When a green youth pastor named Mark Hallock accepted the pastorate of Calvary Baptist Church in Littleton, Colorado several years back, he never envisioned that he would now be the pastor who started a gospel movement of planting and replanting over 30 churches in just 10 years. He just knew that the dying declining Calvary Church needed a new gospel approach, a new Kingdom culture as he put it, to reach the people of Denver or the church would soon die. Over those years of learning, growing, and multiplying a family of churches was born called the Calvary Family of Churches that came to embrace the following biblical tenants: Jesus ruled, elder lead, congregationally governed, deacon served. Mark saw Calvary Baptist of Littleton grow beyond what the facility would accommodate and knew he and the church had a huge decision to make. Do you build bigger somewhere else to accommodate the new growth or do you develop a Kingdom culture of sending members out as missionaries to multiply the work in other locations around the city? He felt the Lord clearly saying that growing “out” rather than just “up” was His plan. Calvary Church planted their first church within a mile and half of their location and sacrificially sent dozens of their members to be the core of the new church. Incidentally, Mark says that about half of the churches in their network are new church plants and the other half are dying churches who reached out to them to be revitalized through partnership with The Calvary Family.
In one of the breakout sessions Mark led, he shared how he learned an invaluable Kingdom lesson and how he desperately desires for more church leaders to learn it; namely that the kind of Kingdom growth they have experienced takes real faith and sacrifice. Now, today, with 30 churches in the Calvary Family across Colorado and several states, he readily admits that it hurts to send good members out to start new works and revitalize churches. It takes real faith, but the blessings far outweigh the sacrifices. He has learned experientially that you cannot outgive God and has witnessed the Lord replacing the members they sent out with even more willing servants. Hallock said it took time to develop this culture of sending but now they see it for what it is, “We’re not losing families, the Kingdom is gaining missionaries elsewhere.”
The keynote speakers all addressed a necessary virtue that must be present for us to see “Radical Collaboration” (the theme of the conference). They shared what was necessary for exponential Kingdom growth and partnering between believers and churches: Love, unity and radical collaboration/cooperation. Just a few quotable highlights from each speaker. Shawn Garmen who is the President and co-founder of One Gospel Network said, “I have read all of the great theological works and consistently they are deficient in their theology of love, God’s love.” And, “Unless you experience God’s love, you will never be able to express it to others.” Robbie Halleen, CFC Global Director talked about hindrances to cooperation. He warned against a separatist mentality that demands that anyone you partner with in the gospel must believe exactly as you do. Doctrinal alignment can be taken too far with the result that we are relating to increasingly smaller groups of believers in the larger family of God. He reminded us that our primary goal as the Church is not to protect the gospel, but to proclaim it. “Imagine that the gospel is like a torch held out to the world. It is hidden under the bushel basket (isolationism) that the gospel is most in danger of being snuffed out, not when it is lifted up high for the world to see.” He shared that we in the church need a more charitable theology that avoids two extremes; (1) that our differences don’t matter or the other extreme, (2) that our differences make cooperation/collaboration impossible. We need a charitable theology which creates missional urgency and understands that division is the luxury of the comfortable. He shared an example of how you would feel if you were working in an Islamic country at great risk to yourself and asked us if we found a believer in Christ who didn’t agree with every nuance of our theology how we would feel. Would we be elated to find another Christ follower in a very hostile place to fellowship with, or, would we snub them because their doctrine didn’t perfectly align with ours? He concluded, “Division and separatism is the luxury of the comfortable.”
This was the fourth year of the conference. Each year, I encourage several pastors to attend to be refreshed, encouraged, and challenged. The conference encourages pastors of smaller churches to boldly attempt to multiply and to partner with other churches for greater impact. Smaller church pastors in declining churches are challenged to allow other churches to come alongside them to help them back to greater health and growth rather than feeling threatened and defensive. Please, carve out some time to attend with me next year. It’s usually held the last week in June. BR-KC will cover your conference fees and hotel if you can cover your transportation and meals. It will be well worth your time. In the meantime, you could read Mark Hallock’s book Replant Roadmap to familiarize yourself with some of the transferable principles they use to plant and replant.
Gregg Boll
Director of Missions
