Phases

For those who are interested in how we’re going about starting the church, or are starting churches and hope to learn something from us…

One of the things we’ve done is phase our Launch Team Meetings so that they began in March of 2009 looking very much like meetings (I would do presentations, we would brainstorm ideas and do a little strategic planning) and will end in March of 2010 looking very much like a church service. Inbetween we have gone through a gradual transition. At one point we added in a “message.” After the message we did group discussion. Then we dropped the group discussion and added in some creative elements. Lately we’ve added a song each week, soon to be two.

Why? I’m not exactly sure, but it felt right. And it’s kind of fit our context. When we began it was with 6 people, so brainstorming worked. Presenting a top ten list may have been awkward. Now we have 60+ people, so brainstorming would be awkward. Presenting a top ten list works.

Also, it’s kind of smoothed things out so that it’s not like this whiplash inducing sudden change at any point.

So … there you go.