Resources
Downloads:
Are you interested in getting regular updates from Nexus?
Would you like to be aware of opportunities for you and your church to get involved in?
Then check out our Newsletter information below:
Sign Up for Our Email Newsletter
Visit our Email Archive
Plant a Church
Is God Calling You to Plant a Church?
We are always looking for leaders who are called into church planting. If you are wondering if this is for you please call – we’d be honored to help you discern what God is inviting you into. Whether you see yourself as a lead pastor, in an associate role, or in some other support role in a new church we’d love to connect with you.
How does this work?
The process is fairly simple. You contact us and we help you thoughtfully and prayerfully listen to God to see if this is a path into which you are called. We will spend some time with you in initial conversations. At some point, if we both determine to keep exploring this possibility we will ask you to take some online tests which can help direct our discussions. When we are all convinced that God is directing you into church planting we will invite you to participate in a Church Planters Assessment Center. (This is a 3 day interview that will involve both you and your spouse – if you are married.) Our goal is to help you discern your calling, and then to help you match that calling with the right opportunity.
How do I start?
Please contact Greg Garcia to start the conversation… greg@nexus.us
read more
Training
Training for church planters is not merely a good idea, it’s an essential part of the process!
Nexus offers a variety of ways for potential church planters to learn the art of starting a new church, as well as opportunities for planters already on the field to hone their skills and increase their effectiveness at leading in their church and community.
God has given you the vision and ambition, let us help complete the picture by helping you learn best practices and putting you in community with other church planters who are doing the same thing!
Below are some training opportunities that are available through Nexus that will help you take your leadership to the next level:
The Art of the Start
The Art of the Start is an interactive workshop experience that takes you from Dream to Design. The training is for entrepreneurial leaders who are obsessed with a dream. Let us help you learn the ART of launching a new vision.
A – Articulate your vision, values, and ministry dream
R – Raise your prayer team, financial support, and leadership teams
T – Train your leaders and teams for missional outreach.
Since 2001, Nexus Director, Phil Claycomb, has provided Art of the Start training to over 150 church planting teams. Many established church leadership teams also discovered the training helped them re-invigorate their own vision.
Who should attend? Church planters, spouses, coaches and team members… anyone helping launch a new church; transformational leaders of existing congregations who want to re-design and re-develop existing ministries for greater growth and multiplication; and Leaders who want to explore the possibilities of church planting.
Schedule: For a Quick Look at the typical Art of the Start Schedule Click Here.
Upcoming Workshops:
May 28-31. McKinney, TX . For more information contact barb@nexus.us.
Coaching and Mentoring workshops
ThinkNext Workshops
Once we arrive at our current situation we immediately face a moment of danger. Will we succeed in the next set of challenges or will we fall by the wayside? Progress requires we do a strange thing: throw out much of the knowledge and behaviors that got us where we are, and grow toward the next level. If we don’t, we’re heading for disaster. This is true of individuals as well as institutions.
The key is learning to ThinkNext!
This one-day workshop will help participants learn to anticipate the changes that are coming at us Next. Too many times we choose to Think-Past, and struggle in our current challenges because we rely on the skills and behaviors which served us in the past. Other times we struggle because we get caught up in the urgency of the present… we plateau because we choose to Think-Now! This workshop will encourage you to ThinkNext as individuals as well as church families and teams.
October 1-3, 2013 at Golf Course Road Church of Christ — Midland, TX
THE TYPICAL ONE-DAY SCHEDULE:
8:30 Registration & Refreshments
9:00 The Need to ThinkNext
10:30 Best Practices of New Churches
Noon Lunch
1:00 Learning to ThinkNext
2:00 Next Steps In Our Journey Together
Your church can schedule this workshop with Nexus. The workshop will be led by either Dr. Phil Claycomb, Greg Garcia, or Rick Cobb (the Nexus staff). In addition, the Nexus staff member will typically bring one of our current Nexus church planters who will also share as a presenter. You and your team will benefit from this exposure to entrepreneurial practitioners of change-leadership.
Seminary-level Leadership Training
The courses Phil currently offers through CCU include:
- Strategies for Church Planting (Last offered – May 2011)
- The Church in Transition (Last offered – January 2012)
- Case Studies in Church Planting (Scheduled – May 2012)
- Spiritual Formation (Scheduled – August 2013)
- Seminar in Church Planting
- Biblical and Contemporary Dynamics of Church Development
- Characteristics of a Healthy Church
Interested in earning a degree in church planting and church growth? Click Here
Churches Planting Churches
As you consider joining a church-planting partnership it may help you to realize that two partners are already at the table learning to put aside their differences and work together to accomplish God’s mission. In addition to Nexus, the Golf Course Road Church of Christ (Midland TX), welcomes you into this partnership adventure. Golf Course Road Church and Nexus have a proven track record for developing partnerships; we would welcome the opportunity to enter into a partnership with your congregation.
Below are the steps we have discovered we need to follow in order to develop a healthy and well-communicated partnership.
1) Develop a Working Draft of the Memorandum of Understanding. The MOU will summarize what the partners may expect of one another, what the church planter may expect of the partners, and what the partners may expect of the church planter. The MOU will also tentatively specify the schedule by which partnership funding will become available for the project.
2) Commit to a Shared Strategy for Church Planting. We perceive these elements to be vital.
a) Pre-Assessment Screening by an experienced church-planting leader. Before partnership funds are expended on a Formal Assessment an experienced leader must screen all potential candidates.
b) Formal Assessment of the Church Planting Couple(s): An assessment process that evaluates the following four areas of compatibility: church-planting skills; contextual and cultural fit; emotional and marital health; and theological beliefs.
c) Formal Approval: partners will formally approve of the church-planting leader following successful completion of the Assessment.
d) Project Partnership Team: A project partnership team of leaders from selected partnering churches and organizations will be formed to provide the project and planter with supervision and accountability until an indigenous eldership has emerged.
e) Formal Training: Initial and ongoing church-planting training.
f) Formal Coaching & Mentoring: An extended Coaching and Mentoring relationship under the supervision of the management team.
g) Church Planter Issues a Strategic Plan: Formulation of an overall strategic plan for the project.
h) Fund-Raising: The church planting leader and team members solicit funding for the project.
i) Missions Commitment To Church Planting: The new church will tithe (10%) on its offerings to repay the church-planting funds that have been provided through the partnership.
j) Shared Biblical Heritage: Doctrinal compliance with shared theological tenants regarding baptism by immersion; and observance of communion during the weekend assembly.
3) Identify the Four Keys of a Healthy Project. The partners need to work together to identify the following four items: the Partners; the Place; the People Group; and the Planting Couple. We find that these four elements come together in various ways and sequence. Our task is to both work toward finding them as well as wait for them to emerge as God leads. When these four keys are identified a church-planting Project is ready to be formalized.
I.e., the Partners + Place + People Group + Planting Couple = a Project.
4) Identify and Pre-Assess Potential Church Planting Couples.
5) Formal Assessment of the Selected Church Planting Couple.
6) Formal Approval by Partners upon the Successful Completion of Assessment.
7) Partners Issue the Approved and Signed Final Memorandum of Understanding.
8) Formation of the Project Partnership Team.
9) Financial Plan Approved by the Project Partnership Team.
10) Church Planter Hired.
read more