The Importance of Values in Shaping the Culture of Your Church

What are the Great Commission building blocks and transferrable principles for seeing your church lead a movement of Christ followers?

In March of this year, two pastors from Michigan and Florida made the trek to Manila to check out our church. Soon into their visit, they expressed their amazement at the way we did church, particularly intrigued by this idea of being one church with multiple services in multiple sites and with multiple preachers.

“We haven’t seen a church model like this one,” they told me. “In the United States, the typical multisite model broadcasts one preacher to multiple sites.” They were also quick to point out that they didn’t believe one model was better than the other. I can only agree.

But they specifically wanted to know and understand how one church does 94 weekend services in 15 locations with 51 lead pastors preaching and with approximately 65,000 in attendance. In their own words: “It’s worth the trip and a two-week stay to observe.”

As both men sat in my office I told them, “When people come to observe our church, they often focus on learning our curricula, methods, systems and processes. They think that by copying these, they’ll get our same results.”

I could tell my words had puzzled them. 

I continued: “The problem with focusing on methods, models, systems and processes is that all of these things are subject to change depending on your nation, city and even the size and season of your church.”

“So what should we focus on?” they asked.

“Pay close attention to the culture of discipleship our church lives by,” I said, affirming their decision to come. “Culture cannot be learned from a book, a seminar or a podcast; it needs to be experienced.”

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Joey Bonifacio

Joey Bonifacio

Joey Bonifacio is Director for Asia of  Every Nation Ministries. Every Nation is a worldwide family of churches and ministries that exists to Honor God by planting Christ-centered, Spirit empowered, socially responsible churches and campus ministries in every nation. He is a member of the team that oversees  Victory, a local church in Manila and a movement of churches in the Philippines and the Senior Pastor of Victory Fort at Bonifacio Global City. He is Chairman of the Real Life Foundation, a Philippine based NGO that provides educational scholarship to the underprivileged. He is happily married to Marie for 30 years now and has three adult sons, Joseph who is married to Carla, David and Joshua. And adopted a cute little dog named  Vito.

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comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you Ed for sharing your insights into the Church Growth Movement. I have my reservations with Church Growth models because it has done more damage than good in the Body of Christ. Over the years, western churches are more focused on results, formulas and processes with little or no emphasis on membership and church discipline. Pastors and vocational leaders are burnt out because they're overworked. I do believe that the Church Growth model is a catalyst to two destructive groups: The New Apostolic Reformation and the Emerging Church. Both groups overlap and have a very loose definition. They're both focus on contemporary worship, expansion of church brand (franchising), and mobilizing volunteering members as 'leaders' to grow their ministry. Little focus on biblical study, apologetics and genuine missional work with no agenda besides preaching of the gospel.
 
— Dave
 
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you for sharing such a good article. It is a great lesson I learned from this article. I am one of the leaders in Emmanuel united church of Ethiopia (A denomination with more-than 780 local churches through out the country). I am preparing a presentation on succession planning for local church leaders. It will help me for preparation If you send me more resources and recommend me books to read on the topic. I hope we may collaborate in advancing leadership capacity of our church. God Bless You and Your Ministry.
 
— Argaw Alemu
 
comment_post_ID); ?> Amen!!
 
— Scott Michael Whitley
 

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