Bridging diversity divides and generational gaps, the table has always been a foundational cornerstone of human community. All cultures, countries, and creeds have a form of “table” that is the centerpiece to the community, gathering generations around a common ground. 

Within the formative experience of the church, the table was instrumental to the establishment of scripture and message. 

The first mention of a table is found in Exodus 25, when God gives instructions to Moses to build the Table of Shewbread for the Tabernacle. This table was designed to hold the shewbread, translated to “Bread of the Face.”  

The role of the table as a place of community, worship, and transformation continues throughout the Old Testament as well as the New Testament. The Gospels are filled with stories of Jesus around the table, demonstrating the importance of discipleship and instruction. 

Jesus speaks truth while reclining at the table in the presence of Pharisees, His disciples, and other community leaders. Key conversations about such items as finances, worship, servanthood, and leadership are all discussed and demonstrated at the table. 

The table has been a key character in the early church narrative. In the modern expression of church, the “table” continues to play a key role in building and shaping church communities. However, with the advancement of technology and the re-imagination of church models in the 21st century, the representation of the “table” must be re-considered. 

Seven years ago, such a re-imagination took place in the hearts of pastors, Justin and Janae Klatt. Imagine Church Global, a collective of communities, was established in 2017. 

In a pre-covid world, Justin and Janae embarked on an adventure to reach women and men who would not traditionally attend a brick-and-mortar church. 

Growing up in legacy or brick and mortar-style churches, both pastor’s kids, Justin and Janae have a deep love and affinity for traditional church models. The endeavor to do something “new” was not in resistance to what had been the format of church, but rather out of a calling to reach groups of individuals they had yet to see in prior ministry contexts. 

The idea for Imagine Church was to explore new expressions of the “table” where men and women who were previously excluded from the seating arrangement could find a seat and space at the “table” of church community.  In their early church planting years, Justin and Janae were exposed to pockets of society who could not attend church for a variety of reasons, such as individuals who were bed-ridden with sickness, cancer patients, families who live on the road in traveling vehicles, or those in rural communities without a local church for miles. 

Imagine Church began as a simple “experiment” to create Biblical conversations with consistent face-to-face community; discipleship around a “digital table.” During the last years, the church has continued to grow, adapt, and re-invent the content to help accommodate the ever-increasing reality of the need for deep, authentic community. 

Justin and Janae have learned, through trial and error, patience and perseverance, that community and the “table” must always be the center of how the church gathers. Creating “tables” where individuals can gather, dialogue, discover, and disciple one another in their personal journey with Jesus is something that is needed in digital communities as well as in-person gatherings. Providing digital tables, with consistency and authenticity is something that can and should be worked out in a digital church expression. 

One of the ways that Imagine Church has hosted tables and conversations in a digital church model is through a church-wide missional week, called “The Neighborhood Table.” Once a week each month, across all the Imagine Church communities, every member is encouraged to host a “table,” inviting those that don’t attend Imagine Church. The purpose of hosting Neighborhood Tables at the same time each month is to help create a sense of collaboration and support of a missional mindset for a nationally distributed digital church. 

For example, someone in a digital community could open their home to neighbors or local friends for a home-cooked meal, at the same time a different member, who is unable to leave their home, could invite a friend for a cup of coffee over Facetime or Zoom. Additionally, families could invite friends to the local park for a BBQ, or a young adult could host a game night with pizza. The goal of “The Neighborhood Table” is to be on mission as a nationally distributed church and have a sense of collective support as each member hosts a “table” unique to their own context. 

Carl Medearis, missionary and author of Speaking Jesus: The Art of Not-Evangelism, says sharing the life of Jesus ministers the gospel more than any information we can proselytize. 

Carl writes, “The really neat thing about accepting Jesus as a person is that it makes our experience with him real. Living with a real person forces us to live honestly. Like in a friendship. Instead of living by some moral code, or conjuring up some spiritual state of mind, all we have to do is make our life about a relationship with a person” (Medearis, 141). 

The power of the gospel, the life of Jesus, is best discovered around frailty of humanity at the table. 

In the many varieties of “church” expressions, the need for innovation and creativity continues to drive the mission of the gospel forward. The goal as pastors isn’t to come up with the “best” idea, but rather contextualized ways of reaching new generations, cultures, and individuals with the Good News. 

The power and hope of the message of Jesus has transformed lives around the “table” for over 2,000 years and continues to do so today. As pastors and leaders, our job isn’t to re-invent the message but rather the method in which it can be served. 

Could it be that as pastors, we are being called to get creative about the “tables” that God is asking us to shepherd? Maybe the tables in your church are digital, or perhaps they are wooden picnic tables, corporate conferences tables, urban café tables, or rugs in the center of a dirt floor. The “table” is a place to allow women and men to gather, inviting authentic Jesus’ conversations. 

The table challenges us and calls us back to an Acts 2 church, where the love of Jesus was demonstrated in practical service, shared meals, prayer, and ultimately radical transformation. 

Exponential NEXT Podcast Episode 106

Series: From Soil to Forest: The Practice of Networked Ministry

Description:

In this episode, Patrick O’Connell and guest Andrew Hoffman discuss the evolution of church planting networks and the shift from isolated ministry to collaborative missional work.

Host:

Patrick O’Connell, Networks NEXT, Director

Guest:

Andrew Hoffman, Bay Area Church Planting Network, Director

Links Shared in Episode:

Bay Area Church Planting Network

Category: Networks NEXT

It’s not loud. It doesn’t dominate stages or command attention with charisma alone. It doesn’t rely on positional authority or polished platforms. Instead, it moves through presence, discernment, and deep rootedness in God.

It is the kind of leadership many women already carry – but have often been told is “too soft” to be effective. And yet, what if these “soft” skills – emotional attunement, adaptive leadership, and spiritual grounding – are not secondary to leadership, but central to it?

I believe these are sacred gifts we are called to steward.

In my own journey of pastoring and leading women’s ministries and nonprofit organizations, I have learned that the most transformative leadership is not built on control, but on cultivation; not on certainty, but on discernment; not on performance, but on identity.

Reclaiming ‘Soft’ as Strong

In many leadership spaces, “soft skills” are treated as optional – nice additions once the “real” leadership work is done. But the reality is quite the opposite.

Research and leadership frameworks increasingly affirm that emotional intelligence, empathy, and relational awareness are not peripheral – they are essential. Leaders who demonstrate emotional intelligence build trust, foster collaboration, and create resilient teams.

In adaptive leadership specifically, emotional intelligence is not just helpful – it is foundational. Leaders must navigate people’s values, fears, hopes, and beliefs, not just strategies and systems.

For women in ministry, this resonates deeply. We are often leading in complex, emotionally charged environments – walking with people through grief, identity, calling, conflict, and transformation.

You cannot spreadsheet your way through that. You must feel your way through it – with emotional intelligence, spiritual attunement, and wisdom.

Emotional Intelligence: The Ministry of Noticing

Emotional intelligence begins with paying attention. It is the ability to notice what is happening beneath the surface – both in yourself and in others – and respond with wisdom rather than reactivity.

In leadership, this looks like:

• Sensing when a team member is disengaging before they say it 
• Recognizing when conflict is about something deeper than the issue at hand 
• Naming the emotional reality in a room others are avoiding 
• Regulating your own anxiety so it does not become the group’s anxiety

At its core, emotional intelligence is about presence. And presence is deeply spiritual.

Jesus modeled this kind of leadership constantly. He noticed Zacchaeus in a tree. He perceived the unspoken suffering of the woman who touched His garment. He wept with Mary and Martha before He ever raised Lazarus. He did not rush past emotion – He entered it.

As leaders, especially women forming other women, we are called to do the same. Paying attention to other’s emotions and being emotionally attuned to them is part of discipleship.

Because people are not transformed by information alone. They are transformed when they feel seen, known, and safe enough to grow.

Adaptive Leadership: Letting Go of Control

If emotional intelligence is about noticing, then adaptive leadership is about responding.

Adaptive leadership recognizes that many of the challenges we face today cannot be solved with existing answers. They require learning, experimentation, and transformation – not just execution.

This kind of leadership asks different questions:

• What is God doing that we have not yet understood? 
• What needs to die so something new can be born? 
• Where are we clinging to familiarity instead of following the Spirit?

Adaptive leadership requires humility. It means admitting:

• “I don’t have all the answers.” 
• “We are going to learn as we go.” 
• “We may need to change.”

And that can feel terrifying – especially in ministry contexts where leaders often feel pressure to appear certain. But adaptive leadership is not about having all the answers. It is about creating environments where we can slow down to seek God’s truth collectively, which involves:

• Listening deeply to diverse voices 
• Experimenting with new approaches where we sense God’s leading 
• Reflecting and adjusting in real time 
• Empowering others to participate in discernment

Adaptive leadership also requires courage because change is difficult. Often people resist change – not because they are resistant to growth, but because change feels like loss. Adaptive leaders shepherd people through that loss.

Spiritual Grounding: Leading from our Identity of Belovedness

Many women in ministry carry an invisible burden: the pressure to prove themselves. We feel like we must be prepared, articulate, wise, pastoral, strategic, emotionally present, spiritually deep – and to do it all with grace.

Over time, leadership can quietly shift from calling to performance.

We begin to derive our identity from:

• How well we lead 
• How much we produce 
• How others respond to us

And when that happens, even good leadership becomes exhausting. This is where spiritual grounding becomes essential.

Because the deeper truth is this: You are not first a leader. You are first beloved. Even before Jesus ever began His ministry, He heard these words:

“This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”

Identity preceded activity. Belovedness preceded calling. And the same is true for us. And when that truth is not anchored in your soul, leadership will eventually hollow you out.

To lead from belovedness is to lead from rest, not striving:

• You do not need to prove your worth – you already have it. 
• You do not need to earn God’s delight – you already have it. 
• You do not need to control outcomes – you can trust God with them.

This kind of leadership changes everything. It frees you to:

• Listen instead of perform 
• Empower instead of control 
• Discern instead of force

It also creates a different kind of presence. People can feel the difference between a leader who is striving and a leader who is grounded.

One creates pressure. The other creates peace. And in a world marked by anxiety, peace is profoundly powerful.

Integrating Emotional Intelligence and Spiritual Formation

As a spiritual director, I have come to learn that emotional intelligence and spiritual formation are not separate disciplines. They are deeply intertwined.

• Self-awareness is connected to confession 
• Emotional regulation is connected to surrender 
• Empathy is connected to love 
• Presence is connected to abiding
  

When we invite God into our emotional lives – not just our spiritual practices – we become more whole. And wholeness is what makes leadership sustainable.

Practices for Cultivating ‘Soft’ Strength

If these forms of leadership are to take root in us, they must be practiced intentionally. Here are a few rhythms that have shaped my own leadership:

1. Daily Re-anchoring in Belovedness

Begin the day not with your to-do list, but with your identity.

Ask:

• How does Jesus see me right now?  
• Where am I striving today? 
• What would it look like to lead from rest instead?
  

2. Emotional Check-Ins

Regularly pause to ask:

• What am I feeling? Why? 
• How might this be impacting how I’m leading? 
• Pause and take deep breaths to get regrounded. 

3. Listening Before Leading

In meetings or decisions, practice:

• Listening fully before speaking 
• Asking questions instead of giving answers

4. Naming Reality

• Develop the courage to name what others are sensing but not saying. This builds trust and clarity.

5. Practicing Release

At the end of the day, 

• Release what is not yours to carry. Leadership is stewardship – not ownership. 
• Review your day with God and give thanks for the ways you’ve seen Him work.

Closing: The Invitation

What if the future of the church does not depend on louder voices – but on deeper ones? What if the leaders who will shape the next generation are not those who have the most answers – but those who are most attuned to God and to people? What if “soft” leadership is actually the strongest kind?

To the women leading in this moment: 

• You do not need to become someone else to be an effective leader. 
• You do not need to harden yourself to be taken seriously. 
• You do not need to abandon your emotional awareness, your spiritual depth, or your relational instincts.

These are not liabilities. They are your leadership. The invitation is not to lead louder. It is to lead deeper.

To become women who are:

• Emotionally attuned 
• Adaptively wise 
• Spiritually grounded

Women who lead not from fear, but from belovedness. Women who create spacious places where others can encounter God. And in doing so, we may discover that the leadership the church most needs has been quietly growing within us all along.

It is not unique to a certain personality type, birth order, or position. I believe everyone is a leader because God created every one of us to influence, shape, and impact the world around us. 

If you stop and think about it, leadership shows up in more places than we often acknowledge. You shape your family culture through leadership. The way you handle conflict is leadership. The way you use your money, spend your time, make decisions, and care for people all reflect leadership. Nothing changes, develops, or advances without leadership showing up at some point in the process. 

This understanding matters for the church, particularly in our current cultural moment. We don’t need Christian leaders waiting for permission to lead. We need believers who understand that leadership begins where our influence meets purpose. We also need support from those who care deeply about seeing missionaries, leaders, and everyday disciples strengthened to live, serve, and make disciples where God has placed them. This is work that requires a broader, inclusive, and more biblical vision of leadership, one that is less concerned with ego, platform, or control, and is being built on impact. 

Looking at the life of Jesus, I see a pattern of leadership. He led in a way that was both deeply connected to His faith and practical. Jesus did not lead randomly. There was a rhythm to the way He influenced people, pursued His purpose, endured hard times, and advanced God’s mission. From His life, I have framed leadership through six interconnected elements: Influence, Mission, Passion, Action, Commitment, and Trust. Together, they form what I call the IMPACT Leadership framework. 

Everything begins with influence. Leadership starts the moment our lives begin affecting the lives of others. John Maxwell famously said that leadership is influence, and there is truth in that statement. 

Influence is the ability to inspire people and motivate them toward something bigger than themselves. It shapes behavior, character, convictions, and direction. We have all been formed by influence, whether through parents, teachers, pastors, friends, or even people who misused influence in ways that left wounds. 

In our own lives, the real question is not whether we have influence. The question is how we are managing it. Jesus provides us the clearest possible example. In the Sermon on the Mount, He did more than preach a memorable message. He reshaped the moral imagination of His hearers. He taught about humility, mercy, reconciliation, prayer, generosity, and love for enemies. He reoriented hearts and invited people into an entirely different way of living and being human. Then, immediately after teaching the large crowd, He privately healed a man with leprosy. Here, Jesus is modeling godly influence. He is showing that true influence is not simply performing for the crowd. It is compassionate, relational, and aimed at the good of others. 

But influence alone is not enough. Influence without direction quickly becomes nothing more than information transfer. That is why mission matters. Mission gives leadership its direction, provides clarity, and defines purpose. A leader may have the ability to move people, but the mission determines where they are going. Your mission is your discovered purpose that is rooted in God’s calling. It answers the deeper questions beneath our work: Why does this matter? Why has God placed me here? What burden has He asked me to carry? 

Jesus was very clear about His mission. In Luke 19, He stops under a sycamore tree and calls down Zacchaeus, the tax collector. This is not a random interaction. Here is the heart of His mission: “For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.” He saw someone others had understandably written off, and He moved toward him. He did this with purpose. Mission-driven leaders do the same thing. They notice what others overlook. They move toward the needs that others avoid. They stop drifting and begin leading with conviction. 

Once the mission becomes clear, leaders need passion. Passion is not hype, personality, or emotional intensity. Passion is the inner conviction that compels you to invest in your purpose and sustain perseverance over time. Every meaningful leadership journey eventually becomes difficult. Progress slows. Criticism comes. People misunderstand you. The initial excitement fades, and leaders are forced to decide whether to keep going or quietly quit. 

That is where passion matters most. Passion keeps leaders invested when the results are slow and the work is costly. In Jesus’ life, we repeatedly see that He was moved with compassion. He was not detached from the needs of the people around Him. He wept over Jerusalem. He healed the sick and restored the fallen. His mission was sustained by His deep love for the Father and genuine compassion for people. This kind of passion transforms leadership from the exercise of authority into the work of sacrificial service. 

Passion, then turns into action. Vision is powerful, but vision alone does not change anything. Many leaders are gifted at and comfortable with dreaming, planning, and imagining what could be, but transformational leadership requires movement. Action is taking strategic, intentional steps toward fulfilling the mission. It turns burden into progress and vision into impact. Without action, even the clearest calling remains only a possibility. Jesus never only talked about the Kingdom of God. He demonstrated it. He moved toward the broken, healed the suffering, discipled followers, and sent others into ministry. 

No meaningful mission is accomplished without commitment. Jesus models this powerfully for us in the Garden of Gethsemane when He prays, “Not my will, but yours be done.” This is true commitment to His calling, even in the face of death. Commitment is dedication to working hard to achieve the best possible outcome in fulfilling the mission. Many people have desire. They feel inspired and start strong. But desire alone does not produce fruit. Commitment is what stays when the work becomes inconvenient, unrecognized, expensive, or exhausting. 

Finally, all of leadership rises or falls on trust. Trust is the quiet foundation beneath every other part of the framework. Trust is currency, and without it, influence collapses. Without trust, the mission is questioned, passion is doubted, action is resisted, and commitment loses credibility. Trust is relational capital built over time through humility, responsibility, accountability, and faith. It grows slowly, and it can be damaged quickly. 

One of the most moving pictures of this is in John 21. Peter had failed by denying Jesus publicly three separate times. Yet after the resurrection, Jesus does not discard him. He restores him. He doesn’t pretend Peter’s failure never happened, but neither does He allow failure to have the final word. He restores trust and calls Peter back into meaningful leadership. Jesus’ restoration of Peter models the necessity of trust in his future ministry. Trust can be restored, regrowing where integrity is practiced, and grace is received. 

There is another side of trust that Christian leaders cannot afford to miss. While leaders need to work diligently to be trustworthy, they also have to trust God. Leadership will inevitably bring us to places where outcomes are uncertain, and resources are stretched thin. Moments when we can’t know how things will unfold. In these moments, leadership becomes an act of faith. We trust His wisdom, His timing, His Word, and His ability to do more than we can see. 

I am grateful for how Jesus models leadership for us. He allows us to see why this IMPACT framework is so necessary. Influence recognizes that we are responsible for how we affect others. Mission gives us direction. Passion sustains us when our leadership becomes costly. Action keeps the mission moving forward. Commitment anchors us for the long haul. Trust gives credibility to all of this and roots our leadership in dependence on God. These are not random, disconnected ideas. Together, they reflect the pattern we see in the life of Jesus. 

For those of us who are committed to the work of disciple-making, the invitation is clear. To achieve more robust Kingdom advancement in our contexts, we have to rethink leadership. It is not something for a select few but rather a responsibility entrusted to every believer. Parents are leading. Pastors are leading. Business owners, artists, and missionaries are leading. Teachers, coaches, neighbors, and volunteers are leading. The question is not whether you are a leader. The question is whether your leadership is creating impact that points people to Christ. 

At MyBLVD, we believe leadership matters because people matter, cities matter, context matters, and disciple-making matters. We believe God is at work raising up leaders through other godly leaders around them who will serve with courage, clarity, compassion, and conviction right where they are. We believe leadership is not about building personal platforms, but about faithfully stewarding influence so that lives are changed and communities are strengthened. 

So what does this mean? Where can we begin? Here is your call to action. Stop waiting for that title, a stage, or a perfect moment to begin leading. Ask God to show you who is in your sphere of influence and to give you the courage and wisdom to engage them. Embrace the burden that the Lord has placed on your heart and then take the next faithful step. Stay committed when it gets hard. Build trust with integrity. And use every ounce of influence you have to light the path for someone else. The leaders who change the world are not always the ones standing at the center of the room, getting all of the attention. More often, they are the ones who quietly, faithfully, and intentionally surrender their influence to the purposes of God.

Exponential NEXT Podcast Episode 105

Series: From Soil to Forest: The Practice of Networked Ministry

Description:

In this episode, Patrick O’Connell is joined by guest Corey Garris to explore the foundational role of networks in church multiplication. Garris, a leader with the Front Range Multiplication Network (FRMN) in Denver, shares insights on shifting from isolated ministry to collaborative action.

Host:

Patrick O’Connell, Networks NEXT, Director

Guest:

Corey Garris – Front Range Multiplication Network, Catalyst

Links Shared in Episode:

Reproducing Network Accelerator

Category: Networks NEXT

Urban Islands Project was the label of the mission in the first Exponential Shark Tank experience. This is the story of the unfinished journey from Urban Islands Project to the Next Wave Community and beyond.

The origin of the Urban Islands Project was not theoretical. It was observational – and deeply unsettling. I saw it happening with my own eyes. For much of the latter half of the 20th century, population patterns in the United States followed a predictable trajectory. As suburbs expanded, people moved outward from city centers into newly developing communities. Churches followed the people. Suburban church planting became the dominant model, and it made perfect sense for the era.

But by the 1990s and early 2000s, something began to shift. In city after city, population began flowing back into urban cores. Downtown districts were revitalizing. Young professionals were returning. Immigrant communities were growing. Walkable neighborhoods were regaining appeal. Density was increasing in the very places where it had once declined.

And yet the church, broadly speaking, did not follow at the same pace. The result was an increasingly odd and concerning reality: In many urban centers, as population density increased, the presence of the church decreased.

More people. Less church.

That disconnect lodged in my spirit and raised some questions that would not go away: Why wasn’t the church following the people back into the city? And what about the faithful city churches that never left? Had our church planting practices become calibrated for yesterday’s population patterns rather than today’s mission field?

Reading the Demographic Signals

The concern that eventually led to the Urban Islands Project experiment was not merely anecdotal. For decades, researchers have documented the large-scale population shift from American city centers to suburbs during the second half of the 20th century. Between roughly 1950 and 2000, most urban neighborhoods in the United States steadily lost population to suburban development, fundamentally reshaping the geography of American life.¹ The expansion of interstate highways, mortgage policy, and employment decentralization further reinforced suburban growth during this period.²

Yet by the late 1990s and early 2000s, signs of partial urban revival began to emerge. Brookings Institution research documented renewed demand for housing in many downtown districts and close-in neighborhoods.³ Studies also showed a growing concentration of young, college-educated adults moving into central city neighborhoods across major U.S. metropolitan areas during the 2000–2010 decade.⁴

Denver reflected this pattern in a meaningful way. Between 2000 and 2020, the city and county of Denver added more than 115,000 residents – a substantial share of that growth occurring in close-in neighborhoods and the urban core.⁵

Taken together, these dynamics created a complex demographic reality: decades of suburban momentum followed by selective but meaningful re-urbanization. It was within this shifting landscape that my concern grew – that the church’s planting patterns were still largely calibrated for the suburban expansion era rather than the emerging urban opportunity.

At the time, however, I was living in Springfield, Mo. – not exactly an urban laboratory. I had working theories about why this gap existed. But I did not want to build a strategy based purely on theory.

I needed to see it up close.

Moving Toward the Problem

Rather than simply analyze urban ministry from a distance, after much prayer and deliberation, my wife and I made a decision that would shape the next decade of our work: We would move into a major city and attempt something that, at the time, felt both exhilarating and impossible.

The goal was straightforward but bold – to mobilize 10 church planting teams to launch neighborhood-focused churches simultaneously within the same city.

The conviction behind this approach was simple but strategic:

• Cities are not monolithic.
• Neighborhoods have distinct cultures.
• One large attractional model would not adequately reach the complexity of the city.
• A distributed, neighborhood-based strategy might give us a clue as to the shape of urban planting.

Denver became the proving ground.

In 2014 and 2015, we successfully mobilized seven church planting teams to converge on the Denver metro area. That convergence alone became a significant learning laboratory.

The concept was simple. Recruit planters from different organizations who were all called to the same city. Facilitate a learning community environment where the planters could learn from each other in real time. In addition to real time learning, the community would provide emotional and spiritual support for the planters are they took on the rigors of starting new faith communities in urban places. 

Each team entered a different neighborhood context. Each faced unique challenges. Each was forced to wrestle with the realities of ministry in environments where traditional assumptions did not always translate.

Encouraged by what we were learning, we later repeated similar convergence efforts in:

• Minneapolis/St. Paul
• New York City
• Nashville

Each city sharpened our understanding. Each planting team surfaced new insights. Each context exposed both the strengths and limitations of our inherited church planting instincts.

This was the beating heart of the Urban Islands Project.

A Story from the Denver Front Lines

One Denver planting team – led by Matthew Collver and his wife, Elora – captured the dynamic we were seeing across multiple neighborhoods in multiple cities.

After relocating to Denver as part of the Urban Islands Project convergence in 2015, Matthew and Elora focused their efforts in the Park Hill neighborhood, launching what would become The Hills Church. Like many capable planters, they initially anticipated momentum building through familiar launch strategies: strong preview gatherings, steady attendance growth, and early financial traction.

But within the first year, the neighborhood began to tell them a different story.

Relationships took time to form. Trust had to be earned through consistent presence rather than event-driven momentum only. Early gatherings were smaller and more relational than programmatic. Financial support grew more gradually than many suburban models would predict.

What might easily have been interpreted as underperformance became, instead, a moment of discernment.

Rather than forcing the neighborhood to conform to inherited expectations, Matthew and Elora began to adapt their approach. One of the most significant milestone moments came when The Hills Church made a strategic shift: instead of relying solely on a weekly large gathering, they began alternating between microchurch expressions and larger corporate gatherings every other week.

This adjustment better matched the relational rhythms of their context. It allowed deeper neighborhood engagement while still maintaining a broader worship touchpoint.

Over time, the fruit of that adaptive posture became increasingly clear. Today, The Hills Church functions as an embedded faith community led by multiple leaders and expressed through gatherings in homes and schools throughout Park Hill. The church now includes more than 200 parishioners connected through approximately 10–15 microchurches across the neighborhood. What began with traditional launch expectations has matured into a distributed, neighborhood-rooted ministry presence and a sustainable community of faith in an underserved part of the city.

Their journey reinforced a critical insight that surfaced repeatedly across the Urban Islands teams:

Fruitfulness in complex urban contexts often requires a different scorecard than success in more homogeneous suburban environments.

What We Discovered in the Field

Planting multiple churches in challenging urban contexts has a way of clarifying reality very quickly.

One of the most important discoveries was that many capable leaders struggled not because of calling or character, but because they were attempting to apply suburban planting instincts in environments that operated by very different rules.

We began to notice recurring friction points:

• Launch expectations were often unrealistic
• Financial ramp-up was slower
• Trust-building took longer
• Community engagement required deeper presence
• Traditional success metrics created unhealthy pressure

Over time, these field observations crystallized into what eventually became known as the 12 Mind Shifts required for effective ministry in complex, non-ideal settings.

These shifts were not developed in a vacuum. They were forged in the lived experience of planters navigating real neighborhoods, real financial pressures, and real cultural complexity across multiple cities.

The framework is articulated in my book, Next Wave – Discovering the 21st Century Church, where we outlined the internal recalibrations leaders must make when traditional church expressions struggle to gain traction in emerging contexts.

In many ways, the Urban Islands Project accomplished something deeply valuable even where it fell short numerically. Outcomes varied by city and team. But we gained something that has continued to shape the movement: Clarity about the adaptive mindset required for 21st-century church multiplication.

Sidebar: The 12 Mind Shifts for the 21st Century Church

(Adapted from Next Wave – Discovering the 21st Century Church*)*

1. Rediscover the Church – from building the institution to catalyzing a movement.
2. Reimagine Discipleship – from discipleship as a program to a lifestyle of disciple making.
3. Reinvent Funding – from self-sustaining to sustainable.
4. Rethink Team-building – from titles and positions to communities of disciples on mission with Jesus.
5. Redeem Architecture – from empty buildings to fully utilized assets. 
6. Reclaim the Ecosystem – from Isolating to complementing.
7. Recalibrate the Timeline – from launching to emerging.
8. Refresh the Metrics – from bodies in the pews to disciples in the marketplace.
9. Refocus Church Habits – from calendar driven to mission driven.
10. Reconsider Core Values – from institution focused to mission oriented.
11. Recommit to Multiplication – from addition to movement.
12. Reactivate Spirit Dependency – from duty to necessity.

Lessons Learned and Pivots Along the Way

Every field experiment teaches you things you cannot learn in a planning session. Several key lessons emerged from the Urban Islands Project journey.

Urban and rural have more in common with each other than they do to suburban contexts. 

The prevailing model of church planting (large, fast, critical mass launch) are not as helpful in rural and urban contexts. Much of what we have learned in the urban applies in rural places as well. In fact, over time it dawned on us that the foremost challenge is the emerging 21st century culture which is born in cities and quickly exported to other contexts. Twentieth century approaches will continue to work in the suburbs in the near term but eventually approaches discovered in the cities will become essential everywhere, including the suburbs. 

Context shapes method more than we realized.

Transplanting suburban models into dense urban or sprawling rural environments rarely works without significant adaptation. Leaders needed more than encouragement; they needed permission – and coaching – to rethink pace, funding, team formation, community engagement, and measures of success. More experience is helping us see guiding urban and rural  models begin to emerge. But continuing innovation will always be necessary. 

Sustainability must be designed early.

Many urban and complex-context plants struggled financially not because of poor stewardship but because of fragile initial design. Financial sustainability is rarely an end-stage fix. It is an early-stage design decision. We realized that the traditional model of church funding (tithes and offerings received from the beneficiaries of the church ministry were no longer adequate to empower sustainability. Multiple revenue streams must be cultivated and activated prior to the emergence of the new church and continued as a part of the sustainability strategy of the church.   

Leaders need pathways, not just vision.

Urban Islands Project created energy and experimentation, but over time we recognized that leaders approaching a new context needed a clearer developmental roadmap to find their way forward. This realization led to the refinement of what is now the Next Wave Innovation Framework:

Discover → Discern → Deploy → Develop → Duplicate

These phases summarize the path that every innovator follows. Discover the need. Discern what is needed to address the need. Deploy experiments. Develop a rhythm of contextual engagement. Duplicate – start over at discovery to figure out what is next and appropriately reproduce the original Gospel impulse.

How the Vision Has Evolved

Urban Islands Project has emerged into the Next Wave Community. This was not a simple rebrand. It was an expansion born out of accumulated learning. We realized that leaders called to innovate needed a place to process their discoveries with parallel innovative peers. And innovation is what will take the Gospel into contexts where traditional approaches repeatedly fall short. 

If Urban Islands Project focused primarily on urban church planting experimentation, Next Wave Community focuses on bringing together ecclesiastical explorers who are building the broader ecosystem required for resilient, multiplying initiatives in any challenging context.

What began as a focus on mindset transformation through the 12 Shifts has now expanded into building the full ecosystem leaders need to thrive – relationally, strategically, and financially.

Looking Ahead: The Emergence of Next Wave Foundation

The lessons that began in Urban Islands Project and were articulated through the 12 Shifts of Next Wave have now pointed us toward an additional frontier: the strategic deployment of catalytic capital.

As the Next Wave Community has matured, one reality has become increasingly clear.

Many leaders today are better trained. Better coached. More aware of multi-stream sustainability. More thoughtful in their design. And yet, a familiar barrier keeps appearing.

At precisely the moment when a promising initiative could accelerate toward sustainability, access to timely capital is often limited or slow to materialize. This observation has led to the development of what we are now calling the Next Wave Foundation.

The vision is straightforward but strategic: to bring real catalytic capital into the Next Wave ecosystem – not merely concepts or coaching, but targeted financial investment aligned with well-discerned initiatives at the moment when funding is often hardest to secure.

Together:

• The 12 Shifts shape leader thinking.
• The Innovation Framework guides the pathway.
• The Community provides relational and coaching support.
• The Foundation provides catalytic financial acceleration where appropriate.

These elements are being designed to function not as isolated initiatives but as an integrated system for helping next-generation founders reach sustainability more quickly and multiply more effectively.

Encouragement for Leaders Launching Today

If this journey has taught me anything, it is this:

We are living in a moment that demands both courage and adaptability from emerging leaders.

• Do not be discouraged if inherited models feel increasingly strained. Often, that tension is not failure – it is a necessary reality of the innovation journey.
• Think ecosystem, not just initiative. Design for sustainability early. Seek community. Be honest about where catalytic capital may eventually be needed.
• Embrace discernment before deployment. Speed is seductive in entrepreneurial cultures, but thoughtful front-end work consistently leads to stronger long-term outcomes.
• Diversify sooner than you think you need to. Multi-stream sustainability is not a late-stage adjustment – it is an early-stage architecture decision.

And finally:

Pivots are not failures.

Adaptive leaders are not those who never adjust. They are those who adjust wisely while staying anchored to their core calling.

The Road Ahead

We are still early in the Next Wave story. What began as a concern about the church’s presence in rapidly changing urban centers has grown into a broader movement focused on helping mission-driven founders build resilient, sustainable, multiplying initiatives in complex environments.

The conviction remains strong: When the right God called leaders are supported by the right ecosystems – and resourced with timely, strategic capital – the potential for Kingdom impact multiplies dramatically.

The work ahead is significant. But so is the opportunity. More people are alive on planet earth today than ever before. In fact, one out of every 14 humans who has ever lived is alive today! The human population of the earth did not reach 1 billion until 1800. Now it stands at 8.3 billion and growing. The greatest days of the church are still ahead of us. May we be like the men of Issachar, who understood their times and knew what to do. 

Footnotes

1. Steven D. Whitaker, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, Population, Migration, and Generations in Urban Neighborhoods, 2019.
2. Roger Auch et al., U.S. Geological Survey, Urban Growth in American Cities, 2004.
3. Alan Berube & Natalie Holmes, Brookings Institution, City and Metropolitan Inequality on the Rise, 2016.
4. Victor Couture & Jessie Handbury, NBER, “Urban Revival in America, 2000–2010.”
5. U.S. Census Bureau, City and County of Denver population estimates, 2000–2020.

There is a pattern beneath every lasting movement. 

It’s not complicated, but it is demanding. It resists control, rejects isolation, and refuses to remain small. It is a cycle – one that begins in relationships, matures through collaboration, reproduces with intention, and multiplies beyond itself.

Most leaders experience parts of this cycle, but very few build with the whole in mind. That’s why many networks start but stall, sustain but never send, or send but never truly scale. They get stuck in one phase and mistake activity for progress.

What we need now is not just more networks. We need networks that know where they are going – and leaders who understand what comes next.

Because the goal is not the network.

The goal is movement.

This is that pathway: Start. Sustain. Send. Scale. 

START: THE RELATIONAL SPARK

Every movement begins the same way: not with strategy, but with relationships.

This runs against our instincts. Leaders are trained to think in terms of plans, models, and execution. We want clarity before commitment. Structure before risk. But movements don’t begin with structure; they begin with trust.

Networks are not organizations first. They are relationships aligned around a shared mission.

So the starting point is simple: a conversation.

Not a formal meeting or a polished vision presentation.

A conversation.

What we call the “ICNU” moment – “I See In You” – is often the true ignition point. One leader looks at another and names something real: a gift, a calling, a burden. That moment creates clarity and courage. It interrupts isolation. It reframes possibility.

It says, “You’re not crazy for wanting more. And you don’t have to do it alone.”

Movements rarely start with a crowd. They begin with two or three leaders who trust each other enough to be honest about their hopes, their frustrations, and the gaps they cannot fill alone.

This is where the principle holds: dream big, start small. 

The vision may be citywide and the burden may be generational. But the start is almost always relational and local.

And here is the constraint most leaders underestimate: Networks move at the speed of trust.

You cannot accelerate what has not been formed. You cannot scale what has not been bonded. If trust is shallow, everything built on top of it will be fragile.

This is why relationships are not the first step of the work.

They are the work.

If you get this wrong, everything downstream struggles.

If you get this right, everything else becomes possible.

SUSTAIN: THE SHARED ENGINE

Starting creates momentum. Sustaining determines whether it lasts.

This is where many networks quietly fail – not because of conflict, but because of drift.

Once the initial relational spark fades, the work shifts into something less visible but more important: building a shared engine. Something repeatable. Something durable. Something that can carry the weight of a real mission.

Sustain is where trust becomes structure.

It takes shape through shared rhythms, shared language, and shared ownership.

Shared rhythms keep the network alive. Regular gatherings for prayer, learning, storytelling, and reflection are not optional extras – they are the lifelines that prevent isolation from creeping back in. Without rhythm, connection fades. Without connection, mission fragments.

Shared language keeps the network aligned. When leaders are using the same words to describe mission, leadership, and multiplication, clarity increases and confusion decreases. Alignment is not accidental – it is cultivated.

Shared ownership keeps the network healthy. If everything depends on one or two leaders, the network will eventually collapse under the weight. Sustain requires distributed responsibility – clear roles, clear expectations, and real contribution from multiple voices.

At this stage, the real danger is not failure. It is complacency.

Meetings become routine. Stories stop being shared. Comfort replaces courage.

The network still exists – but it stops moving.

To sustain well, leaders must continually re-anchor to mission. They must keep naming why the network exists. They must measure what matters. They must celebrate progress and confront drift honestly.

Sustaining a network is not about maintaining activity. It is about maintaining alignment.

A sustained network remains flexible without drifting. It keeps the relational fire warm so that the mission stays alive. It creates an environment where sending is not just possible – but inevitable.

SEND: THE REPRODUCING PIPELINE

A network that focuses only on sustaining itself will eventually stagnate.

Health is not measured by how well you preserve what you already have. It is measured by what you release by your sending capacity.

This is where the cycle becomes costly and real.

In most movements, the primary bottleneck is leadership – not vision, not opportunity. Leadership. And that bottleneck cannot be solved by recruiting alone; it must be solved through intentional development.

This requires a fundamental shift:

• From finding leaders to forming leaders.
• From importing talent to growing people.
• From protecting your best to sending your best.

Networks must stop “shopping” for leaders and start growing them.

One of the most effective ways to do this is through shared residencies – collaborative environments where emerging leaders are developed across the network, not just within a single church.

In these environments, leaders are:

• Formed through real experience, not just information.
• Tested in community, not in isolation.
• Mentored by multiple voices, not just one perspective.
• Released with support, not sent alone.

No single church can do this at scale, but a network can.

This is the power of a shared pipeline – and this is where the cost becomes clear.

Sending creates what can only be described as “holy pain.” You send your best people. You release leaders you’ve invested in. You give away what you could have kept. And everything in you wants to hold on.

Yet this is the paradox of multiplication:

• What you keep, you eventually lose.
• What you send, multiplies.

This is the dividing line between addition and movement.

Addition grows what you control.

Multiplication grows what you release.

If a network never feels this tension, it is not yet reproducing. But when sending becomes normal – when leaders celebrate what leaves instead of protecting what stays – that is when movements begin.

SCALE: THE 16% MISSION

Scaling is not optional. It is the natural outcome of a healthy cycle.

But it is also widely misunderstood.

Scaling is not about making one network bigger.

It is about multiplying networks into ecosystems.

This is where the conversation moves beyond the network.

At a certain point, the question shifts from:

“How do we grow this?”

to

“How do we reproduce this?”

As networks reproduce, they begin to form larger ecosystems what we might call collectives and hubs – where multiple networks align around shared mission and shared infrastructure.

This is where scale happens:

Not through centralization, but through interconnection.

Not through control, but through alignment.

In a true networked movement, no single church or leader carries the weight. Instead, each contributes what they have – relationships, resources, training, prayer, innovation – and the network multiplies the effect.

Small, faithful experiments begin to spread.

Local breakthroughs become transferable patterns.

Momentum compounds.

This is how movements reach a tipping point.

The vision of the 16% Mission captures this reality: when a critical mass of churches becomes reproducing, multiplication becomes the norm rather than the exception.

This will not happen on a single platform.

Or one leader.

Or one organization.

It will happen through thousands of interconnected networks, aligned around a shared mission, continually starting, sustaining, sending, and scaling together.

This is the future.

And it is already beginning.

BEYOND THE NETWORK

Every leader will eventually confront this tension: Even successful networks can become an end in themselves. They may stabilize, institutionalize, and begin protecting what they’ve built instead of releasing what they’ve formed.

The power of a network lies not in its individual components, but in the continuous cycle of movement. The network’s vitality breaks down when any single stage becomes the goal:

• Start without Sustain: Leads to collapse.
• Sustain without Send: Causes stagnation.
• Send without Scale: Results in isolation.
• Scale without Relationships: Becomes hollow.

To go beyond the network means not abandoning it, but refusing to let it become the ultimate objective. The true goal is movement. Movements are built by leaders who prioritize multiplication over maintenance, a shared mission over personal success, and collaboration over control.

CALL TO ACTION

Do not build a castle.

Start a network. 

Start with one conversation. One table. One small circle of trust. The future belongs to leaders who initiate relationships, not just manage structures.

Sustain what you start. 

Stay in the cycle. Show up consistently. Listen deeply. Build rhythms that keep trust strong and mission clear. Networks grow where commitment runs deeper than convenience.

Send what you would rather keep. 

Your ideas. Your access. Your credit. Your best people. A network is only as generous as its leaders. What you release creates room for others to rise.

Scale beyond what you can control. 

Control is for castles. Scale is for movements. Let the work spread into places you will never see, through leaders you will never meet.

We will need thousands of leaders to start networks – and all of us to join them.

This is the moment for collaboration.

This is the moment for multiplication.

No one multiplies alone. 

Let’s start, sustain, send, and scale – together.

Exponential NEXT Podcast Episode 104

Series: From Soil to Forest: The Practice of Networked Ministry

Description:

In this episode, Patrick O’Connell speaks with Eric Metcalf, a leader with Exponential and the Chicagoland Collective, about the vital role and challenges of network leadership in church multiplication.

Host:

Patrick O’Connell, Networks NEXT, Director

Guest:

Eric Metcalf, Partnerships Director, Exponential and Chicagoland Collective, Catalyst

Links Shared in Episode:

Chicagoland Collective Website

Category: Networks NEXT

To be clear, finding the right pastor to lead a new church is critical. We need God to raise up and set apart leaders to preach and shepherd, but the paid staff leaders aren’t the only critical leaders needed. How radical would it be if 50-70 people would pack up and move to a new city to reach a new group of people? If a sending church is looking to sustain a church planting movement year after year, where would you find that never-ending pool of goers?

Church Planting Movements Need The Goers

Every sustainable, repeatable church planting system, especially in a large launch model, has to find the goers. The pastor and other staff members are critical, the startup funding is integral, but getting the goers is essential for the life and the health of the church plant. When a pastor moves to a new city to plant a church, residents may be intrigued but they also know that pastor has a paycheck and a stake in whether they join the church. When a 23-year-old decides what city to move to and what job to take simply based on helping a new church get launched, people in the city take notice. When God’s will for their life isn’t just the job offer with the most zeroes at the end but rather includes Kingdom investment and Kingdom return, the world sees that. They wonder, “What would compel someone to do that?” That’s a perfect setup to share the beauty of the gospel and the reality that they too can have purpose and meaning and mission worth leveraging their whole life for.

It is often said that the first 50 people in the door of a new church will set the culture, meaning it is critically important to get the right 50 in the door first. Who better to set and shape the culture of your church than people who were willing to move across the city or the country to help start it? Those committed goers who relocate their lives for the sake of a church plant will give generously, serve faithfully, invite regularly, and live boldly on mission for the sake of the Kingdom and for the health of the church. 

The big question: Where do you find them? And more importantly for sending churches looking to regularly send out church plants: Where do you find them repeatedly? I tell church planters regularly that they should ask 40 and 50-year-olds to go on their church plant because if they say yes, they will bring maturity and stability, and immeasurable health to the plant. 

But those families have stable careers, decades-long friendships, and kids involved in every activity imaginable. The barrier for that demographic is not insurmountable, but it is high. If only there was a demographic of people who moved to your city for a defined period of time with the expressed intent of leaving and going somewhere else – well equipped and well prepared to make an impact elsewhere!

Ministry Through College Students

The story of Salt Network has been a strategic evolution from a ministry to college students to a ministry through college students. Born out of a desire to see college students reached and discipled inside the context of a local church, now by the grace of God our network has found a strategy that is fueling church planting sustainably, even as our church planting numbers grow and accelerate. Why? Because God allowed us to see that not only are college students in the most critical decision-making phase of their life, but they are in the most mobile and flexible stage of life as well. 

They will typically decide who to marry, what to do for a career, and where to live – all within a few years between the ages of 18-22. Many will also make the most important decision in life of whether or not to walk with Jesus and give their life for His vision and His Kingdom. For those students who say yes to Jesus, when they finish school, receive that diploma, and their apartment lease expires at the end of the month, they become one of the most powerful, mobile forces for Kingdom expansion and church planting. 

Someone in their forties might move if you can convince them. The majority of college graduates will move regardless of what you do. 

Recent college graduates don’t just automatically become gospel-centered laborers in the harvest field; however, it is the result of work done over years of intentional discipleship. From the moment a student gives their life to Christ, our discipleship pathway helps them see how God wants to grow and refine them but also use them to help others see the beauty of the gospel. They are invited into leading others in small group discipleship, reaching their peers who don’t know Jesus, and are constantly presented a vision for their life of what it would look like to say “yes” to Jesus with every aspect of their life. 

By the time college students are getting ready to graduate, the idea of moving to join a church plant doesn’t feel radical – for many it feels like a natural next step in living on mission for Jesus. Over 1,000 students attended interest meetings at the 2026 Salt Company Conference as they considered joining one of our 12 upcoming church plants. The opportunity to help start a church and college ministry like the one God used to reach them was compelling – they couldn’t wait to learn, pray, and discern where God might send them. For our network and our church planting strategy, soon-to-be college graduates are the goers that fuel the movement.

For churches near college campuses that want to be about church planting and multiplication, reaching that campus is critical. College students are the most reachable, trainable, and sendable demographic in our country. It’s eternally significant for them personally that they are reached with the gospel, but also for the potential Kingdom impact and expansion. The campus may be the most strategic mission field your church has access to. Start a college ministry to both reach and send college students!

If Not College Students, Who?

Not every church, however, has an abundance of college students at their doorstep. That doesn’t change or reduce the need for a steady pipeline of goers to help sustain church planting momentum. Who is it in your church or community that is already at a natural transition stage in life that would be open to moving? Who could you cast a compelling vision for to carry the culture and impact of your sending church to the next plant? It could be college students, young professionals, retirees, or another demographic entirely. That group needs intentional discipleship, a compelling vision, and a clear pathway to know how to leverage their lives for the sake of the Kingdom.

The next generation of churches will be built by the next generation of goers. We need to send pastors and paid staff leaders – but just as critical is sending an army of ordinary people eager to engage their new city with the gospel. Find your goers, disciple them well, and send them. The church planting movement depends on it!

If the auditorium was full, we were a success. If the giving exceeded the mortgage, we were faithful. If we raised the capital campaign for a new building, God had blessed us.

Hi, I’m an American church pastor.

Beneath the surface of these measurements however, I was dying a slow spiritual death. 

At church, I watched as good-hearted people slept in the pews. I cringed as good-hearted preachers spoke to congregants with glazed and uninterested looks – sometimes because the sermons were… uninteresting. I trembled as the culture tectonically shifted around us and we buried our heads in the sand.

I saw lots of spectators and not enough disciples. 

I saw people who loved Jesus but were chained to the programs of the church. I saw people’s hearts stirred by God to serve and love the world around them, only to be stifled because it didn’t fit within the existing structures. I attended bickering board meetings and witnessed the weighty shackles of our budget produce a beast who required constant feeding in order to keep the lights on – ironically only twice a week. 

Most importantly, I looked at the New Testament and saw a chasm between the life of the early church and our (albeit well intended) weekend productions.

Then I looked even closer… and I noticed that same chasm in me.

This was not why I started following Jesus.

Abandoning Outcomes

This is the story of how I stopped trying to “grow the church” and started trying to release the priesthood of all believers. It wasn’t an overnight pivot – in many ways it was a slow, agonizing, and beautiful death of my own ego.

The hardest part of this journey wasn’t changing our structures; it wasn’t convincing people they should be disciples on mission with Jesus; and it wasn’t the length of time the transition has taken – it was (and is) changing my metrics of success. 

In our culture, we are addicted to up and to the right – bigger is better. We want more people, more programs, and if we are honest, in our weaker moments, more recognition.

When we began the transition toward becoming a decentralized microchurch network, we quickly realized that we were going to be required to abandon outcomes. In a decentralized network, you lose control. Or more accurately, you more easily recognize the illusions of control you thought you had all along. We plant and water, and we aim do so diligently and with integrity – but it is ultimately God that makes anything grow (1 Cor 3:7).

I had to ask myself: Am I okay with a church that is small, but does meaningful Kingdom work? Abandoning outcomes meant trading the mega for the meaningful – putting our hands to the plow of meaningful work and leaving the outcomes to God. It meant realizing that a group of three people meeting in a basement to care for a widowed neighbor, or a family of five singing about Jesus at a hospice facility as people took their final breath, was more “successful” than 500 people telling me I had preached a “good word” at a Sunday service and then going home and doing nothing about it. 

This is a critical starting point. Our ego’s must be checked at the door, and we must begin by abandoning the outcomes of our work to the Lord. 

Jesus calls – we must follow.

Creating a Calling Culture

In a traditional or prevailing church model, the pastor is often the “professional Christian.” The congregation pays the pastor to do the ministry they feel too busy or ill-equipped to do. So we have inadvertently created a consumer church culture where the laity sit and the clergy perform.

But I am convinced that Jesus is calling the priesthood of all believers to join Him in the work of renewing, restoring, and reconciling all things (Col 1:19-20; Eph 2:10).

In our transition from a traditional church to a microchurch network, we had to deconstruct the hierarchal expectations of the Christians and create a calling culture. When people asked, “Pastor, what’s the plan? What’s your vision?” I would reply with, “What is Jesus calling you to do in the world and how can I help you do that?” 

This meant we had to shift our language. We stopped saying, “How can you help the church run its programs?” and started asking, “Where is God already at work in your life and the world around you – and how can we support you there?” We wanted to view every member, and for them to see themselves, as everyday missionaries in their context and zip code.

When people realized we weren’t just wanting them to be volunteers in the programs of the church – but rather were being called by God to partner with him in his mission in the world – several stepped up to lead small and vibrant communities of faith. Some of these people had never led anything in a church context before. 

We were no longer recruiting people to keep programs running; we were commissioning people into the Missio Dei.

Microchurches are Not Mini Traditional Churches

Early on in our transition, I remember going to a microchurch gathering that I was not leading and crying as we sang, prayed, read Scripture, and shared vulnerably from our hearts. On the way home I told my wife, “I can’t remember the last time I felt like that at church.”

I had witnessed the beauty of the body of Christ. I was able to see Jesus in other people. I was able to worship – and not just work.

All along we have tried to avoid the mistake of “Honey, I shrunk the church.” Many times I meet pastors who think a microchurch is just a small group with a trendier name. I have seen pastors take their 90-minute Sunday service and shrink it down to a living room with a mini sermon, mini worship set, and a mini communion. And usually with the same mini participation as big church. But more awkward.

Microchurches are not mini big churches. Microchurches are meant to be environments where everyone participates and each believer filled by the Spirit of God edifying the group (1 Cor. 14:26). A microchurch is the church, not simply a subsidiary of a larger one.

A microchurch doesn’t need a stage; it needs a table. It doesn’t need a professional orator; it needs a facilitator. In a big church, you can hide. In a microchurch, it’s way harder. We have tried to lean into the strengths of the small: participation, intimacy, accountability, and agility.

Pacing and Surrendering Timelines

If you try to rush the transition from a traditional church setting into a decentralized movement, it will likely implode. And the larger and older the traditional church is, likely the longer it will take, and the harder it will be. Even though we were a small church, it still took us far longer to make the transition that I had anticipated. Thankfully God surrounded me with other wise people that helped the pace of change be manageable for everyone.

Going through the transition slower than I wanted was a great challenge. Not only did I have to surrender my timelines, but I also had to acknowledge where my preconceived timelines were coming from – and why I was in a hurry in the first place. 

I had a vision of a network of 25 microchurches in two years; God wanted us to spend two years learning how to pray together and listen to him. I had a vision to send out Christians as everyday missionaries; God wanted us to deconstruct decades of consumer Christianity and reenvision the very heart of the gospel. 

That kind of heart work doesn’t necessarily happen on our schedules.

Going slow allowed us to embrace change at deep levels. It allowed people to feel part of the process and that they weren’t just getting yo-yoed with the latest church trend. Slow pacing has allowed us to fail small. If a microchurch or new pastors struggled, we could pivot and learn without the consequences of large structures collapsing. 

During this season, I was invited to recognize the fact that Jesus wasn’t often in a rush in his ministry – and confronted with the fact that I often was.

Ecclesial Minimums and Redefining Church

To make this leap, we had to reexamine our theological foundations. While this is extremely difficult, it is a vital task for anyone that would endeavor in this way. We had to ask: What is Church? What is our ecclesial minimum? What are our non-negotiable convictions for something to be called church, and why?

Does it need a building? Does it need staff? Does it need to be a 501(c)3? Does it need a fog machine? 

I pray not.

As a team we studied and wrestled with the Scriptures and concluded that wherever the people of God work together under the lordship of Jesus, mature more into His likeness, and accomplish part of the mission of God in the world, they are the church. This required a willingness to shift theologically. We had to follow the truth of the Scriptures wherever they led us, even if it was away from our previous understandings or traditions. 

Everyone who ventures in this way will have to cross theological bridges like these for themselves.

Plurality and Making Decisions Together

In the traditional prevailing church model, I basically functioned as the church “CEO.” Decisions were often made at the top and trickled down. It can be efficient, but it is also very dangerous – and lonely.

Christians often expect the pastor to have a vision and tell them how they can help execute it, but we wanted to operate in a different way – making decisions together. This meant establishing a team built on mutuality, plurality, humility, and deference. 

This kind of environment can help protect from the cult of personality. In our day and age, we are well aware of the dangers of celebrity pastor fallout and above-the-law style leadership. But when leadership is shared, wisdom is multiplied. When multiple gifts are functioning together clothed in humility, the body thrives (1 Cor. 12:12-31). We found that by listening and inviting diverse voices from our micro church pastors – stay-at-home moms, engineers, teachers, retirees – we made better decisions than I ever would have alone.

Plurality takes longer. It’s messier. It requires more humility. 

But it’s more beautiful – and better reflects Jesus.

New Metrics and Learning to Be Faithful

Today, we don’t look like a church in the way I used to define it. We look more like pockets of light scattered across the darkness, and act more like patches of salt melting away coldness of heart in the world. We simply want to be faithful to the Kingdom work that Jesus has called us to. I encourage you to do the same.

Sure, I may be less famous than I used to be, but I am less busy with the wrong things. I am less stressed and more at peace. And yes, I struggle with doubt and can want to turn back to my well-worn paths of old success metrics.

But I think I may be closer to Jesus than ever. And that’s why I started following Jesus in the first place.

To be clear, microchurches are not for everyone. No single church model or method is able to provide the best environment for every person to thrive spiritually. That is the beauty of the diversity of the body of Christ. 

I believe the church of Jesus, in all its forms, can be used for his glory and purposes in the world. But after several years of being on this journey as a microchurch network, our leadership team sometimes muses about what we miss about big church, and whether we would ever see ourselves going back to it. Obviously, we want to be sensitive and obey whatever the Lord might call us to do. But at this stage, it is hard for us to envision going back. 

Now that we have tasted and seen just how good microchurches can be.

Are You Being Called?

Microchurches may seem new, shiny, and novel to many – even though the concept is quite ancient. But these are the wrong reasons to do it. Don’t do microchurches because they are trendy. Don’t call the small groups in your traditional church microchurches because it’s faddy jargon. 

The only right reason to do microchurches is because you have prayerfully discerned in community that it is what Jesus is calling you to do. 

The rest is simple; obey.

Microchurch Questionnaire:

This calling questionnaire is designed to help you and your team begin discussing if a decentralized model is the right path for your next season. 

Note: It may not be best to try to answer all these questions in one sitting. Perhaps start with a few that resonate and spend time on those first.

Assessing the Why

1. The Call: Why might you want to move toward a decentralized model of microchurches? Do you believe Jesus is calling you to it? Why or why not?
2. The Success Metric: If your Sunday attendance stayed the same for the next three years, or even decreased, but your members increased in becoming more like Christ and deeply engaged the world around them for Kingdom purposes, would you feel like you were successful? Why or why not?
3. The Scattered Priesthood of All Believers: If your building closed and all your ministry programs stopped, how many of your members would continue meaningful Kingdom work in their context?
4. The Control Factor: Are you afraid of people “doing church wrong” without your supervision, afraid of people “not doing church at all” because they are dependent on you, or afraid that people will feel they “can’t do church” without your permission? 

Assessing the How

1. The Leadership Ceiling: Is your current structure designed to produce spectators who support a few leaders, or leaders who support sent people?
2. The Ecclesial Minimum: What are the non-negotiables that make a “church”? For example, if a group of five people meets for dinner, prays, and serves a neighbor, are you comfortable calling that church? Why or why not?
3. The Resource Shift: What percentage of your resources are spent on the gathering versus the sending? Are you willing to flip that ratio? What would it take to do that?

Assessing the Cost

1. The Ego Check: Are you and the staff okay with becoming less visible and less needed as the central figures of the community? Are you willing for people to leave because they do not share the vision or believe it is the right fit for them? Why or why not?
2. The Pacing Test: Are you willing to spend the time it takes to retrain, deconstruct, and de-program, even if it looks like you’ve stalled or gone backwards? Why or why not?
3. The Decision Matrix: Will you need to move from a hierarchical “senior pastor makes the call” culture, to a plurality of elders/leaders who share authority in humility? Why or why not? If so, what hurdles would you face?
4. The Kingdom Impact: Considering your context’s greatest needs (loneliness, poverty, homelessness, addiction, etc.), is your current model an effective way to reach those people, or would a decentralized network be more effective? Why or why not?