How We Train Church Planters

THE MILITARY FIGURED OUT SKILL DEVELOPMENT LONG AGO

Why hasn’t the church?

DEVELOPMENT PATH FOR NAVY SEALS

The Navy SEALS figured out a way to take men in good physical shape with little to no military experience and turn them into the most skilled warriors in the world within three or four years.

Here’s how:

1. They train for 62 weeks to learn the basics.

2. They join a team.

3. They train for 18 months in the team environment to master advanced skills.

  • Six months speciality individual training.
  • Six months of unit level training.
  • Six months of task group training.

4. They are deployed for six months.

Then cycle repeats.

Here is the interesting thing. The men who enter the program have no idea how to do any of it.

Many of them had never put dive gear on or swam in the ocean.

They developed their skill to perform at the highest levels because they submitted themselves to a proven training process under the supervision of trained operators.

TRADITIONAL DEVELOPMENT PATH FOR PLANTERS

It’s content heavy. The aim is for the planter to acquire information through classes, books, conferences, then be assessed for readiness. Much emphasis was placed on gifting, ambition, and personality. Entrepreneur types were encouraged to plant.

HERE’S WHY THAT IS INSUFFICIENT

Its focus is information and innate ability, not skill. Knowledge and ability are important, but they need to be complemented with developing your skill and honing your character.

We Develop Your Church Planting Skills

Starting a church requires advanced pastoral training that builds on your basic training acquired in seminary and conferences. There are about 70 skills that need to be refined or developed. This type of specialized training requires more than traditional church plant coaching. You need individual speciality and team training to develop these skills.

To get there you will have to submit to a proven process under the supervision of trained planters and pastors.

OUR FOCUS IS TO DEVELOP YOU INTO FRUITFUL PLANTER

To make that happen, skill development demands that we:

  • Spend a time with you.
  • We listen, instruct, encourage, troubleshoot, advise, coach, and counsel you until you become proficient.
  • Create an environment to provide you ample support and appropriate challenges to grow and mature as a planter.
  • Integrate honing your character and deepening your knowledge to become godly and effective.
  • Follow proven processes and tools that create and sustain healthy churches from scratch.

THERE ARE FOUR ELEMENTS FOR A HEALTHY PLANT

The Shepherd Model for Church Planters - The GO Center

THE SHEPHERD

Every skill that you will develop flows through leading, caring for, or feeding your church. There are about 80 skills to develop or reinforce.

1. ACCEPT THAT YOU ARE A SHEPHERD

Because you are creating a church from scratch, you will be a generalist. You need be proficient in many skills, even if they are outside your gift mix. The more skills that you develop, the greater chance your plant will become a healthy and sustainable church.

Contrast a church plant with a larger church with a lot of staff and volunteers who specialize. In this case, the Lead Pastor often focuses on vision and preaching. Unless you are starting a church with 500+, you will be a generalist.

This is the reason we use The Shepherd Model. It’s designed for you to focus a on three areas to build and reinforce your skills.

2. ACKNOWLEDGE IT’S GOING TO TAKE TIME

As church plants mature, they will go through different seasons. You will need to be skilled to lead the church from one season to the next.

This is no small feat.

Plants are known for plateauing at some point.

Do you have the skills to keep the plant moving so it doesn’t prematurely plateau?

These seasons add a layer of complexity. For instance, the leadership skills you will need in the Preparing Season will be different than the leadership skills you will need in the Leading Season.

The Seven Seasons of Church Planting - The GO Center
The Oversight of the Planter Model - The GO Center

3. COME UNDER PROPER OVERSIGHT

Being a lone wolf is hard.

It’s almost a death sentence when starting a church.

There is a better way.

Come under proper oversight. There will be three people who will pour into you. Each will focus on a different area on your life and ministry.

  • One will look over your soul.
  • One will develop your skills.
  • One will help you complete the process.

4. ALIGN YOURSELF TO OUR PROVEN PROCESS

We have been providing advanced pastoral training for 25 years. Our proven processes are backed by DMin and PhD research along with corporate training, change and innovation management training.

Hundreds of pastors across 15 denominations in six countries have participated in our trainings. Pieces of it have been taught at eight bible colleges and seminaries.

HERE’S A SAMPLE OF OUR TRAINING MANUAL

SEE WHAT PLANTERS ARE SAYING

Pastor Jason Cornwell, North Augusta Fellowship (PCA)

Jason reached out because he was having trouble creating a discipleship process for his rapidly growing church plant. His church is one of the fastest growing churches in the PCA.

ALIGNING DISCIPLESHIP TO THE COMMUNITY’S RHYTHMS

Meet David our Lead for Pastoral SearchYOUR NEXT STEP TO SUCCESS

To see if our training is right for you, please book a call below.

You will speak with David Zook. He is an ordained EPC Pastor and has helped plant four churches. Two of them have thrived for more than 20 years, one has thrived for over 10 and one failed to launch.

He is also the Chair of Church Planting for the 44 churches of Presbytery of the West (EPC).

Book A Call

You will develop 20-25 skills each year.

Because of the nature and time it takes to develop and reinforce a skill, we require a 12 month commitment.

We have a “it takes what it takes mentality.” Some months we might meet three to four times, other times we might meet once every six weeks.

We will bring church planter’s together from time-to-time to support and sharpen one another.

Short answer: Minimal.

Our emphasis is creating a new mindset and habits while you are ministering to your congregation.

For instance, you will develop your time management skills. We will introduce several tools to you so that you can better plan your time, then deeply support you to become a master of your time.

Same as true with sermon prep. You will use some of our tools to think through the passage and how you are going to present it. We will be a sounding board and give you timely feedback as you work through the process of putting it together. You will think about the material in a different way, but not you may not necessarily spend more time preparing it.

Though we refer to two books and a lot tools during the Fellowship, the amount of time you spend reading will be minimal.

We took the following five factors into consideration:

  1. Your energy: The cost of having the plant drain you because you are not quite sure how to handle certain situations.
  2. Your time: The cost of not knowing how to fix the problem, but trying multiple times.
  3. Your church’s identity: The cost of not being known in your community as you would like it to be.
  4. Your health: The physical toll of trying to figure it out on your own will impact your health and your relationships.
  5. Your church’s finances: The cost of you trying to develop the skill on your own can stunt the numerical and financial growth of the church.

The investment is $400 a month for 12 months.

We have a rolling monthly enrollment.

People perform better with a trainer by their side.

Consider personal trainers. Just going to the gym and randomly working out will get random results. But a personal trainer will help you get your desired outcome by putting together a plan and holding you accountable to it.

The same is true for pastors.

Did you know church planters who have coaches:

  • Increase their effectiveness by 300%
  • Increase the number of baptisms by 150%
  • Increase attendance by 100%

77% of church planters that struggle receive less than one-week of training.

50% of pastors felt that their theological education DID NOT adequately prepared them for ministry.

Look at your return on investment.

Over a three-year period, the planter will raise hundreds of thousands of dollars to get it off the ground.

What is it getting in return?

A trainer working alongside your planter will increase his skill level. As a result, the plant will become healthier and be able to minister to more people in better ways. Healthy churches grow spiritually, numerically, and financially as God sees fit.

Healthy churches multiply.

Contact us to learn more about how we can partner to set your church planter’s up for success.