The effort to multiply congregations and Kingdom communities within the Greater Ohio District is called: Inertia 3M: Multiplying Missional Movements.
The word inertia is a term of physics which describes the tendency of a body to preserve its state of uniform motion unless acted upon by an external force: In other words, it is perpetual movement unless forcefully interrupted. The phrase “multiplying missional movements” speaks to the crux of the Missio Dei. Rather than an emphasis upon simply planting churches, the idea of theological realignment to the understanding of the God of mission and to the mission in which he is engaged becomes centric to the district philosophy. Therefore, the perpetual movement of Jesus’ church should be that of faithfully participating in the mission of God to redeem his creation.
“Getting caught up in God’s mission shifts the center of attention to God instead of us. We are called to join God in the renewal of all things. Reflecting on the sending nature of God, we discover our own sentness; reflecting on the nature of the incarnation, we discover how we can live into our own sentness. Reflecting on how the Father and Son sent the Spirit, we remember that in our weakness he becomes strong.” (J. R. Woodward and Don White, Jr., The Church as a Movement, Starting and Sustaining Missional-Incarnational Communities, 2016, pg. 124)
While speaking to District Leadership in Columbus, Ohio, 2016, Dr. Wayne Schmidt, the General Superintendent of the Wesleyan Church said, “In terms of churches multiplying themselves, denominations and districts do not birth churches. Churches birth churches.” He spoke of multiplication as a Spirit created movement within the denomination, born through the leadership and example of local missional congregations and pastors, rather than something mandated from denominational officials or manipulated through denominational structure. While assessing the place of the denomination and the district in the wake of a Spirit empowered multiplication movement he concluded, “The structure has to conform to the movement, not the movement to the structure.” Dr. Schmidt’s metrics for achievement are simple; success is: “Celebrating every time a disciple makes a disciple and a church multiplies itself. Churches multiplying themselves would be a statement of movement over model. We would like to see our churches multiply until The Wesleyan Church has a faithful presence in every zip code.”
The intention of our district leadership is to encourage, facilitate, and resource this perpetual movement. The goal is greater than planting churches. There is a much higher calling. The goal is to infuse a new paradigm of mission and multiplication into the culture of district life; to multiply mission, multiply disciples, and multiply missionally impassioned pastors, congregations, and communities. This more holistic emphasis is the most effective way to revitalize existing churches and to advance God’s Kingdom at home and abroad.
In support of the above statement each new church will do the following:
Pay it forward: Each new plant is strongly encouraged (expected) to plant another church within the first 3-5 years and to give at least 2% of their annual income back into church multiplication. Example: If a church has an annual income of $65,000 then they should give or set aside $1300 for church multiplication. This can go to the Greater Ohio District for general multiplication usage or can go into a fund reserved for their first plant. The ideal situation is for a church to plant “pregnant.” Meaning: with a potential planter on the launch team who will be preparing to plant within the first 5 years.
Pray about church revitalization and/or replanting. Some congregations in the district are small and gradually dying, but new life could be infused into them if they were closed and replanted, adopted by a new church, used as the campus of a thriving missional church, or given a multiplication minded pastor. A new congregation can help a dying congregation become a thriving congregation through any of the ways above.