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Sustainability within church planting movements in East Asia

<p>The interest in Church Planting Movements (CPM) as described by David Garrison in his two books entitled the same, has generated a lot of interest and discussion, especially in the mission world. Garrison presented anecdotal case studies describing unprecedented numbers of church plants within a very short period of time. He also summarizes universal and common factors inherent within CPM&rsquo;s he has analyzed. </p><p> As time went on, criticisms began to emerge regarding some reported movements raising questions as to the accuracy of the reports. These reports began to generate questions as to the sustainability of movements. This research looks specifically at the question of sustainability within CPMs. Until now, no research has been conducted in order to understand how experienced CPM practitioners define sustainability within a CPM and what practices were engaged in for the purpose of sustaining a CPM. </p><p> Twenty-three experienced CPM practitioners were interviewed for this qualitative research project. A few of the participants have seen movements of over a million. What fruitful practices did these participants engage in so that a sustained movement emerged? </p><p> Through the use of data analysis tools, eleven themes emerged. These eleven themes were grouped into three categories (a) Core (Holy Spirit and Vision); (b) Fruitful Practices (Mission, Reproduction, Worldview Transformation, Church Ecclesiology and Leadership); and (c) Universals (Training, Role of Missionary, Indigenous and Prayer). These themes were integrated into a visual model, The Wheel. </p><p> The grounded theory generated as a result of this research states that if CPM practitioners are able to successfully integrate the five fruitful practices simultaneously, then a sustained movement will occur, because it incorporates the best of what has been learned from both the Church Growth Movement and CPM. </p><p> The author suggests that the Wheel Model presented in this research could be an appropriate model as modern missions moves into the fourth era. </p>

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:PROQUEST/oai:pqdtoai.proquest.com:3560649
Date06 June 2013
CreatorsSchattner, Frank Walter
PublisherBiola University
Source SetsProQuest.com
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
Typethesis

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