Urban Church Planting | Lecture 10 : BC309-UCP-20260917

All right, welcome back. Um, let's pick up on chapter 10, the preparation phase. Okay, now you've done your survey, you've got a place and you feel okay, this is where I'm going to start. Now remember before that you have done all the other parts. Okay, we're not going into that like financially you planned, you prepared legally all that is done. Now in the preparation phase what happens the preparation phase always happens on site meaning you're there in that city in that place okay you can have pre-launch meetings the church planting core team begins to meet regularly on site either at a home or a place where the church services will be held okay so if you say okay it's going to be a church plant from a home, meet regularly in that place, right? If you can uh you know maybe every day if not at least 3 to 4 days a week like meet in the evening, spend an hour praying, reading the word. It's like a pre-launch phase, right? Uh this is the initial phase before an official launch. So the church planting team spends time in prayer, worship, getting itself organized and uh acclimatized to the city and the launch area. Okay. So for example, you've got three people. Three of you say okay you are the leader but you three say we will start in my house. Okay. So maybe on a Sunday you you you meet there. Uh it could be even during the week. Okay. You're meeting there. um you're having every every day maybe prayer, worship and reading of the word, ministry of the word and it could be that you can also invite people for that. It could be like a Bible study. You can call it like a Bible study or a fellowship time, whatever you want to call it. Okay? [snorts] Now, that could go on for some time, right? Uh maybe 2 months, 3 months, whatever period of time, right? The pre-launch meetings could happen for a period of 3 to 6 months until the church planting team decide they're ready to officially launch a church plant. Now, think of this, okay? Say for example, three of you, you in your house, okay? Every week you're meeting three times. On Sunday, you're going to a church. Example, right? You're going to church. Every week you're meeting three times. Now, you got a vision. You got a purpose for your heart, for the church, whatever God has put in your heart. You're evangelizing. You're reaching out to people. And slowly through word of mouth, people come, right? Maybe your friends say, "Hey, I'll come." They come. Now, this is happening for about 5 to 6 months. In 6 months, example, your church become that that meeting becomes 15 people. What was three has become 15 people regularly? 15 or 20 people are coming to the house. Now the core team what they can do is they can decide and say hey now we will officially do a church plant. That means the meeting which was on Wednesday, Monday, Wednesday, Friday for example, you can tell them listen from next Sunday we will officially launch the church right hallelujah ministries next Sunday onwards right so the church service will be 10:00 this is the location this is the place now you know that you have 15 people who are going to come because you've been with them for 6 months. Right? Now the problem is if you have a church location 15 km from where you started the church plant, what will those other people say? You go and preach to yourself. I'm not coming 15 kilometers. You see the reason it should be within that vicinity within there 2 or 3 km away very close by right to you. That's why the launch area is very important. Don't be changing your launch area till you set a base till you have a foundation maybe 100 people then maybe lack of space you can move out but identify the area right so 25 people then you can announce to the church now what you have to do is for example three of us three of you first three of you you're in the cold team you all three sit together and say okay now it is September the month of September okay we have 20 people uh what we'll do is October we'll let hold of October continue like this because we need to find a space okay uh October November first week we will launch as a church plan so you all three have decided so you have the whole month of no you haven't told anybody in the church in the meeting yet you'll go find a place everything you'll do right which you should have already started maybe make a brochure if you'd like right church plant u timings location Google link all of those things right and so on the last Sunday last two Sundays maybe of October third Sunday of October I will inform the church I'll say listen we've been here now for 5 months November first week we've got a space we will move and we will start having Sunday services in this place anyone Understand now you all three have made the decision. Okay. And then you can inform the church plant 25 20 25 people. You can also make it in a way that we've made some pamphlets some invites available. You can take it and invite others also to come. Now suddenly from a house church it's become like a church proper church. So when people come it's it it won't look like a Bible study group or fellowship group at home. it look like a church, right? So, you can boldly invite people, you can you can pray for more people to come. So, uh there may be some one-on-one evangelism and invitation extended during the pre-launch meeting, but during this period the but this period is primarily to strengthen the core team on site. You three as a core team are strengthening. You are working together as a team. One is finding a place, one is making the plans, one is preparing spiritually. And the same thing happened in the church in Jerusalem. Remember Acts 7, is that Acts 7? Uh where uh the the widows, there were Jews. Acts six, the choosing of the seven. uh if you go to Acts chapter 6, I'll just read that in those days when the number of disciples was increasing, the Henistic Jews among them complained that the Hebrewic Jews, Ibraic Jews, because their their widows were being overlooked in the daily distribution of food. So the 12, who are the 12 disciples, gathered all the disciples together and said, "It would not be right for us to neglect the ministry of the word of God in order to wait on tables. Brothers, choose seven men among you, and we will turn this responsibility over to them, and we will give our attention to prayer and ministry of the word." Classic, perfect, good example. The church is growing. There are two kinds of widows. Henistic widows that is uh Greeks right Greek and Jews Henistic these widows and then the Hebra Hebraic widows they some of them felt hey we are not getting good treatment so then they're coming and complaining to the disciples disciples said okay listen we can't do all this the church is growing so I will look after we will look after the ministry of the word prayer let's choose people other leaders who and we can train them and send them and they will distribute the food. Good thing they did that. Imagine Peter standing there, enough rice. You want some more food or you don't want food? Peter is thinking, "Hey God, I have other things to do. The church is 3,000 people. There's ministry. People need to learn the there's there's prayer and worship. Many things to get done. I can't be doing wasting my time here." Right? So in the core team, each one of you must take on responsibilities. And one will say okay I will preach the word mostly it's the pioneer who will set things in in terms of in terms of preparing and teaching the word and then maybe another person will make sure that organizationally right when people come in you know you'll have volunteers under you right maybe two three volunteers okay the chairs are set in place u the uh you know the things within the church service everything is okay and one of the other core team members looks after the offering accounting something like that you know some important tasks right u why is this important because what you do initially in this phase is something that you will carry on in your church of course there will be things that you will unlearn you will keep growing you'll keep getting new ideas new strategies but this this is your foundation as a core team right worship prayer and intercession prayer Time spent in worship, prayer, and intercession during pre-launch meetings is very important, and we'll cover that in the launch phase. Know your primary target audience and others. Remember, we talked about this in the survey phase. You should have done your research. What is your primary target audience? Who are you going to reach? English- speakaking professionals, English, young English- speakaking married couples as well as others who can be part of the local church. Now let me give you the example of APC East. Okay, you won't believe in APC East we have hardly 10 youth. Now it's not like we're very happy about it. I'm just giving you an example. Reason being a lot of our church members and people around that side are family family people who are working professionals. Right now it's not like young people are not working. There are young people. There are youth but what I notice here is lot of couples and these couples have two children one two children right and they're in that middle-aged group so early 40s that's why our children's church is so big right and now these families invite other families yeah I'm going to this church can you come I'm going to there's even children's church children also have a nice place to play and it's an open space you know you all should come to East Sai it's an open space right and um lot of place it's it's a safe place so like that many families have invited other families okay so our primary target at APC east is families right uh couples and young couples and families so if you come you will see very few youth Right. Uh maybe 10 to 15 youth out of the 180 180 10 to 15 youth. That's it. Right. Uh others all are married couples, right? With children. It it's a good thing. It's an advantage and a disadvantage because see we also want to reach youth, right? Because a lot of them are working professionals. They come um and we want to reach young people. But our primary target we are seeing that God is working in this place is bringing couples families right young children are young small kids are coming and so we are also focusing on that now doesn't mean we are not focusing on young people we are we want to do youth meetings we want to do youth conference we wanted to maybe this year coming year 27 we're planning a youth concert right to reach out to the youth and do something there our worship evenings it's for everyone right young people older folks so as you plan the church you will get a feel of what is your target audience right is it more of youth is it more of families and definitely it could be a mix of both but you know your target audience okay these are the people so for example if in east nine out of 10 people are working in corporate where do you work I work in this office close by. All are close by. I work in this office, this this office. Nine out of 10, right? Uh why? Because they're all in that side of town. They've come to that side of Bangalore just because of the offices, because of the IT companies that are there, right? So they all work over there. Nine out of 10. So you know your target audience, these are the people, right? So as you start ministry you will understand what's your target audience. It could be youth for you. Suddenly youth are coming only youth are coming right now. Don't neglect families. Families also may come. So there as a leader you must be able to discern very well. Right? You must be able to minister to both families and young people. Right? See for me for me example in east uh lot of these families husband and wives come with children and they say pastor my children are not listening to me so I'm able to minister effectively I'm saying okay this is what I do because I also got kids right they're also in children's church this is what I do I I'm trying to teach them this way it's not like I know everything but these are things that have worked out why don't you try it right example one couple in church right they were very worried One Sunday I was talking to I said why are you worried? said, "No, my son cannot stay in the without phone. Every time phone, every time phone tab, phone tab and he is this. He's the same age as my son." Okay. So, I remember uh going to him. I said to his parents, "If you give me permission, I'll talk to him." He said, "Yeah, yeah, pastor, please talk. We fed up of telling him." Okay. I said, "Come here." Very sternly. I said see I don't need to use phone I don't need to use screen time your eyes are very like I gave him a good solid strict 3 minute uh thing and I prayed for him I said from now on you will not touch it don't believe he never ask for phone and tab now said pastor said don't [laughter] you know uh so they're able to relate they're a we are able to relate you understand what I'm saying right so I'm able to relate to them in terms of okay get up get the kids ready come to church Monday to Friday is school and after school homework it's not easy see when you're youth it's easy no you get up what time you go to work come back after coming home it's a empty house relax play music eat at 10:00 you can't do that when you have kids right it's a completely different life so we need to understand what is your target audience how to minister to them. Okay. Um then identify their needs. Identify ways to connect to your target audience. Very important now. For example, this Saturday we're doing marriage and family retreat. Right now, what's what's the target audience in APC East? Couples. Couples are married. They have kids. Marriage and family retreat. come right. We're going to help you. We're going to teach you. Then we also planned some parenting workshops, right? Cuz these are parents and they don't know how to I mean they don't know but they're all learning how to be good parents. How to you know the way we parent kids those days and now is different. Those days you take a stick you have to choose stick or belt which one you want. I remember my dad used to say which one you want to get today by the stick or belt. I'll choose. Okay. Today I think belt is good. Okay. Belt. Nowadays you ask them stick or belt they'll say none of it. They'll say phone or tab. You know it's a completely different understand. They're not afraid of stick and belt. I remember once I asked my kids you want stick or belt? They said belt I have. They didn't understand that you know. My elder son said belt I have dad I have belt I said not that ritually right so it's the way you parent them is completely different now right once I whacked both of them and I said okay go stand they're not even crying they're talking discussing among themselves so what are you discussing no we're discussing how to hide the belt and the stick I said okay Very good. They got belted and then they're discussing how to avoid how to hide my belt and my [laughter] but you see the way you parent is so different now. So identify how you connect with your people. How do you connect with your audience right? Uh this sent Jesus sent his disciples initially to minister to people. Paul was sent to the Gentiles while Peter was sent to the Jews. And there was a reason for it. There was a some kind of a calling, right? God told Paul, "I'm calling you to the Gentiles." But did Paul preach to the Jews? Yes or no? Did Paul preach to the Jews? Yeah. Everywhere he went, he went to the synagogues and preached first to the Jews. But his calling was to the Gentiles. Peter, his calling was for the Jews. But did he preach to the Gentiles? Yes. So there's this call. There's a call that God puts into your life, right? And you'll recognize it as you keep serving. You you'll know, okay, this person in the core team, for example, this person very good at worship. That's his call. That's something you can use. Or this person very good with youth. Youth, he knows how to minister to youth, right? Example, for me, I don't I'm really not good in ministering in children's church. Really? I can't. I remember I used to go to lead worship. Once I went to lead worship, the kids are going crazy. They're going they're running. They're playing hide and seek and hitting each other during the worship. I don't know what to do. And my son is playing the drums here and I'm playing the guitar and I look at him and he's happily playing. [laughter] I'm telling him, do we stop or what do we do? And that day I realized because I got angry during worship. I said everyone please [laughter] it's a grace that you should have no and I look at these children's church teachers they so gracious ma'am can I open the chocolate they why you want to eat now can you please eat it later if they come to me is this the time I'll ask her is this the time to eat the chocolate you know uh but I hope you're understanding what I'm saying right there's a grace is and there's a gift thing that God places in each of us right um and you build on that build on your strength identify people who God has already prepared mean go where you welcome meaning Lydia and her prayer group in Philippi imagine Paul went there he saw some people he preached the gospel God opened Lydia's heart she received the gospel and she immediately said come stay in my house rest here so there will be people in your in ministry where God will really they'll be very encouraging to you right there will be those people who will be very close to you in the church there'll be people who will come you know they'll come on Sunday morning they'll pray they'll be there they'll go away next you'll meet them only next Sunday right maybe a couple of phone calls but there'll be those people who will go the extra step pastor why don't you come home pray in the house. We'll try to invite some people. Why don't we have life group here? They open their homes for life group. They open their homes for you know worship time. They're there for events. They're there for conferences. Those are those people who really want to grow. So identify those people and when those people come in >> [snorts] >> uh try to give them opportunities as well. Encourage them, build them up into leadership. Right? So I remember this one time uh in East there's this young guy uh he just joined East. young he came to me every Sunday I would notice this is in 2023 okay every Sunday I would notice he comes and he sits quietly he's making notes for the sermon young guy okay making notes I thought who is this guy not see not ever spoken to him so once after Sunday I preached the sermon benediction and I ran to him so I spoke to I said I see you every Sunday I didn't get to talk to you uh what do you do and I began to talk to him right He's a he's done his masters, right? So he's very knowledgeable in the word. So he likes to write down notes and he had his Bible open. I said, "Wow, that's wonderful." You know, said, "What do you do?" I work in the IT. What do you like to do? He said, "I like um you know, uh sound engineering. That's something I've always wanted to do." Immediately I told him, "We have some need in the sound team. Would you like to join?" He said, "Yeah, yeah, sure. I'll join." So initially I told him you carry speakers from the store room to the stage. He was doing every Sunday I would ask the lead leaders the sound team leader is he coming? Yeah. Is he doing everything? Yeah. Yeah. He's doing everything well. Now 2024 the whole I let him do that for one year. 2024 I said you stop carrying speakers and all you start working on the um sound right. You start learning that. And he started learning. Now he's leading the sound team in east right you'll see him on Saturday right young fellow right so there will be people like this who sometimes they just get connected to church immediately they get connected there'll be some people who will come they may not get connected it may take some time for them uh and sometimes people may not come back also that's okay don't be discouraged start with what you have you have 50 people they're encouraging they're there start with them build with that okay don't focus on who left the church right of course there will be you know you can find out why they left the church is it some reason now some reasons will be beyond your understanding I didn't like that worship song so they didn't come back to church all that you leave it right you can't take pressure on all that all that right so uh discern and avoid people with wrong motivation and intentions discern everyone say discern discern turn means there will be some people who only want to come because they want places of prominence. So that's why in APC what we do is we give them the smallest task first. See if you're faithful in that. What did pastor say this morning? Good leaders are good followers. If you're a good leader, if you see that leadership in them, first ask them to follow. First ask them, give them instructions. Ask them to do small things, right? It could be setting up the book table, setting up the communion table, uh setting up the chairs, carrying speakers, tying up cables. First being faithful in those small things, right? Um uh there will be some people who are there only to who say no, I only want to do this. They only want to be in front or they want to be seen. Their intentions you will get to know it, right? So those kind of people don't immediately give them opportunities. Wait, train them. Give them maybe smallest things. See if they're faithful in that. If they're faithful, then you can slowly but most often if their intentions are wrong, they won't be faithful in the small things. They may just leave and go. Okay. Next, identify your launch location. The location where you will launch and have your church services is important. We talked about that. Ensure your location is easily accessible to people. Right? Remember de I didn't want it to be inside. It should be accessible. Walkable distance or you know at least some kind of transport should be there for people to reach. Ensure the meeting place is clean and suitable for the kind of people you are reaching. Very important. Right now if you are uh starting a church and you have IT people in IT you know corporate offices who work there coming to church you better ensure that the place is clean right so and we are always working on this we're open to take feedback we're open to even give feedback we have to give feedback right so let me give you an example one day it was I think it was central long time back Uh I came into church, the fans were on. Okay. And I'm [clears throat] getting fish smell. I thought it's only me. After some time, uh the fish smell was very strong. So I went and told one of the ushering, I think I'm getting fish smell. Is there something okay with is the fans okay? Yeah. Yeah, it's okay. I said, why don't you put some air freshener? They never he they never put. Okay. Then after that I went back and I told them see the smell there's something different in the smell and I ensured that they either put off that fan or spray some room freshener but later on we got couple of emails there was a very bad smell in church I knew it cuz that's not how the room should smell right something was wrong with those fans maybe I don't know u so we always want to improve we want to make things neat right Even at east once I came into the church and I saw there were uh you know some big insects sitting everywhere. Now it's the APC East has a lot of trees and open area outside. Insects will come. That's true. We're not saying no. But it was too many on the walls. They were sitting everywhere and and I said no we can't start until this is cleared. Imagine you're preaching and one insect comes and sits on my head. what will I do? Plus, we people are there. They want to worship God. They they wanted to be they're coming once a week, right? So, I immediately told the team just called the people, got that all cleared up, sprayed and got it all cleared up. Right? Make sure the place is clean. Make sure the restrooms are clean, the the the utensils or the uh things that you use, the tablecloth, the tables, they're all clean, kept well, right? Um then ensure basic facilities are available. Parking, restrooms. You could start at home then move later to a hall or an auditorium. There's no set formula. Now we've been talking about this but also remember you can also start in a hall. Nothing wrong. So you can say pastor I don't want all this house church and all. I'll just start in a hall. Good right? You can just go back home prepare financially say okay there's a 50 seater. Start off there. Even if it's 10 people, it's fine. Start. If you feel that it's worth it, start it. Okay? Don't feel I have to do home church. I then only No. Remember, we were two. It's a 250 seater hall. We were 40 45 people. Eventually, it grew. So, no problem. When there's no space, that's a little bit of a problem, but you can always start immediately. Okay. Um if you are renting make it absolutely clear that the space that is being used is for a church gathering have proper rental agreement in place. Please underline this highlight it and register it inside you. If you are renting make it absolutely clear that the space is being used for church. Don't say this is an NGO okay this is only for prayer once a week. No, tell them it's for a church service and other additional events. Tell the owner. If they say no, it's okay. But tell directly. Especially those in North India, I know it's going to be difficult, right? But if somebody's willing to give you, say it is for church. Don't hide it. Okay? Don't say no, it's not for church. actually just a small prayer NGO. Yeah, you know this is an NGO. No, no, no, no. Say it's a church. Make it clear. Now, the owner may say, "Okay, church, whatever. I'll give it to you." Make an agreement. Put down everything on the agreement, the amount you're paying, what the place is going to be used for, right? uh you know when what is going to happen in that place new people will come we will have advertisements this location will be posted on social media put everything down right also what you will do inside the location right so now even we at east we have this place we we are the ones who use it mostly every Sunday but for anything we take permission so for example we wanted to put those track lights you know to the stage so that it'll be brighter so now I'm writing an email to take permission, right? No drilling, no sticking things on the wall. All that is on the agreement. We put it on the agreement. We will not drill. We will not stick anything on the wall otherwise the paint will come out. All the ACs will be used only during the church service. Every AC maintenance repair work is done by the um by the team not by APC but by them right they have to repair AC. If anything we will use it from 6:00 a.m. to uh 12 12:00 noon 12 we will lock up we'll give you the the you can come and lock up everything's on paper right uh this hall the children's church hall this hall will be used only at this time if there's another conference or anything happening that's a dining hall so the children's church will be given another place somewhere around in the campus itself that's also on the agreement right so we can't say hey children's church all how can you give it to somebody else. No, it's on agreement. Why? Because that's the place where people eat. It's a dining hall. So if there's a camp or something happening, they have to eat there. You can't expect them to eat outside. So we have to adjust that time. It's not easy, but it's on agreement. I have to adjust. Okay? That's why agreement is so important, right? Everything is on a paper. Okay? Then this is our storoom. In the store room, this is what we have. We have a whole you know uh all the equipment whatever we have right uh it's all mentioned and we send them that email and these are the things in the store room so that there's no you know uh no problems while we were while we are leaving or anything okay make sure that the gathering and worship activities will not troublesome be troublesome to the neighbors very important especially if you're a house church don't put high volume and start screaming and shouting right don't say acts two it happened it should happen now also and then everyone acts two holy spirit came here police will come we should be wise okay no screaming and shouting whole night did I tell you that one of our pastors one pastor in Bangalow's got arrested I tell you or was it the second years I'll tell you this pastor in Bangalore narrow lane full of houses next to each other. What he's done in his house on top he's made a hall. Now that hall he's done semi soundproof which only cuts down the noise. It doesn't die out the noise. Now imagine all houses next to each other. You've seen the lanes you know in Bangalore like continuously houses. He started church service Sunday morning. Okay. People were quiet. Okay. He has bought both speakers for that. Okay. Volume full. Now the combination is one loud guitar and tabla that you know that bongo. Okay. Loud. Okay. I don't know what they were singing but they were singing. Okay. Now suddenly he got an idea. Let's do whole night prayer. Whole night prayer is going on and on. What happened? Whole night demons are worried. That's true. But people came, what are you doing? We have whole night prayer. They said we don't care. We have to get up in the morning, go to work. What is the sound? No, I put soundproofing. No, we're still getting the sound. It went on for some time. 2 3 days. After that, they called the cops. Cops came and are you doing this 1:00 a.m. 2:00 a.m. in the night making loud music? No sir, we have soundproofing. What are you church? Show your documents. No documents. [snorts] He got he they took him. They put him in the cell. They had to you know luckily you know nobody filed an FIR against him otherwise he's gone. That's called foolishness. Right? First of all, you're doing it in a small space. Be wise. Okay? Make the volume low. You don't need all this. You don't need whole night prayer in that place. If that's the case, you have to go take another hall, do 30 days whole night prayer, right? Where you're not disturbing people. See, we're not here to cause, you know, a menace to people. We should be people who attract people to us right as believers. We must be able to attract people not people should not uh you know we should not make it in a way that you know we are disturbing others right uh you get what I'm saying right um make sure that the activities are not troublesome to neighbors now here's the other side you're going on outreach right you're evangelizing you're reaching out to people now people may not like it that's a different story they may feel disturbed but that is different that's a that's different but this one right? Uh church activities, screaming into the mic, shouting, right? And some churches believe you the louder you shout is the greater the Holy Spirit anointing, right? So we don't want to do all those things. You we need to be wise. Okay. Okay. Five principles for for initiating a church plant. We need to live in the community. Very important. Hudson Taylor, you read his story, right? God's missionary to China. He goes into China. He becomes one of them. He begins to wear their attire, eats their kind of food, adopts their culture. That's how he was able to minister the gospel there. We need to learn the community. We need to link gospel ministry to the community. Very important. We need to link gospel ministry to the community. And that's something that we like to do here in APC. We have parenting workshop, marriage workshop, we have uh Christian professionals workshop, single adults meet, right? All these uh you know like uh training on AI, right? Training on leadership. Why? Because these are things that are growing in our city, right? So we want to be able to link the gospel to the community, learn to love the community and uh then we need to launch in the community. So what is the common phrase here? Community. Ministry is about people. It's in the community. It's not outside of the community. We are called to go bring people from the community into the church, make an impact for their lives. Okay. Then any questions before we go ahead you understanding this right and uh so don't isolate people hey these people no we cannot do no no we have to learn to be part of the community if I go to north India I have to learn Hindi I have to learn how to minister in Hindi I have to learn their culture I have to learn their songs I have to learn uh you know how to minister to them it's going to be completely different to what I'm doing here but I have to learn it for me to be fruitful there, right? Cuz I'm going to do ministry within that community. Then identify other locations. These would be would have been recognized as a result of your detailed survey of your launch area. U evangelism places where the core team will be going out for evangelism. Right now you've started a church. It's been a couple of years, maybe one or two years. Now God puts it in your heart. Let's start a church maybe 10 kilometers away from here right maybe one church member is there right who comes from 10 kilometers you can talk to him say hey what do you think about starting a church there uh let's pray about it let's see let's go there let's evangelize let's plan eventually if god willing we can start a church plant there two disciple places where team members can meet with new believers right so most probably you can say coffee shops Uh and now we have malls and different other places here, restaurants or even homes. So life groups could be a great place to disciple people. Then serving and meeting special needs through evangelism. There's counseling, deaddiction programs, financial counseling, um you know, uh spiritual counseling. uh something that we have here in APC is life coaching where we uh where anybody so for example you're you have a problem in spiritual matters you can sign up and say I need somebody who can mentor me in this maybe you're in business or you want to start a business so you can say I want some ideas on how to start a business so we will choose somebody in our team to counsel and mentor you and help you to start your you know give you ideas to start a business Now this is not going to be like financial support. It's just counsel, godly counsel and wisdom that they're sharing with you which is far greater than finances. Right? Imagine if [snorts] you have a somebody who has planted 10 churches and he's telling you how to plant a church. Will you take his ideas or no? Oh, hey, he's planted 10 churches and all churches are doing well. Pastor, please tell me the strategy you used. let me learn, let me try and apply what I can do to plant a church. Right? So then what about people in uh financial? Maybe there are some people who are very good at finances, right? Uh and they can help you, right? Um know how you're going to help them or people uh within your congregation who can help them, right? Then finally, you have the ch house church model. If you plan to uh plan to plant churches using the house church model uh which in some places may be the only option and the point of a hall in auditorium is not required now especially for those who are in north India where there is right now a lot of persecution and firstly nobody's willing to give you a space secondly you can't even start in the open at church what do you do you can continue with a church model, the house church model, right? Um, one thing is if what happens if there are 25, 30 people, the house church becomes big. What can you do? Break it down, right? So, if there are 30 people, choose another leader. Say, "Hey, now we become 30. So, we'll have to move 15 people here so that we can have ministry here." Right? Now, don't let it discourage you by saying, "Hey, that other church got a hall. they have a big meeting. I also wanted that as a vision for my heart. Maybe that's not something that you can do now, right? Because the government is things are not easy, right? So be happy with whatever plan and strategy that God is giving you at that time, right? Remember, it's not how much you do, it's how faithful you are with what God is giving you. Okay? Yes, it can be discouraging. I know, right? Imagine 3 4 years doing the house church and you want to go, you want to build, you want to uh grow and multiply but it's just can't be done because of the restrictions around. It's okay, right? Stay in faith, stay encouraged. Remember that every person you're ministering to is someone that can you you're bringing them to Christ. There's great rejoicing in heaven, right? So the work is your work is not measured by how big but how faithful you have been. Okay. So these uh this is the launches. We'll we'll stop here. Next week we'll pick up and uh I hope you're able to make notes and apply these things right u yes this is all like we are studying it as you go on ground there's a lot that you can learn as well right you learn how to uh apply these principles you learn to undo certain things you learn some things that may work some may not work and then accordingly you can uh you know make plans and strategize Nice. All right. Any questions before we close those online? Everything okay? All right. Okay. We'll stop here and we will pick up from next week. Have a great week ahead. See you next week. God bless you.