is about people not buildings, though buildings are necessary for the church (people) to meet together in many parts of the world. Whether it is a home, a café, or an auditorium buildings are useful, but not the church.

The tag-line can mean sending the church (people) literally to where there are no believers in a region of the world. It can mean sending the church (people) to an area of the city where a church is not existing presently. It can also mean sending the church (people) into the world to be a visible expression of Christ to a community of friends and associates.

In the country I reside there are many churches that exist already so why have we been sent to be the church where there is no church?

As I have thought about this over the last several months I have come to realize we are sent here to be a church that lives out the message of Christ incarnationally among of a people where churches are already found. We have been sent to reproduce disciples by the power of the Spirit. To reproduce leaders can live incarnationally among their sphere of influences in a way that will lead to new churches being birthed. We have been sent with intentionality at the heart of who we are. The DNA is sending, reproducing, incarnational living, multiplication, leaders, disciples and new generations. We have been sent to plant, partner and reproduce.

Being the church where there is no church in my context is more than a church building in a community with no physical gathering place. It’s more than groups of people who are meeting each week doing the same things time and again.

It is about sending healthy leaders to plant a healthy, reproducing body of believers who are reproducing and sending a new generation of disciples and leaders.

Sounds good in a blogpost and makes a great tag-line…but it is difficult, risky and dependent on the Spirit. Where else would we want to be?

How Did This Happen?

How Did This Happen? pt.2

The Whole Story (video)

From Here To There

I hope this helps you process what He is saying to you.

I need to ask you to consider joining us for what I believe will be some of the most important work that will happen in Brussels. It will not be the only work, but certainly some of the most crucial and important to happen.

• Samuel Zwemer, a missionary of old, is quoted as saying, “the history of missions, is the history of answered prayer.”
• Oswald Chambers has written, “Prayer is not preparation for the work. Prayer is the work.”
• In the 1700′s the Moravian communities committed themselves to an hour of intercessory prayer for the work of world evangelism.
• The Haystack Prayer movement is said by some to be the beginning of the modern mission movement in the United States.

But these are not the only examples of how prayer has moved people into a season of great mission and evangelistic movement. In Acts 13 the Antioch church was praying and the Holy Spirit commanded them to set aside Paul and Barnabas by laying on of hands and they were sent to the Gentiles. From this time of prayer we see the movement of the Gospel through out the book of Acts.

Even in our own church, LifePoint Church, we have seen God move  when we commit to praying and seeking after Him and His plans. In 2004 and 2008 after times of prayer and fasting during our Sacred Gathering times God sent many of our people to the “ends of the Earth” and at the same time brought the “ends of the Earth” to Smyrna.

With this background I am asking you to join us in prayer for what God is doing today and will do in the future through LifePoint Brussels.

I am asking you to commit to praying with us on the First Thursday of each month for 30 minutes between 6:00 am and 6:00 pm.

We will send you a prayer guide with Scripture passages each month before the day we all pray together so we can pray in a directed way toward the same goals. There will be Scripture passages we ask you to remember as you pray and also specific request. We are asking you to pick a 30 minute time section during the 12 hours and let us know what time you are choosing so we can know you are praying also.

Please leave a comment stating which 30 minute time slot in which you will be praying.

Thanks to Steve Hawthorne for the article concerning prayer movements and the importance of prayer in our work.

Jesus ascended Scripture tells us in Acts 1:9.

Here’s an excerpt from Wikipedia concerning Assumption Day.

Although the Assumption (Latin: assūmptiō, “taken up”) was only relatively recently defined as infallible dogma by the Catholic Church, and in spite of a statement by Saint Epiphanius of Salamis in AD 377 that no one knew whether Mary had died or not, apocryphal accounts of the assumption of Mary into heaven have circulated since at least the 4th century. The Catholic Church itself interprets chapter 12 of the Book of Revelation as referring to it.The earliest known narrative is the so-called Liber Requiei Mariae (The Book of Mary’s Repose), which survives intact only in an Ethiopic translation.  Probably composed by the 4th century, this Christian apocryphal narrative may be as early as the 3rd century.

On November 1, 1950, Pope Pius XII solemnly declared:

By the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ, of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, and by our own authority, we pronounce, declare, and define it to be a divinely revealed dogma: that the Immaculate Mother of God, the ever Virgin Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory

Roman Catholic theologians consider this declaration by Pius XII to be an ex cathedra use of Papal Infallibility.  Although Pope Pius XII deliberately left open the question of whether Mary died before her Assumption, the more common teaching of the early Fathers is that she did.

I need Scripture passages that support this belief and doctrine for me to accept this teaching.

Living in Belgium does afford us many public holidays based on the religious traditions of the Catholic Church.

Easter Monday

Ascension Day

Pentecost Monday

Assumption Day

All Saints Day

Most school age children and university students learn English as an academic exercise but do not have a way to practice conversing in English. We are hosting directed conversation English groups for 8-10 people during the university semester. We have been learning form people in Brussels and a neighboring city how to lead the groups. We are very excited and anxious to begin.

Last week we hosted a team of students from the United States (Texas specifically) who helped us promote the conversation groups on several university campuses in the Brussels area. We divided into teams and walked the campuses in search of places to hang posters. We soon began to see people seek information from an email address we established.

As of today we have received 18 request for information and several are desiring to get involved in the English conversation groups. The groups are the beginning of us establishing a consistent service opportunity for the university population on these campuses. We are hopeful we can establish great connections and relationships with university students in the coming semesters.

Thank you to the team from Rockwall, Texas who came and gave lots of energy during the week.

I remembered back to one of the very first gatherings I was in with a group of guys from The Upstream Collective and how they recommended a website to us called Meetup. They explained how it worked and spoke of how people in Western Europe were used to meeting people online and making new friendships. I honestly walked away from that meeting thinking, “This is weird. I don’t think I could ever do that kind of thing.”

Well, fast forward over a year later and seeing no good way to meet people in the Western European city I am living in, I decided to give this website thingy a try. I went to the website to look for a group I might be interested in “meeting up” with in my area. There weren’t many that appealed to me personally. If I was going to try something new I wanted it to be something that I enjoyed. I decided to begin a Meetup group around coffee and conversation. I filled out the profile to begin a group and paid the registration fee for starting a group and the next thing I knew I had launched a new Meetup group.

Over the next several weeks people began to register for the coffee and conversation group. First there were two (2) then three (3) people and the next thing I know there are 25 and then 30 people who were interested in meeting and having a talk. Wow! People wanted to get together and meet other people they didn’t necessarily know.

The very first Meetup happened at a local coffee shop on a Sunday morning. I had the opportunity to set the time and the place we would meet to have coffee and talk. Since we wanted to meet with people who may not have heard the Gospel or no a true follower of Christ I chose Sunday morning at 10:30 am as the time for our gathering. We had eight (8) people come together to talk about life, work and to laugh together. Our group was a mix of internationals and nationals talking together in a common language.

We now have over 40 people who are apart of the coffee and conversation Meetup group. We meet together every other week and new people attend each time we gather. There are usually around 8-10 people at each meetup. This has been a good way to meet new people and begin “investing” into the lives of others. I use this time together as a way to meet people and get to know them personally. We do not use this meetup time as a time to “pound” our beliefs. We are open about our worldview, why we live in the city and intentional about building and investing into the relationships. We are trusting the rest to the One who sent us here.

Here’s an understatement…I am really glad I tried something new.

Dec. 2010
Our family moved into a furnished apartment after only 2 weeks in the city

Jan. 2011
We connected with a French-speaking Belgian national, a relationship that is still growing strong today. This person has opened many doors for our family in this new country.
Our kids started in a French speaking Belgian school.
Kyle and Amy begin language school in hopes of communicating one day in French.

Feb.
Kyle and Amy celebrate 20 years of marriage.
Invited our first Belgian couple to share a meal in our home and they accepted.

March
The Christensens arrive from Nashville to plant and partner.
We were invited into a Belgian couple’s home to share a meal and experience their life.

April
Our first LifePoint Brussels gathering – 7 people (Apr. 3).
We began the process for LifePoint Brussels to receive non-profit standing in Belgium.

May
The Kids participated in the end of the year program at their new school and had major roles in the school play.
Our 1st. outreach coffee with 8 people gathering on a Sunday morning at 10:30 am.

June
Everyone in our family completes their first 6 months of language school successfully!
We are now preparing to receive and work with our first mission team in July, 2011.
Our team is preparing for 3 English discussion (college students) groups we hope to begin in September.

So much has happened in the last 7 months, and it is because God answered the prayers of His people. Thank you for partnering with us to pray for our family as we serve Him in Brussels. We are also thankful for your interceding on behalf of the people in this city. Your prayers are important.

I really looking forward to the next 7 months.

The last time I admitted to something being this difficult was in the middle of completing the written portion of my doctoral project. I did complete the project and was able write about my findings in a satisfactory way for the professors who were guiding me through the project. The research, the project and the writing was painful, very difficult and time consuming for my work and my family. There were times when I didn’t think it would be completed. There were thoughts of quitting the on many occasions, whether it was because of my desire to move on to something else or just laziness. But, the project was completed and the relief was sweet. I would add it was one of the most rewarding experiences I have walked through in my life. I am a better man and leader today because of the struggle.

I now find myself in the middle of another challenge like the doctoral project. Attempting to learn a language at my age (43) has not been an easy task. Learning a new language at any age is difficult. I never studied languages during my academic career, not in high school, university or seminary. It wasn’t required for my degree tracks so I “slid” by them all together.

I live in a city in Europe where English is a major language player. It is not the dominant language but someone could “survive” if that was the goal. It is not my goal. Therefore, I must study and learn how to communicate in a way new. I am learning that I will never be fully fluent, but I will learn to communicate one on one with people to accomplish the task I am here to do.

I have learned that I am an active learner. I like to have other people involved in the process of learning with me. I need to be able to ask questions and have people interact in the learning process. I am also the type of person that needs a little time “to process” what I am learning.

With that in mind I sat down recently and made a tool to help me in my quest to learn this new language. I am in the beginning stages of learning and I am sure it will be a long time before I am comfortable or confident to speak with some sort of clarity to the locals. I still go out and try each day. I fumble and bumble the words. I speak with one or two words and in very simple phrases not complete sentences yet. This shouldn’t be a surprise to most of  you since it was my M.O. even in my native English tongue.

So for the record this is my feeble attempt to retain what I am learning.

I created a board game so I could get the family to help me practice things like vocabulary, grammar and sentences.