Just this past Sunday, we at Grace Community Church announced that we will be a mult-site church in January, 2011.  The response was overwhelmingly positive, with so many people saying how eager they are to pray with us, and some already committing to being a part of the launch team.

We will be expanding to Kenwood High School, which is about 10 miles north of the high school where we currently meet.

If you’re currently worshipping in a permanent facility that you own, this move may make little sense to you.  You may wonder why we didn’t just move forward with building a permanent facility on the land that we own.  Why would we even consider starting another campus in a high school, knowing how difficult it will be to continue setting up and tearing down every week?

There are many, many reasons that we considered as we sought God’s plan, and we’re convinced that this is what He’s calling us as a church to do…and not build right now.

In the book The MultiSite Church Revolution: Being One Church in Many Locations by Geoff Surratt, Greg Ligon, and Warren Bird, they take a look at Community Christian Church in Chicago.  Pastor Dave Ferguson lists eight advantages, each of which solves a problem in its own way:

  • Grow larger and grow smaller
  • Brand-new and trusted brand
  • Staff with generalists and specialists
  • Less cost and greater impact
  • New-church vibe and big-church punch
  • Move there and stay here
  • More need and more support
  • More outreach and more maturity

I love the reasons given there for going multi-site.  Though not all of the reasons are specific for us, they do make great sense for us in our context.

Are you doing multi-site in your church?  Help us learn from you!

What have you learned?  What worked?  What didn’t?

If you were in our shoes right now, what would you be reading?  Doing?  Who would you be talking with?

    Tomorrow, I’ll tell you why I feel like multi-site makes great sense from a small groups perspective.  In the meantime, though, I’d love to hear from you and your story with multi-sites!