National Church Planting Leaders Capacity and Collaboration Think Tank Monday, July 23, 2018 Billy Graham Center

WHY INCREASE CAPACITY AND COLLABORATION FOR THE FUTURE?

What do we mean by North American Church Planting Capacity (NACPC)? North American Church Planting Capacity (NACPC) is the amount of church planting activity required to keep pace with the growth of the general population and non-Christian affiliation in North America. Are we below, at, or above capacity?

Four Reasons Why We Need to Talk About a NACPC

Four Reasons Why We Need to Talk About a NACPC Reason #1: There is no one group broad enough to scientifically and authoritatively calculate the need for church planting in North America and report on the collective progress.

Four Reasons Why We Need to Talk About a NACPC Reason #2: There are no markers or measures for progress and no standardized performance indicators to help raise the evangelistic effectiveness of networks and denominations.

Four Reasons Why We Need to Talk About a NACPC Reason #3: We lack a readily available (open source?) system to discover and disseminate best practices.

Four Reasons Why We Need to Talk About a NACPC Reason #4: We do not know if we are ready for the future.

Why 2050 might be a significant decade: U.S. will for the first time in its history have no majority race (Diversity Explosion, William Frey.) New national narratives emerging where Church Decline language will no longer motivate Boomers are gone Gen X retired or dying Millennials retired or retiring Gen Z entering into their 50’s

At least Three Ways to get us thinking about NACPC

At least Three Ways to get us thinking about NACPC CHURCH TO POPULATION RATIO US 2010 Congregations: 324,000* Population: 309,000,000 Ratio: 1:1000 US 2050 Congregations: 400,000 Population: 400,000,000 Between 2010 and 2050, we need to: at least net 76,000 churches on average net 1,900 churches/year As of 2014, we were planting about 4000 churches and closing 3700 churches, netting 300 churches**. * Hartford Institute, RCMS 2010 ** LifeWay Research, 2014.

At least Three Ways to get us thinking about NACPC CHURCH SIZES SIZE # OF CHURCHES WEEKLY WORSHIPPERS PERCENT 7-99 177,000  9 million 59% 100-499 105,000 25 million 35% 500-999 12,000 4% 1,000-1,999 6,000  8 million 2% 2,000-9,999 1,170  4 million .4% 10,000+ 40  .7 million .01% TOTALS approx. 300,000 approx. 56 million 100% Hartford Institute, Approximate Distribution of U.S. Protestant and Other Christian Churches by size based on National Congregation Study

At least Three Ways to get us thinking about NACPC CHURCH SIZES SIZE # OF CHURCHES WEEKLY WORSHIPPERS PERCENT 7-99 236,000  12 million 59% 100-499 140,000 33 million 35% 500-999 16,000 4% 1,000-1,999 8,000  10.7 million 2% 2,000-9,999 1,600  5.5 million .4% 10,000+ 53  .93 million .01% TOTALS approx. 400,000 approx. 74 million 100% Adapted from Hartford Institute chart to reflect distribution for 2050

At least Three Ways to get us thinking about NACPC TRACKING MULTIPLICATION CENTERS “What does your organization strategically focus on the most:” Best Practices in Church Planting Systems with Particular Attention to Church Planting Churches. Send Institute, 2018.

At least Three Ways to get us thinking about NACPC TRACKING MULTIPLICATION CENTERS “Which church multiplication metrics do you currently track?” Best Practices in Church Planting Systems with Particular Attention to Church Planting Churches. Send Institute, 2018.

At least Three Ways to get us thinking about NACPC TRACKING MULTIPLICATION CENTERS “From 2014 to 2017, what percentage of your churches had active church planting interns/residents?” Best Practices in Church Planting Systems with Particular Attention to Church Planting Churches. Send Institute, 2018.

79% At least Three Ways to get us thinking about NACPC TRACKING MULTIPLICATION CENTERS From 2014 to 2017, what percentage of your churches can be categorized as a Church Planting Church actively planting other churches? 79% answered “few (less than a quarter)” to “none” Best Practices in Church Planting Systems with Particular Attention to Church Planting Churches. Send Institute, 2018.

Why we need greater collaboration?

Why we need greater collaboration? Reason #1: No one network has enough information or the know-how for the future.

Why we need greater collaboration? Reason #2: God has allowed the industry of church planting to develop over the last 30-40 years for something more than what we’ve seen. We can reinvest that know-how into something better for the future.

Why we need greater collaboration? Reason #3: We’re in a time of transition socially, institutionally, and perhaps even spiritually. We need a prayer movement.

Are we at a crisis point or are we at an opportunity?

New collaborative opportunities before us: Idea #1: New national narratives for mission besides Church Decline

New collaborative opportunities before us: Idea #2: WikiChurch.Com? National new church registry and data collection

New collaborative opportunities before us: Idea #3: National team of statisticians and forecasters (think Google labs)

New collaborative opportunities before us: Idea #4: Helpful performance indicators around diversity, innovation, scalability, and Gospel saturation

The objective for today: Ask: “What and who do we need to know in order to determine North America’s Church Planting Capacity?” Dream: “What would it take to double or triple church planting by 2050?”