I came across this blog post written by a local pastor in town. I have never witnessed a pastor encouraging this type of “church growth” strategy before. The names have been removed in this post to protect the innocent. :) This pastor and I did correspond back and forth a few times but we graciously agreed to disagree on various points. Here is his blog post below:
“As you heard during my presentation, XXX is now entering an exciting stage in it’s early ministry—where the stakes are high! In this stage, we must all start seeing ourselves as “missionaries to Freeport—recruiting other missionaries to Freeport.” Large churches like XXX can survive for quite some time based on size, budget, different-ness, and momentum. XXX can survive based on size, multiple staff and a broad, mainstream evangelical culture, and migration from broad evangelical churches.
I ask during the upcoming year each of you join our family in…
1) Asking our sovereign God to glorify Himself by bringing to XXX people who would 1) Benefit greatly from XXX AND who would 2) Contribute greatly to XXX (as missionaries with us). To be honest, XXX needs both types of people.2) Making a list of both types of people that you personally know. Please do NOT rule anyone out because they have gone to “church x” for 15 years. Missionaries are always people sent from an established church, to start a new church. No churches would exist today if no one left their churches to birth ‘daughter’ churches. There’s nothing immoral about asking people to be missionaries. It’s been done for 2000 years!
**Making these friend lists should be fun. After all, this is a chance for you to sit back and ask, “who would I love to see a part of XXX?” Who would be a privilege to serve alongside?” “who would add warmth, servant-heartedness and gifts to a new church?”
Praying for you!
~ Pastor XXX XXX”
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