Unite! for a Hands-On Gospel
Atlanta, Georgia
To most observers, Perimeter Church in Atlanta was a model of church growth. One church in multiple locations continued to see phenomenal growth after two decades, but to senior pastor Randy Pope, something was missing.
“I looked at the example of Jonathan Edwards,” Pope says, “and I found that the most effective churches emphasize three areas: the head, which is good theology and a biblical foundation; the heart, or a passion for worship and for reaching the lost; and the hand, meeting the needs in our community.
“Many churches are one-prong churches. At Perimeter, we had a good combination of head and heart, but it just hit me: we were really missing the hand,” Pope explained. “When we reached our 25th anniversary, we said, ‘We’re going to add substantially to the hand.’ Part of our vision is to be externally focused, to get outside the four walls of the church.”
In spring 2003, Perimeter’s leaders shared their vision with leaders from Hopewell Missionary Baptist Church, a predominantly African American congregation. The result was the formation of Unite! and the first Compassion in Action Weekend and Celebration, which saw 4,500 people from over 30 churches join in service projects throughout needy northeast Atlanta.
“We said to Hopewell, ‘What if we do this together?'” says Chip Sweney, Perimeter staffer and director of Unite! “One of the reasons Unite! works so well is that we’re not a separate organization trying to pull churches together. We are the churches, working together.”
Unite! now includes nearly 70 churches in relationship with more than 40 community agencies. Unite! churches sponsor a host of ongoing service opportunities, along with monthly prayer meetings, pastors’ breakfasts, and leaders’ lunches. At the same time, each church brings its own emphasis to the network. Some focus on the homeless, some on immigrants, others on single moms or the elderly. Out of these relationships, a community health center will be launched this year.
“What’s going to make this last is not projects, it’s relationships,” Sweney says, relationships that overcome barriers. “There are racial barriers, cultural barriers, denominational barriers, barriers between churches. Our prayer from the beginning has been, ‘Lord, bring down all the walls the evil one has put up.’ If you try and unite around theological issues, you often end up having more controversy,” Sweney contends. “But when you come together to show the community that the church cares about them, churches say, ‘I really want to be part of that.'”
Unite! has changed Pope’s vision for his church and his city. “Our church intended to bring all of the city into an encounter with the Kingdom of God,” Pope says. “The vehicle we were using was one church with multiple locations, but we realized that won’t change Atlanta. Church growth is not what God honors. We should be working toward a far grander goal of community transformation, and we really need every church working together for that.”
—Angie Ward
Unlikely Partners
Columbia, South Carolina
Jeff Shipman started a church with the intention of reaching every one of the half-million people in his community. And he’s making good progress, but his congregation is not going it alone.
Shipman and his team began Columbia Crossroads Church in Columbia, South Carolina, with a vision they call the “circle of accountability.”
“We believe we are accountable for every man, woman, and child in our community, but there was no way our church alone could reach Columbia’s 500,000 people,” Shipman says. “So we either had to partner with existing churches or plant new ones.”
In 2000, Shipman took his “circle” vision and hit the streets. First, he built relationships with local pastors. To prove his sincerity and his church’s commitment, Shipman literally walked to four churches near Crossroads and presented each of them a gift of $10,000. “We were still a small, struggling church,” he says. “But we were so convinced that our vision was right that we were willing to sacrifice to prove it.”
Today, the organization born of this vision, Mission Columbia, includes 14 churches from a variety of denominations. More than a pastors’ prayer group, Mission Columbia has aided in planting a dozen new churches.
When the leaders of Mission Columbia (www.missioncolumbia.org) heard that the Southern Baptists were planting a new church near the University of South Carolina, Shipman says, “Given our vision we had no choice but to help, even though none of the Mission Columbia churches were S.B.C.” In fact, not one of the churches they’ve started is from Shipman’s own denomination. “It’s not theological, it’s practical,” Shipman says. “I love my denomination, but they just don’t have any money.”
Today, Shipman’s church has grown to 450 attenders, but Shipman plans soon to send out 110 of them to plant another church. “When people come to Crossroads we tell them, ‘Don’t unpack your bags.'” Starting new congregations and cooperating with other churches has become part of the fabric. “Every Sunday we pray for other churches and pastors by name. We meet together with a map of Columbia and talk about how to reach the new apartment complex being built, and which church will take the lead.”
For this coalition of churches, success has a new definition: “Are people being given the opportunity to accept or reject the gospel? And are they being integrated into a Bible-believing church? Whether it’s my church or someone else’s doesn’t matter anymore,” Shipman says.
—Skye Jethani
Book ‘Em After School
Honolulu, Hawaii
Just after the shootings at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, the leaders of Kaimuki Christian Church in Honolulu, Hawaii, asked the head of the local school how their church could help. Jay Garman recalls the early phone calls: “When we asked the school principals and counselors if there were any children in their school who could benefit from the attention of an interested adult one hour per week, they replied, ‘Dozens, how many volunteers do you have?'”
Jarman is founder of Common Grace (www.commongrace.org), a ministry that grew from those phone calls. Kaimuki Christian started a prototype ministry with 14 volunteers in 2000. The program now involves 82 volunteers from eight churches serving in six schools. The adults are matched with kids who need help with homework or sports, or simply need someone to talk to. “We need adults who care enough to come on campus and befriend our kids,” one principal told Jarman.
Kaimuki pastor Ron Arnold is enthusiastic about the project, which is now five years old. “In our church’s 73-year history, we never knew how to serve our wider community through that school.”
—Helen Kitchen Branson
Leading Business Leaders
Leduc, Alberta
The pastor was surrounded by friends and acquaintances. There were nifty door prizes, awards for community service, a well-stocked silent auction, and a wonderful buffet. When it was his turn to speak, pastor Grant McDowell thanked the guests and all those present for the opportunity to serve them.
“I hoped you have benefited from my term of service as much as I have from serving. I’m not just preaching,” he concluded, “when I say that the Lord Jesus is my strength and deserves the credit for everything.”
McDowell didn’t give this testimony at a church supper; it was the annual Chamber of Commerce awards banquet, and the pastor had just completed a term as president.
Ten years before, at the invitation of a businessman in his congregation, McDowell began attending the monthly Chamber of Commerce luncheons. “I felt a little awkward at first,” he says, “however, over time, I came to embrace it as part of my ministry.” He became the unofficial “grace sayer” over the meals, and found himself drawn into conversations with community leaders about economic forecasts and the region’s leadership requirements.
One day he was approached about serving on the board. McDowell declined that invitation and a second one. When the third invitation came, he accepted. “I had recently reviewed my personal mission statement, which emphasized taking risks in serving Christ in my generation. At the third invitation, I felt that the Lord was standing before me, mission statement in hand, asking whether I meant it or not.”
Within a year he was named president-elect, and then, a year later, the pastor became president of the Leduc District Chamber of Commerce. “No one was more surprised than I was. At a board retreat, the facilitator asked each of us to state why we served on the board. It was a moment of truth as I explained that I had no business being on the board, except that God instructed people through the prophet Jeremiah to seek the peace and prosperity of their city.”
During that time, the community wrestled with difficult issues, including gambling. McDowell was called on to moderate a debate between the merchants who would benefit from the revenue and the local ministerial association that opposed it. He had friends and church members on both sides.
McDowell was encouraged by the way his community received his leadership, and the opportunity it presented to extend his ministry to people who didn’t attend his or any church. And he points to a vast number of such leadership needs as ministry opportunities. “There are Food Banks to direct, Habitat for Humanity houses to build, and myriad other important groups that need support. In my view, spiritual leaders must model ministry beyond the confines of the congregation if they expect the congregation to extend its own boundaries past programs that become self-serving and redundant with time.”
—Eric Reed
Where Everybody Knows His Name
Cardiff, Wales
There’s a trend among church planters and multi-site congregations to use restaurants and sports bars as meeting places during the establishments’ off hours. Here’s a church taking the gospel to the bar crowd—and bridging a wide gap in the process.
Welsh pastor Chris Coffey turns his neighborhood bar into a sanctuary every Sunday night. “The biggest obstacle we’ve had to overcome has been our own preconceptions of what church is.”
Mission accomplished.
At a festival with two friends, Coffey dreamed up the “pub church.” And with the assistance of Glenwood Church in Cardiff, Wales, he’s serving up the gospel alongside the Guinness. The church, called Bar None (www.pubchurch.com), meets at The Oz Bar, which Coffey describes as “the darkest, dankest pub around.” The church attracts nearly 100 people for music, open conversation, and communion.
“Our aim at Bar None is to plant ourselves back in the heart of a community, to bar none that are looking for answers or a place to ask questions,” Coffey says. “Pubs by definition are public space. They feel unpretentious, a quality that, unfortunately, is not shared by many churches.” Coffey realized the pub church concept worked when the bar staff began participating in the worship and discussion. “They love the atmosphere,” he says. “They get involved, and they even ask for prayer.
“Bar None does not pretend to be how all churches should be,” he says. “It’s just one small expression of a diverse and growing global church.”
—Skye Jethani
Bikers, Babes, and BaptistsBurlington, North Carolina What do the pastors of a motorcycle church, a cowboy church, a cyber church, and a 100-year-old Baptist church have in common? They’re all committed to effective, healthy ministry, and they’re all part of an interdenominational pastors’ group in North Carolina, the Innovative Church Community (www.innovativechurches.org). “Our unifying theme is that we’re very focused on leadership effectiveness,” says Bud Wrenn, senior pastor of Integrity Community Church in Burlington, and founder of this eclectic group. Wrenn received so many calls from pastors asking for leadership guidance that, four years ago, he decided to bring some of these pastors together to hammer out some solutions. Now, pastors from more than 60 churches across the state gather each month for a day-long sessions on such themes as preaching, conflict resolution, or strategic planning. “We want to help leaders put together strategies that will help them be successful in their local context,” Wrenn says. “We’re the link between the leaders who have been there, and the leaders who are going there.” The Innovative Church Community is intentionally cross-denominational, a concept that seems counter-cultural in the region. “We’re in the Bible Belt, and churches here engage in turf wars all the time,” says Wrenn. “It’s been a natural presumption that denominational affiliation is very important. Now, however, a lot of the new church starts don’t have the denomination in their name, and they don’t always care that people know about their denomination. “We wanted the same approach when we began the pastors group.” As a result, it is not uncommon for pastors to invite their colleagues from other churches in their community. Forget the old rules: young and old, male and female, rural and urban, Pentecostal and Baptist—and biker—have all found kindred spirits in the Innovative Church Community. —Angie Ward |
Copyright © 2005 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal.Click here for reprint information onLeadership Journal.
