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Why Student Ministry Is Essential at the Summit

• 85% -- in the last century, all but 15% of believers in the USA came to faith before the age of 20.
• 70% of those coming to faith did so primarily through the influence of their friends that age.
• 3 years: the average length of time for a believer to be effective in evangelism before they become so Christianized that they lose significant contact with many of their non-Christian friends. Reference

We want to win, disciple, and send our students!

The Value of Humble, Gospel-Centered "Lay" Elders

Next Wed, Sept 9, at our first SENDRDU forum, I am going to be speaking about what it looks and feels like to be called by God, and how to discern what He is telling you to do. It is open to all, but especially those of you considering a call to the ministry!

The below is from one of your lay elders, Summit Church... thought it provided a great insight into the heart of these men. As Proverbs tells us, humble rulers who rule well are a blessing to the people. We are blessed to be shepherded by men such as these. I share it, of course, with permission:

Let me start with a confession:  I may be one of the easiest believers to get distracted.  A little pressure, a little pleasure, and once again I move away from the Cross and start doing my own thing.  If the distraction lasts more than a few days there is no telling where I might find myself.  I have not done a good job this year in gospel centered living and for that I am sorry.  

The Gospel:  I just read the Cross Centered Life and am grateful for this book.  If you have not read it I encourage you to do so as it is one of those less than 2 hr. books that packs a library worth of good stuff.  All I want to say this morning is that we have such good news.  The report is in and we are saved.  Why do I ever let any other news compete with this?

Leadership:  Yesterday morning I prayed specifically that God would use me to bring the gospel to someone in  my office.  Of course by the end of the day I had forgotten and was packing up to go home.  I got delayed by a new employee who just wanted to camp out in my office.  I was in a hurry until my mind quickened to my mornings prayer and so then I proceeded to spend the next hour sharing the gospel to this young agnostic.  I remind myself this morning that as a leader I need to be at a place where I encourage others to go. If we want our people to be carrying the gospel into their workplace it needs to start with us. Simple I know…but I am a sheep who needs a little help.

I am grateful for you men and count it a blessing to serve alongside you.  We have such good news.  Tell someone about it today.

For more on our leadership structure, check here.

The Measure of Success for a Church

When I measure our success as a church I do so more by the leaders we raise up and the people we send out more than I do the size of the audiences we create. As I've heard it recently, it's sending capacity, not seating capacity, that is the measure of a church.

(Of course, the ultimate measure of success for a church is faithfulness to the will of God. All other things, no matter how impressive and important, are secondary to being able to say we obeyed God in all that we knew and sought Him diligently. That said... when I want to "count" success, I will do so more by the leaders we raise up than the warm bodies we sit down.)

Summit, my desire is not for you just to come and hear me preach each week. My desire is for you to discover the gifts and ministry that God has given to each of you. Have you discovered your gift yet? Are you involved in a fulfilling ministry? Are you living a life of purpose and sacrifice?

If not, the best way to begin that process is to be a part of a Summit Life Group. That is the first stage of our leadership pipeline.

My desire for many of you is for you to leave our church... of course, not to go and sit in audience somewhere else, but to go and plant your life in one of our church plants, whether here or overseas. It's a radical idea, yes... but it's who we are. Our God is a sending God. If we follow Him, we will be a sending people

Should Evangelical Churches Be Involved in Community Ministry and if so, WHY?

Over the next couple of weeks J.D. Will be traveling so I, Ike Miller, will be posting a smattering of his greatest hits, thoughts on Church Philosophy and possibly some guest blogs.  J.D. also will be posting intermittently with thoughts and updates from his trip so be sure to check in for those.  

With "Week of Hope" right around the corner, the following article is an excellent explanation of the importance of community ministry and a reminder to our church that our service is to be a picture of the Gospel and a sign of the Kingdom of God:

Our church is committed to physically blessing whatever area we are trying to plant churches in. By that I mean not only do we want to see churches planted, we want to see the improvement of local education, health, and politics, and standards of living, and see the decrease of crime and poverty. We engage in projects to those ends. We don't do this as a bait and switch, as if it's just a gimmick to get people to trust Jesus. Part of the Gospel is loving our neighbor whether or not they ever trust Jesus. As a friend of mine says, "We don't serve to convert, we serve because we are converted."

Thankfully, a lot of evangelical churches today are re-embracing the need to love their world soul AND body. However, they don't always seem to agree on the reason behind why we do it. Some have never put much thought to it. There seems to be a theological haze around evangelical community ministry.

Let me sketch out for you a few of the different reasons I've encountered for why churches serve (or don't serve) the physical needs of their community. (I will leave the names associated with these reasons out in case I am misrepresenting them, but I have found popular evangelical spokesmen who advocated each of these positions)...

1. Some say we do community ministry because we are extending the Kingdom of God on earth: Some people believe that Jesus left us to build His kingdom on earth. We are not simply to be evangelizing the earth, as if we're simply trying to load up the Ark before God destroys the world again. These people embrace a worldview of creation/fall/redemption/restoration. The whole point of God's work is not simply to rescue people out of the earth, but to actually restore the earth to its glorified state. They point out that in the final chapter of Revelation what you have is not a group of Christians being evacuated off of earth into heaven, but a city coming DOWN from heaven to earth. Jesus' miracles, they note, were not (as commonly supposed) a suspension of the natural order, but a return to the natural order. They showed the earth the way it was supposed to be, the way it will be in the Kingdom. Jesus' resurrection, in like manner, was just the "firstfruits" of the resurrection of the whole world. We are to take the power of this resurrection to all spheres of the world. Martin Luther exemplified this when he answered the question, "What would you do if you knew Jesus were coming back tomorrow?" with, "Plant a tree. Imagine what that tree will look like in Jesus' glorified reign." For these people, community restoration is not simply a means for evangelism; rather, evangelism is the means to community restoration, because "community restoration" is the ultimate point of the church's work on earth! I've heard community restoration and evangelism described as two wings of the same plane, with community restoration being the "more important" wing!

When confronted with the question, "But doesn't the Bible say in 2 Peter 3 that the earth will be burned up?," these people point out that what Peter actually says (when you consider the Greek translation) is that the world be "purified" through fire and that the heavens and earth will "pass away." When the earth is purified by fire, the dross of corruption and sin will be burned away but the gold of God's Kingdom will remain. Just as one day my physical body will "pass away" and my spirit will still remain, so the dead outer body of the earth will dissolve and only the Kingdom (which we have been building on earth) will remain. Jesus will simply finish what we have started.

2. Some say we do community ministry simply because we love our neighbor. Some other Christians disagree with the above, but are still involved in community ministry. They say that we are not called to build the kingdom physically on earth, other than to call people to surrender to the Lordship of King Jesus. Jesus will build the Kingdom Himself, our role in the Kingdom is to call people to King Jesus. Ours is not primarily the ministry of restoration, but the ministry of reconciliation. They point out that the city that we see in the final chapter of Revelation DESCENDS from heaven, not rises up from the earth as Christians build it. In other words, we don't build the Kingdom so Jesus can return to it. He builds it and brings it down to us.

These people are still involved in serving their neighbor, however, as they note that we cannot love our neighbors and see them cold and underfed and not meet their physical needs. Love is the most significant change the Gospel makes in our hearts, and to love people means that we can't sit by when they are in hunger. "We don't serve to convert, we serve because we are converted."

It's just that they would not see the restoration of society as the endgame of OUR (the church's) work on earth, they would see the redemption of people as the church's work. Evangelism is our PRIMARY task, not community restoration.

3. Some say social ministry is not the domain of the church; the church should only be concerned with preaching the Gospel. Other Christians go a step farther and say that preaching is the one, primary work of the church and that other good pursuits (like social justice) should not take the church away from her one task, the preaching of the Gospel. These people believe that preaching the Gospel IS the greatest act of community service they can do.

They would see themselves kind of like an EMT in an emergency. If there were an earthquake that left a lot of people dying, the most loving thing the EMT could do is not be distracted by cleaning up all the mess and do the one thing that only he can do, and that is perform emergency procedures that save lives.

They point out that in Acts you don't see the Apostles running soup kitchens, you see them preaching. When they are presented with a social need like the hunger of the widows (Acts 6), they challenge other Christians to take up this task so that they will not be distracted from preaching. They point out that when Jesus was asked to get involved in social justice issues, he declined and preached instead: when he was asked to end world hunger in John 6 he declined and preached instead to the people about Himself as the bread of life; when he was asked to solve the property dispute of one person who had been cheated out of their property, He said that this was not His business and preached to the crowd instead about the sin of greed.

These people believe that individual Christians (or groups of Christians, as in charitable foundations, philanthropy groups, parachurch ministries, etc) can and should engage in community ministry issues, just not the local church body herself. The focus of the organized church should be preaching. However, if the church perceives that she can preach the Gospel better by engaging in community ministry, she should do that. But preaching is the endgame.

4. Some say community ministry is done as a "sign" of the Gospel, and a necessary part of preaching the Gospel. OK, I'll admit, this is my position (which is why I left it till last.) We believe that community ministry is more than just love of our neighbor, it is a sign of the Kingdom that Jesus inaugurated. In the same way that Jesus' miraculous signs gave physical pictures of what His kingdom was like (a Kingdom without blindness or sickness), community ministry also shows what the kingdom is really like: a kingdom of justice, progress, equity, health, and sacrificial love. Unlike the "build the Kingdom" people, however, we don't believe that we are actually building the Kingdom on earth. Jesus alone can do that. As pointed out above, the glorified, restored city comes down from above and the heavenly Garden is planted by God Himself.

What we are doing is giving signs, the way that Jesus did. Signs, whether done by Jesus or by us, are only temporary. The blind eyes that Jesus healed went blind again--they weren't Kingdom eyes, because Kingdom eyes will never decay. The dead people Jesus raised died again. He was only giving a temporary picture of what the Kingdom was like. Some theologians assert that had Israel accepted Jesus as the Messiah He would have inaugurated the Kingdom, in which case the healings He gave would have become permanent and the actual institution of the Kingdom. Regardless, Jesus is now in heaven and we await His return. He alone can bring resurrection to the earth. Just like his signs and miracles, our "restoration" is only temporary and only a sign of the future restoration. The bodies we heal will deteriorate again; the neighborhoods we rebuild will turn back into ghettos once again. Every single "renewal" that God did in the Bible, Old or New Testament, eventually deteriorated back into chaos, with the exception of the resurrection of Christ Himself and our souls resurrected in Him. We are not building the Kingdom for Jesus; we are giving signs of that Kingdom, just like He did.

To those that think we are actually building the Kingdom now, I would urge the consideration of a little historical context: this was the failed experiment of zealous Christians in the 17th and 20th centuries. In fact, much of the "America is God's chosen nation" heresy in the church today came out of the mentality that some Christians had at the birth of our nation. They thought they were building the perfect Kingdom government which Jesus would come back to. Those that are trying to build Kingdom businesses and Kingdom governments should be wary of trying to actually build the Kingdom without the King.

What we, the church, are here to do, primarily, is to preach the Gospel of His Kingdom and compel others to surrender to the King Jesus. Ours is the ministry of reconciliation to the King, not restoration of the Kingdom. HOWEVER, just as Jesus, as part of His preaching, gave signs of the Kingdom, so we are to perform signs in our communities. We are to heal the sick, feed the hungry and clothe the poor, sometimes by natural means and sometimes supernatural. We are to constantly testify that this is what the Kingdom is like and compel people to come to Jesus the Kingom. Our kindness is neither random nor senseless. It signifies the Kingdom. We are to (in the words of N.T. Wright who, so far as I know, does not agree with my position) "sketch out with pencil what Jesus will one day paint over in indelible ink."

We want our cities to be like Samaria in Acts 8, who "rejoiced" because of the preaching and healing ministry of Philip. We want our communities to be like Tabitha's community in Acts 9 who wept at her death because of all the kind deeds she had done in their midst. We believe that the beauty of Jesus' kingdom is so compelling that our community will look at us and say, "Wow. We don't believe what they believe, but thank God they're here!" 

Also, do not overlook that the local Church itself is the greatest earthly sign of the Kingdom. The Church is to be an inexplicable new community of unity and love--Jesus said in John 17 that the world would know Jesus' Messiahship by the love of His disciples for one another.

I guess my position is kind of a hybrid of the first 3. We serve people because we love them, and because we know that in order to preach the Gospel effectively to them we need to give them signs of the Kingdom we preach.  

This is a work in progress for me, so I'm open to your thoughts.

Why the Multi-Site Strategy Is Biblical and Can Be the Wisest Course of Action for a Congregation, Part 3

*This is part 3 of a several part series in which I'll try to walk through some of our thinking about the multi-campus movement and why we have chosen to adopt it.  You can find part 2 here.

The multi-campus church does not preclude or even compete with church planting.

The multi-campus strategy does not preclude church planting, it fosters it! There are a few reasons for this. 

First, it should be understood that most studies show that church planting will not alleviate space needs at any one campus. If you can convince 200 of your people to go and start a new church (and that is usually a tough sell), you end up making up that growth within a few months. Even if you plant 10 churches out of your church, chances are that you will still be dealing with space problems. Church planting will not provide a solution for space issues. So, by all means, plant churches, but in order to steward the people God is bringing to the original campus, you’ll need a different solution! 

The question then becomes whether you should send people away, build a bigger facility, multiply services or plant a new campus. Sending people away is not on option. Building a bigger facility can be expensive, and many people will drive far to get there. Multiplying services is great, but you quickly reach a limit of how many you can do. Multiplying campuses is the cheapest and easiest way to keep growing beyond that. As John Piper said, “The question is no longer whether we’ll be a megachurch, but what kind of megachurch we will be.”

Second, those leaders that can plant churches should be sent out to plant churches. But, as noted above, not every church leader is equipped to be a senior teaching pastor. Many of these men would make ideal campus leaders. So while you train up and send out your church planters, you will find some who will be better suited for campus leadership. This is what the Jerusalem church in Acts 2 did. 

Finally, it has been our experience that multiple campuses provide a leadership pipeline for developing church planters. It provides a place to hone the skills necessary for teaching and leadership. The multi-campus strategy is integral to our church planting strategy.

The problem of developing a cult of personality is not exclusive to the multi-campus church.

I’ve often heard, “The multi-site movement fosters a cult of personality by tying everyone to one mega-teacher.” Leader-worship is certainly a danger in large churches, and unfortunately many large church leaders seem all too willing to foster it. However, the cult of personality can exist as much in a small, single-campus church. In fact, sometimes moreso! When I pastored a small church, my congregation seemed to think that my presence was necessary for everything of spiritual significance. I had to marry and bury everyone, and my people wanted me to resolve all problems and answer all questions. I tried to teach them otherwise, but their natural tendency was to be much more dependent on me than they are now that we are a multi-campus church! The people in our church know that I am nothing special, I’m only a man with a teaching gift! There are many other pastors in our church with the Spirit of God to whom they can look for leadership and ministry.

*Part 4 to follow shortly. During this series, please feel free to offer your comments.

Why the Multi-Site Strategy Is Biblical and Can Be the Wisest Course of Action for a Congregation, Part 2

*This is part 2 of a several part series in which I'll try to walk through some of our thinking about the multi-campus movement and why we have chosen to adopt it.  You can find part 1 here.

The criticisms of the multi-campus church can apply to any large or multi-service church.

One of the primary criticisms of a multi-campus church is that you create disparate groups of people who will never know each other. Realistically speaking, however, this happens at any multi-service church. For that matter, it happens at any church above a couple of hundred. 

The hardest ecclesiological shift for me was not in going to multiple campuses, but in growing larger than 400 members! At that point I realized that I couldn’t know every member in a meaningful way and they wouldn’t all know each other. Large churches of whatever style have members who do not know each other, and not every pastor knows every member. 

Every member in a multi-site church, however, is connected somewhere, known by a pastor, and under the care and governance of our church elders, just as they can in other large churches. 

The multi-campus strategy is better at promoting leadership in a large church.

I’ve often heard this: “Why build the church so much around you? Do you really think there are no other good preachers in Raleigh-Durham? Why not develop other leaders and teachers?"

We have found that a multi-campus church is better at developing leaders than a single-location large church. My wife remarked to me the other day, “Have you ever noticed that some of your favorite staff members you no longer see each Sunday?” They are serving at one of 3 campuses I don’t usually get to on Sunday. These were guys I raised up, trained, and on which I had depended. Now, as campus pastors, they have the opportunity to lead in ways they didn’t when we were all at one place. And, in their wake, new leaders have emerged at the original campus. 

Campus pastors are guys who are gifted leaders and good communicators, but not necessarily called teachers. Many guys, who are great leaders and pastors do not enjoy doing what I do each week, spending 20+ hours preparing messages and deciphering vision. As campus pastors they exercise leadership within their gifts in a way that they could not as church planters, where they must devote an exceptional amount of time to study.

The bottom line is that we have more and better leaders as a multi-campus church than we did as a single-campus church.

*Part 3 to follow shortly. During this series, please feel free to offer your comments.

Why the Multi-Site Strategy Is Biblical and Can Be the Wisest Course of Action for a Congregation

*This is part 1 of a several part series in which I'll try to walk through some of our thinking about the multi-campus movement and why we have chosen to adopt it.

In 2005 our congregation moved to a multi-site strategy out of what we perceived to be a necessity. God graciously was bringing to our doors more than we could handle. We were doing as many morning services as we could in our rented-school facility, and we’re now having to turn people away. So, we opened another campus 3 miles down the road, where I preached in between our other services at the main campus.

Since that time, we have become convinced that a multi-campus strategy is not only a satisfactory way to deal with our space problems, but is a biblically sound strategy for growing our church and reaching our city. We currently are a church of about 3000 attendees, meeting in 4 campuses throughout Raleigh-Durham, NC. We plan to add two new sites in the fall of 2009.

We believe that one of our primary missions as a church is to seek and save the lost in our city. We are also a church, however, who believes that faithful ecclesiology must trump pragmatism. We believe that being multi-campus is the best way to do both.

Let me first acknowledge that many of the criticisms of various multi-site churches I find ready agreement with. Many multi-site environments encourage consumerism, foster anonymity, are cults of personality, and have more foundation in the wisdom of men than of God. That said, over the next few blog entries I will explain why we still enthusiastically embrace the multi-site strategy as responsible ecclesiology and effective missiology.

First, The essence of a local church is a covenant body, not a manner of assembly.

I have heard the objection to our multi-site strategy, “A church is primarily an assembly, and to assemble means all the people come together in one place.” The essence of a New Testament local church, however, is a covenant local believers make with one another. Assembly is a much-needed function, but covenant is the essence. And where in the New Testament does it say that “all people must assemble at the same time?” To say that “assembly” means all people in one place at one time is suggestive at best.

The objection that believers who meet separately for corporate worship cannot be one body in Christ would apply also to the multi-service church, not just the multi-campus church. In our judgment, the New Testament does not demand a church assemble all together in one place, at one time, each week. As John Piper notes, we have a clear biblical example of the opposite! The new congregation in Jerusalem is frequently referred to in the singular, one “church” (Acts 8:1; 11:22; 15:4). They obviously, however, had to meet in different times and locations. Historians tell us there was no space in Jerusalem available to the disciples large enough for 3000 plus people to meet on a weekly basis. Furthermore, it also appears that many of the house churches in the 1^st century churches came together to celebrate the Lord’s supper as one citywide church (see 1 Cor 11:17–20; Romans 16:5).

*Part 2 to follow shortly. During this series, please feel free to offer your comments.

I don't want to be new and innovative

It seems that a really dangerous temptation of us that are younger is the desire to be new and innovative... to discover groundbreaking truth or some new methodology that changes Christianity, and then be able to speak prophetically into the church. I can't tell you how many times I talk with guys in seminary who, when asked why they are going into the ministry, say, "I want to change this or that about the church."

There is, of course, some level at which this is good. We really do need to rethink the state of the church on a continual basis.

But the need for newness is not the primary need of the hour. The problem is not that most people need a new way of hearing the Gospel, but that most people have never heard it all. My goal each week is not to give what the people in front of me will perceive as a "new approach" to the Gospel, but simply to explain the really old Gospel in as clear a way as possible to them.

If that is "new," then let that be new. But my goal is not newness. It is the clear communication of the really, really old.

C. S. Lewis, called by many to be the most original expounder of Christianity in the 20th, once said something like, "I never really cared a wit about saying anything new or original, just to be as clear as I could on what Christians have always believed. Somehow that sounded original."

The desire for newness or relevance can actually work against you. It can lead you to the corruption of truth. I think of the words of Sinclair Ferguson, who said about "the New Perspective on Paul": "We don't need a new perspective on Paul. We just need to communicate the old perspective on Paul!" Most of the people I preach to each weekend don't have a wrong view of Paul, they have no idea what he taught about salvation by grace through faith!

The desire to be new can also keep you from the one task God has given the church... not the discovery of something new, but the revelation of something old. Sticking to clear explication of the old will make you relevant. As G. K. Chesterton said, "If you marry the times, you'll soon become a widower." Or, Hank David Thoreau, "Read not the times, read the eternities."

My goal is to find the clearest way to communicate a really old story most people have never heard.

In one sense, I want to remain focused on preaching the Gospel and winning the lost, not being a prophet to the church. In leading our congregation to reach the lost, I imagine that needed renewal will come to the church. Or, to say it another way... I'm not trying to bring revival to the church, just vival to the lost. And ain't nothing that brings revival to the church like a vival among the lost.

In the spirit of relevance, I've added this picture of me in vintage relevant dress from 1991, just to show you relevance has always come natural to me. Or maybe I was just a dork.

P.S. Check out my cappucino that I got in NYC on my recent trip. When can we start doing this in RDU? Come on, Mad Hatter!!!!!

Multi-site vs. church planting

I get frequent questions from thoughtful believers about whether multi-site is a good option in light of what the New Testament says about a local church. As one missionary said to me recently, "I hear no biblical grounding in people who advocate it; they only say 'it works so it must be right.'" I agreed with him that "it works" is not a good enough reason by itself to do something. That is nothing but a version of "every man did what was right in his own eyes," the root of all sin. God's way is always best, especially when it comes to doing church. I want to be an avid, committed student of the New Testament when it comes to leading and structuring a church.

Recently, I discussed the biblical nature of multi-site from Acts 2, et al here.

The "short answer" is that satellite campuses are NOT an alternative for church planting, but they ARE a good substitute for multiplying services on one campus.

I believe each church should capitalize on the growth God is bringing them. The way that they do that is to a) build a bigger facility; b) multiply services on the campus or c) plant new campuses. Of those 3 options, c is the most efficient.

Some say, "Do none of the above! Instead, plant a church." But numerous studies show that planting new churches, even if very close to the home church, makes no significant reduction in how many people will come to the home campus. It is a good "theory" to say that when you get full in your sanctuary you should just plant a church. But it usually does not do what we designed it to do on paper--i.e. free up space at a campus or provide for maximum growth.Only a small percentage of people will leave their church and pastor to go be a part of a new church plant, and that number you usually replace in your sanctuary in a few months, which then leaves you to face the same "problem" again.

Thus, we believe you should multiply services/campuses AND plant churches.

Ecclesiologically, there is no substantive difference I can find between multiple services on one campus or services on multiple campuses throughout the city.Both are ways to accommodate the growth God brings to one congregation.

Churches that do this should also be planting churches IN THEIR OWN CITY, as they will capitalize on new leadership and reach a whole new set of people. We want to plant 1000 churches in the next 40 years, and I hope that at least 20 of those are in the Triangle.

To say it briefly, satellite campuses are an alternative to multiple services and bigger sanctuaries, not to church planting.

One small word of caution to critics of the multi-site movement--make sure that you're not doing the same thing the traditional church did to Luther (who put the Bible in the vernacular so farmers could read it) and Wesley and Whitfield (who had the audacity to preach outside of the church in the open field)--criticize the new medium just because it's not what we're used to...!

What the city thinks of our multi-site approach...

This the article that appeared in the N&O this morning about our church. I appreciate the kindness Yonat showed to us in it. She is a fair writer, a responsible journalist, and really tries to get to the heart of who we are. I really like her and am grateful for her work in our local papers.

Obviously, not everything in the article reflects our intentions. For example, when I became pastor it was not under the precondition of changing the name and dropping "Baptist" from our church title. I came under only one precondition: that we would do whatever it took to reach our community. The name change, selling of our property and etc were things that we, as a church, decided together and adopted our first year of ministry together (2002).

I also wish that it was not so strongly implied that all our campuses are built around me. We are very committed to empowering leaders at our church, and our plan for reaching the Triangle includes twice as many local church plants as "satellite" campuses. We have begun a church planting training center this year to train up other leaders and teachers for that purpose, and have as a goal planting 1000 churches in the next 40 years. In no way do I think that God has given only me the teaching gift and everyone should be sitting around listening to me. We want to find those people God has gifted to be teaching pastors and help them get out there to plant churches.

Why not ONLY plant churches and pursue no satellite locations? The simple reason is that each is effective in a different way. There are certain situations in which a satellite location will reach more people than a new church plant, and some situations where that is reversed. Satellite campuses are a way of managing the growth God is bringing to the one congregation (rather than simply multiplying services at one location, you multiply them at various locations, closer to where people live); new churches are a way of beginning new growth in new congregations.

We are committed to doing both, depending on which is better suited for area we are trying to reach and which resources we currently have in hand. We see a clear biblical precedent for it in Acts 2, which I discuss here. (p.s. for you theologians, the harder jump for me was going from one Sunday service to two, than from going from services at one location to services at multiple locations. When God brings you growth, you have to accommodate it. What is the difference in doing multiple services at one location to doing multiple services at various locations around the city? Planting churches is not a good solution, practically speaking, to burgeoning growth, as it never really slows down the growth of one campus. Satellite campuses help you with the growth of your congregation, and should be done together with starting new works.).

In some ways, satellite locations actually encourage the decentralization of leadership. For example, if all 2800 of our people came to the Brier Creek campus, everyone would look at me as their "pastor." Obviously, I can't be significantly involved in that many people's lives. But at smaller campuses, the congregation is shepherded by a local campus pastor, who can more effectively engage the people.

At the end of the day, I'm less concerned about the size and shape of the venues than I am the people being encountered with the Gospel and the growth and health of local churches. The stakes are too important to get caught up in ego wars or pull back for fear of what people will say about us.