Members of the newly-appointed Church Planting Task Force met last week at the Church of God International Offices.
Consisting of a cross-section of pastors and leaders, the group met to cast vision and assess how the task force can best meet the church planting needs of the Church of God in the future.
Assistant General Overseer Tim Hill is the liaison to the task force, whose members include Michael Baker, Steve Brown, David Hagee, Ronnie Hepperly, Michael Knight, and Matt Roberts.
Some of the purpose and passion of the group was outlined during the day-long meeting and included explaining the realities of where the Church of God is and what the opportunities are as a movement and the importance of Evangelism; and to cast a new vision for evangelism through church planting. The opening session also included strategic planning.
In the afternoon session, Dr. Hill directed the group to spotlight all of the “wheres” in the Church of God. These include military, chaplains, prison, youth, college ministries, and Hispanics, universities, cultural pioneers, evangelism and home mission.
The question of “who?” was presented to the task force and several ideas were discussed such as bringing the district overseer and administrative bishop of each state or region to a “Covenant Commitment.” These leaders want a sense of ownership as it relates to the responsibility of planting churches,” Hill stated. “We also want to deal with the profile of a successful church planter and we need to have clear and simple action steps that make church planting more productive”.
The next meeting of the task force will take place online through SKYPE on November 18, 2010. The goal of this meeting will be to leave with a more detailed vision and schedule for the state and district overseers training which will be held January 12-15, 2011.
Following the November online meeting, the task force plans to gather for a planning retreat to be held December 13-15, 2010.
“The goal of that meeting will be to bring all of the task members’ thoughts and ideas into a strategic plan, which will serve to keep us focused for the next two years,” Hill stated. It is our desire to ask God for a Great Awakening in the Church of God through church planting.”