UK: Simple church planting across the twelve regions of Britain
How do you develop vision for reaching regions in your country for Christ? Peter J. Farmer tells us how God gave him a vision to see a Church Planting Movement happen in the UK. His story starts with his work among the unchurched in Meadows (inner city of Nottingham) in 2000. Young people and families came for food, prayer, life and the bible. From there God began to speak to him to plant simple churches from harvest and to see hundreds of churches planted across the UK. In 2008 they started to train people based on Matthew and Luke 10 and several simple churches were started.
How did God lead you to start with planting simple churches?
In 2000 I began working in the inner city of Nothingham in the UK. I was living in a cottage on the grounds of an Anglican Church. As we worked with local unchurched children, young people and families it became apparent that many were interested in Jesus but were not interested in coming to the ‘church service’ on a Sunday morning. The culture gap between the Christians and the local area was huge!
However the local people had no problem coming over to my cottage sharing food, prayer, life and bible!
A little while later I met my wife, Marsha! She started counseling women who needed freedom from addictions to drugs, drink and abusive relationships. She felt God lead her to open up her flat on a Monday evening. Soon the flat was too small as more and more women came to receive deliverance and freedom.
Meanwhile I was thinking more and more about planting churches in the harvest. I knew that the churches would need to be simple, flexible, reproducible and culturally relevant. I read about Paul who planted churches then moved on to the next town and wondered how that could be possible (given the fact that the churches held up as ‘successful models’ in the UK were planted by people who stayed in the same place and became ‘senior pastors’).
I read the Book of Acts several times and began studying how the various churches formed in Jerusalem, Antioch, Galatia, Corinth and Asia Minor. It was not long after this that a friend introduced me to books by Frank Viola. From there I read ‘Houses that Change the World’ by Wolfgang Simson and many other books on simple/organic/house church life.
Much of what I was reading reminded me of times in the cottage with local people coming over for prayer, it also reminded Marsha of how the church had begun in her flat both happened ‘by accident’.
I also began reading more mission-orientated articles on planting simple churches by people like Neil Cole, Curtis Seargeant, Bruce Carlton, George Patterson, David L Watson and Victor Choudhrie. What I loved about this stuff was the emphasis on the making of disciples and church planting movements taking off in the harvest.
From 2008 we began intentionally planting small, simple, reproducible churches. We also began ‘Newforms UK Gathering,’ an annual event that connects people across the UK exploring simple/organic/missional church life. God had been speaking to me about ‘Mission Britain’ and seeing church planting movements kick-started in the twelve regions of the UK. So I made a trip in the beginning of 2009 to connect with people in these twelve regions.
Can you tell us a story of people who came to Christ?
As my wife takes our three-year-old son to nursery each day, she takes the opportunity to prayer walk and to search for a person of peace amongst the young mothers. One day she met a mum and on the way back from the nursery saw where she lived. The Holy Spirit spoke to her saying “She is a person of peace, go and knock on the door”. So she knocked on the door and the mum welcomed her in for a cup of tea. As they were talking, my wife Marsha started to share her God story and then had words of knowledge for the mum.
The Holy Spirit was clearly working on the mum and when asked if she would like to surrender to Jesus she said yes without hesitation. Marsha asked if we could begin to come around at least once a week to share a meal and Jesus with the mum, her partner and her family. She agreed.
After a couple of weeks I read a story about repentance, faith and water baptism and asked the questions:
1. What does it mean?
2. What are we going to do about it?
3. Who can we share this with?
The young mum responded, “We need to change and get baptized!” So we arranged a baptism party at her home where she invited her family and friends. We baptized her in an inflatable pool in her back garden. A cousin of hers was there and Marsha got words of knowledge for her. She too surrendered and got baptized there and then!
This group is not without difficulties. Many times the group meetings get cancelled. But this is normal mission life in the inner city where nothing ever seems to go to plan. But we continue to pray and are arranging times to meet with the mum to coach her so she can facilitate the group in her home.
How do you train people to plant new churches?
We train people using a course called ‘Pioneer Mission’ based on 7 practices found in Matthew and Luke 10. The course is action-learning (obedience) based. Each week twelve or so people discover a mission practice (such as prayer walking) and then set goals to do it that week. They report back the following week. Those who plant new churches are then invited onto:
1) Newforms Episode 1: Planting Simple Churches that Multiply. In this training we look at what it means to be blessed, fruitful and multiply (Gen 1:28).
2) Newforms Episode 2: Multiplying Disciples, Leaders, Churches, Tribes and Movements. In this training we look at multiplying disciples, leaders, missional communities, tribes and social businesses.
How will the groups be formed? On what moment do you begin a group?
We begin new groups as we find People of Peace. A group is formed as the person of peace gathers their social circles (or oikos, household). We also encourage Christians to make disciples and form simple churches in their home, work or leisure.
What does a meeting of a group look like?
New groups are based around simple patterns found in Acts 2:42:
1 Share Bible/Stories
2 Share Life
3 Share Prayer
4 Share Food
As new groups develop into simple churches (with baptized disciples) they begin to practice 1 Cor 14:26. They bring and shares a thought, word, song, revelation or something else.
How do you muliply disciples and group?
Multiplication is built into the life of each simple church (group) and Pilgrims group (discipleship groups of 2/3). When a group grows, instead of splitting down the middle or renting a bigger space, pioneers are sent out to start a new one. Or if a new family/person of peace joins the group they are immediately coached to form one with their social circle.
Can you mention three points others can learn from you?
It’s good to coach Christians to form a church in their home, work or leisure, but it’s even better to start from scratch finding a person of peace in the harvest. New disciples are fresh soil! As Christians we need several years to detox from institutional church life…not all of us can make the switch and some will say the old wine is better.
Once we find persons of peace, the process of MAWL (Model, Assist, Watch and Leave), coaching the person of peace and training are vital! It’s important to leave the group sooner rather than later. But when leaving there should be good systems of coaching and training of the key local leader in place.
Never give up…we must persevere with faith. All who want to live a Godly life will be persecuted. The process of seeing simple churches multiplying won’t take off straight away and requires many years in the desert doing unseen work and living in obedient relationship with the Father. We must be prepared to die to multiply.
What have you learned that others can benefit from?
We are in this for the long haul! Simple church is not a quick fix. We need to be broken for God to use us so that only He gets the Glory!
Source: Peter J Farmer, Newforms
J Fokker