Is There Such A Thing As A “Church Planter Personality Type?”
Is there a specific gift mix or personality type that’s necessary to be a successful planter? Is Vineyard or seminary/bible school education necessary? Is being on staff at another church first necessary? There are some irreducible necessities, but beyond that, there are as many ways to plant a church as there are churches. The assessment […]
Death By Suburb? The Unique Challenges Of Suburban Spirituality
Dave Goetz is president of CZ Marketing (www.czmarketing.com), a brand and strategy firm for the service and nonprofit sectors. He has been an editor at Leadership Journal, and has written for Christianity Today and Christian History magazines. He lives in Wheaton, IL, with his wife and three kids. In his book Death by Suburb, David writes, […]
The Nuts & Bolts Of Church Growth
Rich Nathan is the senior pastor of the Columbus Vineyard and an internationally known writer and speaker on a remarkably wide variety of topics. Under his leadership, Columbus Vineyard has grown to over 7,000 weekly attenders, and has become a major influence for the kingdom in it’s community. They have planted 22 churches, established a […]
The Small Church Pastor
What pressures or challenges do pastors of smaller churches face today that were not that much of an issue 10 or even 5 years ago? Because of the way that media of various sorts creates the ability for a church on one side of the country to become the gold standard for a town in […]
The Power Of Partnerships
Not many people understand the power of partnership in missions like Phil Strout does. As a former missionary and now a senior pastor of the Lewiston Vineyard in Lewiston, Maine, Phil has the advantage of seeing missions from both ends of the spectrum—the giving and receiving. Cutting Edge caught up with Phil to get his […]
Church Growth & The Life Of A Pastor
One of the great challenges of ministry is to understand what our purpose is and try to find ways to measure our progress. In other words, figuring out what business we are in and asking, “How’s business?” Bert Waggoner has spent decades helping pastors develop healthy ministries and think about their growth. We asked him […]
Start Small & See Where God Takes It
VUSA: It seems there is a lot going on with compassion ministry in the North Phoenix Vineyard today. How did you get started? MF: In 1996 my pastor, Brian Anderson, asked me to come on staff at the church. I had already been a part of the church for about five years. One of the […]
God’s Picnic: Stories From The Harvest Vineyard
VUSA: So tell us the story of the Harvest Vineyard, and the “Picnic in the Park”. JM: Well, The Heartland Vineyard had a vision to plant a church in downtown Waterloo in the urban community. In order to do this, they knew that they had to establish relationship first. So, in the 1990s, Heartland had […]
Caring for the World
One only has to visit to Boise, Idaho, to see why the Vineyard’s environmental stewardship movement has taken root there. If you think “potatoes” when you think Boise—think again. Rather, think “high desert paradise”, because it is a sermon for the senses on the glory of God. This is where the Boise Vineyard is flourishing. […]
Simply Worship: A Conversation with John Barnett
You’ve been around the Vineyard leading worship a lot lately. Have you noticed any themes? Have you had any sense of what God’s doing, both in worship and also in the churches? I do, as a matter of fact. We started about three or four years ago, but the root of it lies with John […]
