Über die Autorinnen und Autoren

Geoff Surratt is on staff of Seacoast Church, a successful and high-visibility multi-site church. Geoff has twenty-four years of ministry experience in churches. Along with his wife and two children, he lives in Charleston, South Carolina. He is coauthor of The Multi-Site Church Revolution and author of Ten Stupid Things That Keep Churches from Growing.

Greg Ligon serves as Vice President and Director of Multi-Site Church Leadership Communities for Leadership Network, which involves location visits to over fifty multi-site churches. A capable writer, he also coauthored The Multi-site Church Revolution and is Leadership Network’s Publisher. He and his wife have two children and live in Dallas, Texas.

Warren Bird, Ph.D., is Senior Vice President of Research and Equipping at ECFA.org (Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability). Previously he was Research Director at Leadership Network. He's an award-winning author/co-author of 34 books for pastors and church leaders, church boards, and seminary professors. Bird researches cutting-edge churches and works with their leaders to multiply their evangelistic and disciple-making impact.

Von der hinteren Coverseite

Hop On for a Guided Tour of the Multi-Site Church Movement

From multiple locations to internet campuses, the multi-site church movement is changing the shape of the church. What is this rapidly expanding phenomenon all about? Experience the revolution for yourself and see why it has become the “new normal” for growing churches. A Multi-Site Church Roadtrip takes you on a tour of multi-site churches across America to see how they're handling the opportunities and challenges raised by this dynamic organizational model.

Travel with tour guides Geoff Surratt, Greg Ligon, and Warren Bird, authors of The Multi-Site Church Revolution, on their engaging and humorous journey that shows creative ways churches of all kinds are expanding their impact through multiple locations. Hear the inside stories and learn about the latest developments. Find out firsthand how the churches in this book are broadening their options for evangelism, service, and outreach--while making better use of their ministry funds.

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A Multi-Site Church Roadtrip

Exploring the New NormalBy Geoff Surratt Greg Ligon Warren Bird

Zondervan

Copyright © 2009 Geoff Surratt, Greg Ligon, and Warren Bird
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-310-29394-1

Contents

INTRODUCING THE ROADTRIP...............................................91 THE MULTI-SITE VARIETY PACK..........................................202 THE CHURCH PLANTING VERSUS CAMPUS LAUNCH DILEMMA.....................333 GETTING MULTI-SITE INTO YOUR GENES...................................414 YOU WANT TO LAUNCH A CAMPUS WHERE?...................................565 CHANGING YOUR COMMUNITY ONE CAMPUS AT A TIME.........................736 INTERNET CAMPUSES-VIRTUAL OR REAL REALITY?...........................857 FUN WITH TECHNOLOGY..................................................1018 STRUCTURE MORPHING...................................................1149 GOING GLOBAL.........................................................12910 SHARED COMMUNICATOR.................................................14611 MERGER CAMPUSES-NO LONGER A BAD IDEA................................15812 TWO-OR MORE-AT ONCE.................................................17313 MULTIPLIED, MULTIPLE LEADERS........................................18614 ARE YOU SURE THIS ISN'T A SIN?......................................19815 GRANDCHILDREN ALREADY?..............................................209EPILOGUE: PREDICTIONS OF WHAT'S NEXT...................................219Acknowledgments........................................................223Appendix 1: Resources..................................................224Appendix 2: Job Descriptions of Campus Pastors.........................225Appendix 3: Multi-Site Roadkill........................................231Appendix 4: Discussion Questions.......................................233Notes..................................................................238Subject Index..........................................................240Church Index...........................................................245About the Authors......................................................247

Chapter One

THE MULTI-SITE VARIETY PACK

SEACOAST CHURCH Fast Facts

Church vision * To help people become devoted followers of Christ. Year founded * 1988 Original location * Mount Pleasant, South Carolina Lead pastor * Greg Surratt Teaching model for off-sites * Primarily video/DVD Denomination * Nondenominational Year went multi-site * 2002 Number of campuses * 13 Number of weekly services * 33 Worship attendance (all physical sites) * 10,000 Largest room's seating capacity * 1,300 Internet campus? * Yes International campus? * No Internet address * www.seacoast.org

No longer primarily for megachurches, multi-site campuses range from a few dozen people meeting in a neighborhood clubhouse to thousands of attenders in a brand-new church building.

In order for us to experience the full range of multi-site diversity, the first stop on our roadtrip will be Seacoast Church, originally located among the old live oaks and Civil War-era plantations of Charleston, South Carolina. We'll begin our visit a few miles outside of Charleston, in the small town of Manning, population 3,947.

It's easy to miss Manning when you are driving up I-95 through the rural surroundings of South Carolina. On my first visit to Manning, I (Geoff) would have easily passed the expressway exit if I hadn't seen the prominent Shoney's billboard on the highway. A local pastor had invited me to meet him at that restaurant to discuss the possibility of his church being adopted by Seacoast. Though I was excited about the discussion, I was also secretly hoping they would be having an all-you-can-eat seafood day.

After I met with the pastor and we enjoyed some excellent hot cross buns, the two of us agreed that Manning would be a great place for Seacoast's next multi-site experiment, opening a campus in a small town. At the time, Seacoast was drawing almost ten thousand people every weekend. The campuses were spread across twelve locations throughout North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia.

But what would happen if we opened a campus in a town like Manning, where the entire municipal population was only half the attendance of Seacoast? Six weeks later we found out, when Seacoast Manning was born. Soon about eighty people were gathering from across Clarendon County each weekend to worship in a rented community college auditorium. From the beginning, exciting things were happening. One woman started bringing her brother to the church. "He's now actively exploring areas of faith, church, and a relationship with Christ, none of which were really open for discussion before the Manning campus opened," she said. My Shoney's acquaintance, who became the campus pastor, still shares stories about friends and family who are attending. "The opening of the Manning campus was an answer to so many prayers," he says.

An hour south of Manning is Summerville, a suburb of Charleston. Affordable housing and proximity to Charleston has led to a great deal of growth in Summerville, but it has still managed to maintain a small-town-America feel. The biggest event each year is the Azalea Festival, during which people come from all over the county to see flowers and eat fried things on a stick. Seacoast started a Summerville campus on Easter Sunday 2004 in a senior citizen community center, and every Sunday since that opening, campus pastor Phil Strange and his wife, Sherri, have stood at the door after services and hugged people leaving the building.

The campus then relocated to its own facility, and they saw weekend attendance jump from six hundred to over twelve hundred. Pastor Phil has maintained the small-town feel, but he is no longer able to hug everyone who walks out the door. Though it's not for lack of trying!

Fifteen minutes east of Summerville on I-26 is North Charleston, recently named the seventh most dangerous city in America. In the heart of North Charleston, on one of the most crime-ridden streets in the city, you'll find the Seacoast Dream Center. Every Sunday morning, six hundred people from the community gather in a little traditional church building for worship that sounds a little like David Crowder, a little like Al Green, and a little like to by Mac. The crowd is an eclectic mix of African Americans, first-generation Hispanic immigrants, and blue-collar whites. Campus Pastor Sam Lesky has created a family atmosphere for people who have never known what it is to be cared for and loved unconditionally. In the midst of all the crime and urban decay, God is changing people's lives daily.

Jumping back on the highway, we travel to Mount Pleasant, the home of Seacoast's original campus-fifteen minutes by car but a world away economically. Every weekend approximately 5,000 middle-class suburbanites gather in three on-campus venues featuring simultaneous worship experiences. One venue is an auditorium that seats 1,300 and features contemporary worship. Another venue is a traditional 300-seat chapel featuring acoustic music sprinkled with a mix of hymns and modern worship songs. The third venue is a rugged 450-seat warehouse with fog, moving lights, and guitar-driven worship.

All these venues are joined by a large lobby that resembles a shopping mall and features a full-service coffee bar and a large bookstore. Because of the variety of venues and the size of the crowd, attenders can come and go anonymously, or if they wish, they can join one of the dozens of ministries or hundreds of small groups that are part of Seacoast Church.

One Size Doesn't Fit All

Being one church with multiple locations has allowed Seacoast to grow larger and smaller at the same time. In the past seven years, Seacoast has seen its overall weekend attendance grow from three thousand to over ten thousand. At the same time, people are attending Seacoast campuses of eighty, one hundred, three hundred, eight hundred, one thousand, and five thousand people.

Some people appreciate the anonymity of the large congregation. They like the safety of being able to blend into the crowd without fear of being pointed out. They want to be able to move at their own pace toward a relationship with Jesus, and the huge congregation gives them that opportunity. A smaller crowd would be intimidating.

A larger congregation can also offer a larger palette of ministries. For example, Seacoast's largest campus offers at every service a "One by One" ministry for special-needs children. While smaller campuses may see the need for such a ministry, they often don't have the room or the volunteers to make it happen. For some people bigger really is better.

Other people crave the intimacy available in a small-church atmosphere. They want to go where everybody knows their name (to borrow from the theme song for Cheers). They want people to notice when they are missing, to know their children's names, to ask them about their job. People in Seacoast's smaller congregations like the fact that they know their campus pastor and that the campus pastor knows them. While a smaller campus doesn't have state-of-the-art facilities or a large selection of specialized ministries, it can often offer closer connections and more intimate relationships.

Why the Variety Pack Works for Seacoast

Having multiple campuses of multiple sizes in multiple cities and states certainly isn't for everyone. Many multi-site churches, such as Willow Creek in the Chicago area, try to replicate the ministries of the original site as closely as possible each time they open a new campus, although their downtown Chicago site did also take on an urban flair. When Prestonwood Church in Greater Dallas decided to expand to more than one location, they first purchased 127 acres in Prosper (an exurb about seventeen miles north of Plano) and built a new building that somewhat rivaled their original site. Central Christian Church in the Phoenix area and Southeast Christian Church in Greater Louisville have had a lot of success with similar large-campus satellite strategies.

Seacoast, however, has purposely decided to grow larger and smaller at the same time. As a staff, we are constantly asking how we can reach more people with the gospel in a variety of contexts and help them grow in their faith, and for us the answer includes many different sizes and formats. We have found several advantages in the variety pack approach to multi-site campuses:

1. a Variety of opportunities to Volunteer

The complexity of having several campuses offers a new set of opportunities for volunteer leaders. We have several CEOs, CFOs, and small business owners who volunteer to help us figure out the corporate side of organizing a diverse set of church campuses. While these individuals might not be fulfilled serving the church by handing out bulletins or changing diapers, they eagerly dive into helping us figure out how to leverage the resources God has given for the maximum kingdom impact. The challenge of managing a large organization spread across three states allows these men and women to use their God-given gifts in ways that go beyond the marketplace. When the economy began to tank in recent years, we were especially thankful to have high-capacity volunteers such as these to help us steer the ship.

We also have opportunities for engineers who like to figure out traffic patterns. The parking lot at our Summerville campus has only one entrance and one exit. On some weekends the parking lot has to be turned over with only fifteen minutes between services. Engineers love this kind of stuff. Summerville has cones and ropes and people wearing orange vests and waving batons in every direction, and they do an amazing job.

We also have a wide variety of service opportunities for anyone who likes to work with children. We have nurseries with as few as two babies at a time, and rooms with as many as one hundred children. We utilize teachers and small group leaders and baby rockers and door monitors. Whatever a person's gifting, experience, or availability, there is always a place for him or her to experience the joy of serving at a Seacoast campus.

(Continues...)

Excerpted from A Multi-Site Church Roadtripby Geoff Surratt Greg Ligon Warren Bird Copyright © 2009 by Geoff Surratt, Greg Ligon, and Warren Bird. Excerpted by permission.
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