 Hey! Good morning and welcome to the session on Urban Church Planting. Let's begin this time with a word of prayer and then we'll get into our teaching. Father, we just thank you for this wonderful time. We thank you for giving us once again another opportunity to learn and we thank you for all that we have learned through this course and even as we come to the end of this study, Lord, we pray that you will continue to speak to us, speak through us. We open our hearts, Lord, let there be new plans, new visions, birth in our heart and Lord, we just surrender this time into your hands, Lord. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Okay, so last class we did chapter 23. We looked at personal preparation and we looked at a few practical aspects on personal preparation when it comes to church planting. Just a few of them, we talked about being spiritually strong, maintaining a consistent spiritual life, getting equipped. So as a leader, you've got to keep learning, got to keep developing, learning, studying, reading, very important. Be clear of the vision and the calling that God has placed for you now. Remember that you are the vision bearer, you are the vision caster, you cast the vision and others will follow along. Pray, plan and prepare. So even as you begin your ministry, pray, plan, prepare well, learn where to go, how to go. And I like the point number four where it says be willing to work twice as hard. So never compare what others are doing to what you are doing. So if you are a pioneer, there is more effort, there is more hard work that you will have to put in. But remember, it's not a burden. So for example, you have a child. The child is there, it's a baby. You've got to look after the child. You've got to feed it, give it a bath, clean its diapers. There's so much of work to get done. But it's never a burden. You've got to work hard for it. You've got to be emotionally strong, get things right in order. Learn to relate with people. People skills are extremely important when it comes to being a pioneer. Remember, ministry is about people. We can't say, hey, I'll just preach and then just go back home. No, it's about people, interaction, communicating. All of that is very important. Learn how to manage relationships without feeling guilty. So there'll be times you will have to say no to certain people. You'll have to say no to certain events or programs. And saying no may not be very easy, especially in ministries. It's hard to say no, but you've got to say no. If there are times you have to say no, say no lovingly, and don't feel guilty about it. So for example, you just started your ministry. It's one or two years down the line and you have a child. You're married, you have a child. You're going to spend time with a child. Now don't feel that, okay, this is a Saturday, so I have to do some event. And only if I do some event, the church will grow. But then you have a child, you have a family at home, but you're not able to spend time with them. No, it shouldn't be that way. You should be able to say no to certain things, even if it's ministry. Learn to say no at times. Nothing wrong. And as we grow in leadership, as we grow as a pioneer, we will learn how to say no to be loving yet to be stern. And that balance is something that we can learn over time. Let me also look at developing skills, time management, money management, communication, technical skills. Time management is one very important factor for a pioneer. So you've got to know, okay, what is priority? How can I manage my time well? And even if you look at the world and you look at big leaders and pioneers of businesses, they are people who manage time very effectively. Because it's important. It's important for a pioneer to know how to manage time. So these are skills we learn. Then establish good mentoring relationships with others, stay aligned and be accountable to your church. So this is what we did in chapter 23. Now in chapter 24, we're just going to look at a few points on making the journey. And chapter 25, 26 and 27 is just future projections and being prepared for what the church can be ahead. Always look ahead. A pioneer always thinks way ahead of time. Now in 2000 and I would say 2010 or even 2012, 10 years, a decade before, nobody knew that we would have online churches. And it must have been there. But very limited. But now after the pandemic, we see that online has become a big deal. We have our life groups in Bangalore here in APC. Many of the life groups meet online. I'm not saying they have to meet online, but it's a good way to at least they're connected with each other. So things change. So we look at that preparedness. So let's go to 24, making the journey. Number one, step out and get on the ground to get started. Not everything can be done on the laptop and on the phone. So you got to get out. You got to step out. You got to get things done. Even if you look at getting a trust done, yes, most of it, 90% of it can be done via phone and online. But you got to go out, get things done when it comes to the practical things. You can't book a hall online. Meaning you got to see the place. You got to see things, the venue, the location. There's so many things involved. Establish commitment to your call. Very important. You got to call him. And God has called you to pioneer something. Establish commitment to it. Be committed to that call. Look at the best example. And I'm sure there are many examples, right? Look at the example of the great apostle Paul. God said, I'm going to make you the light to the Gentiles. I'm going to make you stand in front of kings and leaders, and you will testify of who I am. Now, the apostle Paul was so committed to that call, right? Now, around his age was approximately around 33 years old when he had the vision in Damascus. And for about three years he was in Arabia where he had those great revelations. And about 14 years old he was in Tarsus. Just nobody knew about him. Now, it's been about, we could say 16 to 17 years that the apostle Paul has been out of touch, no ministry. So he's almost 50 years old. And Barnabas finds Paul, brings him to Antioch. And then they go to Jerusalem. And now he's starting his first missionary journey. So you look at this. It's been how many years? From 33 to almost 17 years. But the apostle Paul never forgot the vision that God had put for him. The call that God had for his life. That he was called to be a light to the Gentiles. And then he launched out in his missionary journey. He started all these churches way at the end of his, in the book of Acts. He says, he's standing in front of Felix. And he's under trial. And he's standing there and he says, not Felix, he's in front of King Agrippa. And he says, oh King Agrippa, I have been faithful to the call of God on my life. That's what he says. He says, I've been faithful to the call of God on my life. We need to be committed to the call. Nowhere do we see the apostle Paul saying, oh, there's too much of persecution. There's too much of challenges. People are not agreeing to what I'm saying. People are not accepting my message. What should I do? No, there was not an ounce of, of a feeling of doubt in the apostle Paul. He was established in that commitment, established his commitment on that call. God has called me and he's faithful to complete the work that he has started for me. You know, one of the things that, by nature, you and I as human beings, when God calls us, you know, we want to pioneer one year down the line. You know, we're still encouraged, but it's very easy to lose hope, you know, as time goes on. It's a natural thing. It's not wrong. I'm not saying it's wrong, but we need to establish that commitment. You got to go back to God. I said, God, I know you've called me for this. Can you picture what Saul of Tarsus would have been feeling? God has told me, you're going to be the light to the Gentiles and here I'm in Tarsus. Mostly he was doing his tent-making work there. Nobody knew about him, but I'm sure that he also, you know, ministered to people, but nobody knew. There was not much of an impact. But he stayed committed to the call. So you and I, even as we make the journey, one year down the line, you've pioneered your church or your ministry, one, two years, three years down the line. Sometimes we may not see church growth. You know, the other day, I was just talking to some of them from our pastoral team. You know, from 2001, when we started, APC started, 2001, February, in a year or maybe in about two years, the church was still very small. There were only about 100 odd people or even lesser than that. Very few people. They go to very less. And here's the thing. It's very easy to lose focus. It's very easy to question God or to say, God, why is it not happening? So remember, you've got to establish your commitment. You're committed to God and the call of God in your life. Right now, here's another issue that I have seen. Sometimes as pioneers, we compare our ministry with others' ministry. How come this church has 500 people in five years and my church has 200 people in 10 years? Now, it's a question that we can ask. Right? But here's the thing. The ministries may be different. The way that you're doing ministry, I'm not saying there's no anointing, but the ministry areas may be different. Right? So God has called you for something. You just be faithful there. Just be faithful in doing what God has called you to do. Right? The moment we begin to compare, we feel insecure. Right? Remember, when God looks at us, he looks at us as one. So don't compare. It's a normal thing. It's a normal tendency to compare, but don't. Try to take it off your mind. Say, God, I'm doing what you have asked me to do. I'm doing it faithfully. I'm putting in my 100%. I'm putting in my hard work and I'm trusting you and I know you will work. Remember, God used 12 people. Jesus used 12 people. And all of them went preaching the gospel everywhere. So sometimes it's not about the numbers. It's about commitment. Right? Stay focused and avoid distractions. Distractions can come. Remember, the enemy wants to distract us. He tries to bring in things to distract us. You stay focused. Stay focused on your vision, your callings. Fix your eyes, your gaze upon the Lord. Say, God, whatever I'm doing, it is for your glory. It's for your honor. Distractions come. They will go away. Because your gaze is not only on your calling, but your gaze is also on the Lord Jesus. He is the one who's leading me. Then be tenacious, be persistent, resilient. Don't quit until God says your work is done. I like these three words. Tenacious. That means be fervent and persistent. To constantly keep knocking. Remember the parable of the persistent widow. She was persistent. And then resilient. Resilience is basically to go through challenges and still be committed to a cause. Don't quit until God says your work is done. Number five. If you are in a season where you are bivocational, now when it comes to bivocational, it means you're working a job and also planting a church, then carefully watch over your time for spiritual growth, family and work life. Now let's talk about this. This is happening normally in urban cities where you've got a person. He's working in the workplace and he plants a church. So that's wonderful because we know that if he's planting a church in an urban city, you need funds. You need to have funds to start and prepare everything. So there can be somebody who's already working in the corporate sector or anywhere and he plans to start a church. Now he has to look after the affairs of the church but he must also manage his personal life, his personal spiritual growth, his family and he must maintain a work life balance. It's going to be very hard because he or she will have to intentionally make time. Otherwise what will happen is it will always be work ministry, work ministry in the natural because see remember this, pioneers are like people who cannot stay without work and you don't find pioneers simply sitting or just doing nothing. It's very unlikely. They have to be doing something. So it's important that we develop the ability to say, okay, no, I should give time to my family. I should give time to my children. Learn to divide your time in the right way. Something that has helped me and I'll just share and maybe you also can think about it. Number one, what I do is I break the week, Monday to Friday. I break it up into what I want to do. So right now I look after three areas of ministry and including bbq, this would be four, including teaching for areas of ministry. So Monday to Friday, or you take a seven day week. So Monday to Friday, work days. So I know, okay, it's work. So nine to six, whatever, go back home. So I make sure that I spend a good two hours with the children and with family, good to us. So every day it's at least two hours. If it's the kids play with them, help them to study, get their homework done, get to know how they've been. It's being with them. Family is, it's not always about talking, just being there for them. So do that. Now, what we also do is on Saturday, I try to avoid doing too many things. So I spend the whole day with my kids. There are times I go for worship practice and I come back. And then there are some days there are events. So if there are a full day event, so for example, if there's a conference and I have to be there nine to five, so the whole day is gone. So what I do is I compensate that day. So I probably take a day off during the week, Monday to Friday, take a day off. And I know that if the kids are at home, I take a day off. If not, I try to compensate. So to make sure that those hours that I missed out, somewhere you don't take the kids out as a family, just go close by. Sometimes you just need to do simple things. And that is family time. And then you've got, there are times you can, then you can break it up. You can say, okay, your work as well. You can break it up. Okay, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, these are the areas of work I will look at. Thursday and Friday, these are the two areas of work I will do. So you're dividing your time. And then you'll realize that, hey, I'm able to, you know, you're able to touch on every area of work that has been assigned to you. And I'm not saying that it is a full proof method, but this is something that works for me. So you can also divide your time into hours per day. You can divide it as three hours. I'll do this, this and this. You can divide it that way. So I've just divided it by days. You can divide it by hours. But especially when it comes to this, right, you're working, you've got ministry, you've got family. Divide your time. Plan your week ahead. You cannot have it in your mind and say, okay, I'll do this. I'll do this now. You've got to put it down. You've got to make sure that you follow that. Now, initially it may be difficult, but you have to do it. And what happens is you will realize that you're able to maintain a work-life balance. And I'm not saying that I've, you know, I've learned everything, but we, what we, especially in ministry, what we do is we intentionally make time for family because it's always we are doing something, right? We're always out, always house visits or we're, and we enjoy it. That's the, you know, that's the best part in ministry. Like as leaders and as pastors, pioneers, we enjoy going and ministering to people. It's not a burden. So that enjoyment sometimes we may forget about priorities as well. And so always make sure that you put that down. Ask questions. Number six, ask questions. Keep learning. Keep revising. Keep adjusting. Ask good questions. Keep learning. Keep revising. Keep adjusting. Keep changing things around. Make sure that you're able to, you know, balance yourself, know that, okay, what's happening around? Am I in tune with what's happening? You know, media and technology and what is being preached, the styles of preaching Bible studies. Keep yourself occupied. Keep yourself learning, right? And now with Google and online, there's so much that is available. So you can just, you know, just in the tip of your fingers, you can, you know, read so much that is available, right? You have commentaries now. You have so much, right, that you could just by a click, just read and learn, right? So learning can never be an excuse for us as leaders. But again, because of busyness, sometimes you may avoid wanting to read and learn. But we've got to make time for it. Got to make time, sit, cut off your things from, you know, cut off your mind and your things from, you know, just doing ministry, just being in God's presence, spending time learning and developing your skills. Nurture and protect what God has, but avoid wrong alliances. Eliminate things that are destructive. Now, look at this. Imagine, I'm just going to give you an example. Imagine, you know, you've been praying to God and you say, God, help me to plant this church. And then after two years of praying, you plant a church and you put in all your hard work there, right? You worked hard ministry and, you know, just put in everything, your heart, your soul, everything into the church plant. And now it is almost 10 years. And in 10 years, your church has been established. You have about 500, 600 people in the church. Now, it is very easy if we have wrong alliances. It is very easy for something to come and destroy your ministry what took you 10 years of hard work, blood, sweat and tears to build. It can, you know, somebody can come and just, when I say somebody, wrong alliances can come and what took you 10 years to build, you can lose it in a moment. It's true, right? So it's very important that we nurture and protect what we have built. So something that we do in APC and I've noticed is if we're very careful about who we give for preaching, but don't just give everyone, right? Preaching is very ministering of God's word. It's very rare, you know, maybe once a year we have a guest preacher. But it's always, you know, because why? We want to nurture and protect what we have. We have years that this has come up to now and we want to avoid wrong alliances. Now, how do I know? That can be a question. How do I know that this is a wrong alliance? That's where comes in the wisdom of God. That's where we have to depend on God, trust God, you know, just learn to hear from Him. When you're unsure, wait. Don't make a decision, right? So for example, you have a guest, a person says, hey, can I come and preach in your church? And you feel unsure, I'll let you know. Now you pray about it. Ask God to minister to you. Now, remember the other point in personal preparation, where we talked about the ability to say no. So if you feel that God is not saying, not now, say no to the person. Because what you're doing is you're protecting, you're nurturing what you have built for 10 years. You don't want somebody to come and he'll preach and go. But then you have to, you know, look after all the damage that is done, right? So you've got to be very careful, nurture what you have built, right? It could be theology, it could be practices and ideas, especially theology, right? You've got to nurture it. You've got to make sure that what is being preached is in line with your vision, calling, in line firstly with God's word. You can't have somebody coming and preaching something that is totally not in line with God's word. And what's going to happen is you're going to have people with different levels of maturity in the church and it's only going to cause damage, right? And then repairing it is going to take time. Now at ABC, we have gone through these things, right? We have applied things, we have failed. So trial and error is always good. But there are times when it, you know, it just took us maybe even a year to get things repaired, meaning to make sure, okay, this problem is solved or, you know, this thing that has happened in a right way, you know, the problem was solved. So it almost took us a year, right? So we learn from that. And then be a steward, not an owner. That means encourage others to be part of what you are doing, right? So be a steward. Don't tell people always what to do, but do and then let people watch and learn, right? Take care of yourselves. Yourself, you are a blessing. You are blessing others when you take care of yourself. Very important. Finally, take care of yourself. Take care of your health. Now, I was talking to a couple of pastors many years back when I think we were at missions, I forget when and where, but I remember talking to a couple of pastors and these pastors, I kept noticing they were taking these tablets. And they were young, right? So I said, what is it? Why is it that you are, you know, before your meal, after your meal, you're thinking, oh, you know, we started ministry when we were very, very young. And what happened was we just ate anything. We didn't bother about how we were. You know, we ate anything that was given to us, all, you know, outside food, oily food, unhealthy food, junk food. We ate everything that happened for about 10 years. Now after that, now these are the problems we have. And that when he was sharing that, it really struck a chord with me because, you know, sometimes in this being zealous of doing ministry, we end up not looking after our health, and which is wrong, because we got to be healthy to do the ministry. We can't afford to do ministry and we're not healthy, right? So we got to look after yourself, your eating habits, you know, if you have to exercise, exercise, get good sleep, get good rest, right? These are important things, right? Because when you are healthy, you're able to think, you're able to be more effective when it comes to ministry. Then number 10, plan for future generations, right? Raise up succeeding leaders in the next generation. Set things in place that the succeeding generations can build on and leave a legacy. This is the most, I believe for me, at least it is the most exciting part of ministry, to see a person grow from where he is to where God wants him to be. It's the most exciting part. And there are so many leaders that we have now who are there with us from Children's Church and now they are youth leaders. And now they are just there, they are life group leaders, cell group leaders. And it's wonderful to see it. They were there, you know, in Children's Church. But plan for your future generations, right? Raise up a generation that can build on what you have started, right? Remember we talked about this? The greatest sign of a leader is not what he, how big the ministry is or how many conferences he's done or how many preachers he has, how many messages he has or sermons he has preached. No, the greatest sign of a leader is how many leaders he is able to raise up. Greatest sign. It's not about how many books or all that is part of the calling. But the greatest sign of a leader is how many leaders he is able to raise up. Set things in place for the next generation, right? Raise up leaders who can take up this mantle, right? And God will send people, right? We will have to give people opportunities, train them up, they will make mistakes, right? You correct them, encourage them, lift them up, be patient with them, right? So as pioneers, we need to develop that skill of raising leaders, right? And, you know, something that we have in APC is emerging leaders, right? Something that we do. So we currently have youth leaders all across Bangalore locations. So we have youth leaders. So they oversee the youth and probably in their locations as well. And now we have emerging leaders. So these youth leaders, and of course some of them from the youth leaders, you know, the youth pastors, they identify leaders that are going to, you know, emerging leaders for the next, maybe for the next decade or so. They'll be very young, 20 years old. Now they may not know everything in God's word. They may not have deep revelations of God's word. But what we're doing is we're training them to be the next leaders. So then maybe five years down the line maybe 10, 15 emerging leaders becoming youth leaders or life group leaders. And then from life group leaders, they become associate pastors. And from associate pastors, they become assistant pastors and just joining the pastoral team. From where? From being a youth in the church. So plan for your future generation. Leave a legacy that can carry on and on and on from generation to generation. Because what you build now will stay till the end for your ministry. Lastly, step out and hand over at the right time. This is a hard time, but you have to do it. When you are a pioneer, there will be a time God will just ask you to hand over. Now, we are so attached to the ministry. We are so attached to the people. It's a common. It is natural to feel emotionally sad. But it's good because what you're doing is you're letting go and you're letting the work, the ministry to move on. How do you think Moses felt? And God told Moses in that mountain, he said Moses is standing on that mountain and he's saying God is telling Moses because you disobeyed me by the rivers of Kardesh you will not enter the promised land. But a new generation will enter. And this generation, Joshua will take it further. What do you think Moses would have felt? Have you ever thought of that? He did all the hard work. All the hard work Moses did. He went up fasting 40 days. What was Joshua doing? He was just waiting. He went prayed for 40 days. He saw the glory of God. He went to Pharaoh. He did all the sacrifice. He got the people out of Egypt. He went and heard from God. He prayed when the serpents were biting and all the Israelites and they were dying. And everything was Moses, Moses, Moses. Then comes this man, Joshua. And God is telling Moses you won't go into the promised land. You got to stay back. You got to hand over to Joshua. And Joshua may be feeling but this is the best part. God how can you make me skip the best part? But hand over at the right time. It may have been hard for Moses but he knew that there was a bigger purpose. Joshua had to take it on. You know what's the interesting part? Joshua got Moses, prayed in Joshua. He prayed in Joshua. God was ready. What did God tell Joshua? Joshua chapter 1 and as I was with Moses so I am with you. And the Israelites just they didn't question Joshua. Who are you? Where are you from? Why is it that we should believe in you? Moses okay. He parted the season to two. There was a pillar of fire. We saw the miracles. Who are you? They saw Joshua. They saw the leadership in him. Moses planned for the next generation. And it was beautiful. The transistor was so beautiful. Moses just said, here Joshua, you're the leader and he leads the people into the promised land. As I was with Moses so I will be with you. Here's an important point. Sometimes as pioneers we may feel that without me it won't work. The ministry won't work, which is wrong. The ministry is God's work. God will bring people. If we choose a person for example God will still work because the ministry is not ours. It's God's. The working may be different. See, Moses parted the seas. There was a pillar of fire. He did all these wonderful miracles. God was with Joshua also. What did Joshua do? He made the sun stand. Moses didn't do that. What did Joshua do? He looked at the walls of Jericho and he brought down the walls. Different kind of work. But God was with them. So even when we hand over don't expect the ministry to be the same as how you had started it. There can be different things. There can be changes. I love it to happen. Yet, we must ensure that the word and all of that is well protected. The word, the vision all of that is the same and everyone are in one mind. So there's a recommended reading here. Code of Honor and House of God. These are free APC publications. You can go online to our website apcwo.org just put it here. .org slash publications. You can download the books. And then I'm sure you've done the House of God in the second years. So that's again a very good book. Code of Honor is a powerful book that you can read, especially for leaders and pioneers how to start a ministry in an honourable way and to live in an honourable way. So we'll stop here. We'll meet maybe for the next class. We'll do 25, 26, chapter 25 through 27. In the appendix we see this is major cities in India. We'll just touch on it. I know that maybe there are some of us here who are not from India but we'll talk about just a few pointers and how you can do basically a consensus of your city or your state that you are living in. So we'll meet next class for this and then we should be able to wrap up in maybe the next class. Any questions, any thoughts? So what I'll do is after the next session once we complete this I'll put up the assignment as well on the classrooms and then you can begin to work on your assignments and feel free to ask questions. You can email me any time and we'll be able to respond to you. So we'll meet next class and then we'll wrap up in the next class. Thank you so much for joining. Have a great day ahead. I'll see you next class. God bless you.