Simple lessons and inspiring stories of church growth
Introducing the new book from Firestarters Network On This Rock: Simple lessons and achievable habits for church growth, which shares principles of growing Baptist churches, as well as their stories
'God opens doors. One of the keys to this story is if you’re where God wants you to be, God opens the door,' says Nathan Hunt, pastor of Shinfield Baptist Church. Nathan and six other pastors shared their stories in the recently released book, On This Rock: Simple lessons and achievable habits for church growth, written by Alex Harris and Chrissy Remsberg.
Alex and Chrissy wrote this book to tell the stories of some of the churches that are part of the Firestarters Network and the Conversations that are held throughout the UK. Each story is paired with a simple lesson learned as these growing churches began to share their experiences with each other.
Over time, it was found that there were seven simple lessons that most of these growing churches had put into practice. Despite the variety of churches, styles, leaders and locations, each church seemed to embody many of these seven lessons or principles.
In On This Rock, Alex and Chrissy work hard to share these lessons in a way that a church diaconate or leadership team could read and discuss together and practically put these simple lessons to practice in their own church. Lessons like: a leader-led intensity in prayer and fasting, the gospel is simply told, and the people you have are enough. Most lessons are simple, at times, even obvious and absolutely achievable for any church.
Combined with the inspiring stories of ordinary Baptist churches being used by God in extraordinary ways, Alex and Chrissy hope that many churches will be encouraged and begin to see God move in their congregations as well.
With the reality that in some parts of the UK less than one per cent of people know Jesus, the Firestarters Network is passionate about empowering Baptist churches, pastors and leaders to reach more people with the great good news of Jesus. To do this, the Firestarters Network hosts Conversations around the UK throughout the year inviting pastors, leadership teams and church volunteers to come along to hear some of these stories in person, learn about the simple principles and habits these growing churches have learned, and have lots of practical discussion about how to put these things into practice in your own church or community.
Because it wants to support as many churches as possible, the Firestarters Network has now begun to create resources either for those who can’t make it to a Conversation or to support leadership teams who want to work through the material together.
These resources include On This Rock, an upcoming podcast, to be released this spring, and an exploration of learning communities for those pursuing scattered or non-traditional expressions of church.
Baptist Times, 18/01/2023