I have heard many arguments for and against multi-site church. I really enjoyed the video below and it got me thinking about this stuff.
No matter where you land on this, the truth is that we are all about to witness one of its first real tests when it comes to the longevity of the model. Here’s the big question:
How will the multi-site church look after the first major transition of leadership?
In the next 10-15 years, we will see these churches hand over their leadership to the next generation. Some will do so because of “natural causes.” Others will do so because of massive failure in leadership. (Unfortunately, this is way too common.) Either way, the transition of leadership will be a major test for the model.
There are really three options for how a church will survive this big test:
1. Point leadership is handed over to the next generation and the church continues on its mission. Win.
2. Campuses (or sites) develop their own leadership and multiple, separate churches continue on. This is a win, too! The multi-site church strategy actually becomes a new type of church-planting strategy, in this case.
3. The churches fold as the complexity of multiple sites, staffs and congregations is too great to survive a change in leadership. Not a win.
That being said, I stepped back and thought about what a healthy church might look like – one that is poised to take on this first major challenge they face. Here are my questions for these churches as they prepare. (These would also be great questions to ask yourself, if you’re considering jumping into this model.)
One last point. This is NOT an argument for or against the model. As an employee of one of these churches, my opinion may surprise you. You can see that HERE. This is my attempt to step back and look at the idea of the multi-site church, objectively. If you want my personal opinions on how we’re doing, you are going to have to take me out for coffee!
Is the church missionally centered or is it personality centered? Here’s how you can answer that question for yourself. If the “Preacher” were gone tomorrow, would you survive as a church? I’m not concerned that there will be a drop in attendance; people are shallow, so that will happen. I’m talking about your core. Personality-centered churches will not survive losing their key personality.
Is there a development plan for preaching going on? One of the main ways you can tell if it is personality centered or missionally centered is by how tightly your “personalities” hold onto their position. Are they preparing to be replaced? Are they preparing leadership to replace them or are they driving that sort of person away? Leaders protecting their positions will not lead churches that will survive.
Does the long-term plan hand over more and more authority to the sites or to central control? As the organization grows, you should see a slow shift of authority – away from the center to the campuses. A clear mission, vision and strategy should be coming from “Mother Ship.” If power is going to “Mother Ship,” then the campus will rise and fall on a decision-making team that is getting further and further away from the people they are trying to reach. Decisions must be made as close to the “front lines” as possible. As a multi-campus church grows, the authority to make decisions locally needs to stay with them or the future looks dim. A church dependent upon a centrally located and increasingly disconnected leadership team will not survive.
Do you have a leadership pipeline or are you stealing from other churches to fill your leadership positions as you grow? A church should not grow faster than it can produce leadership for itself. In fact, this is a great way to pace yourself! A church that is not raising up its own leadership will not survive.
If this is a video-driven church, are there policies about how often the main personality is “featured” or is it at the discretion of the local leadership? If you need to mandate that everyone must use the content coming from “Mother Ship,” there are some major issues going on. Either the content is not good enough and you have to force it on people or you don’t trust your leadership at the local campus. There are FEW people good enough to be mass produced. A church that mandates programming for a group of people it doesn’t even know will not survive.
What’s their debt situation? Another good way to pace your growth is with finances. As the number of campuses grow, your debt-to-giving ratio should go down. If the ratio doesn’t go down, you just owe more, because you have more! A new campus will cost you in the early days. God will not ask you to violate His principles to accomplish His plan. If you have to be stupid with money, it’s not His plan. A church that is heavily leveraged financially will not survive.
Do you staff your new campuses? If you double someone’s job description so you can open a campus, you will self destruct from the inside. There is MUCH more cost to opening a new campus than just the location. This attitude, in the end, will not fare well during a major leadership change. Chances are that you will not survive until the leadership transition. But, even if you do, a church that doesn’t think beyond sticks and bricks will not survive.
What have I missed?
Be sure to watch the video below:
Multiple Sites: Yea or Nay? Dever, Driscoll, and MacDonald Vote from Ben Peays on Vimeo.
Thank you for providing this article for our consideration. It helped me in the writing of my own Orthodox Christian reflection on the phenomenon (probably not a topic which most people would expect to see an Orthodox priest write about!). Your article is obviously much more in-depth and more broadly considered than the generalized portrait I present in my comparison, so I am happy to link my readers to your article if they wish to consider the Multi-Site Church phenomenon in more nuanced detail.