Today’s church must move outside the walls of the building and invade the community; we must be willing to be a laboratory of sorts, experimenting and testing new methodology with the unchanging message of Christ, continually pushing the limits while holding fast to God’s dream for his church, according to Ron Sylvia in his book Starting New Churches on Purpose: Strategies for the 21st Century.
There are two opposing schools of thought among church planting practitioners: start small and start big. The author is clearly in the start big camp, quoting Rick Warren saying that churches grow most effectively from the outside in, not the inside out. The Purpose Driven church starting model requires a heavy up-front investment of time and resources in order to create a high-profile launch and draw a crowd, and then proceeds with a crowd-to-core approach to growth.
The book goes on to describe the phases of starting a Purpose Driven church: the Dream Stage (0-3 months) in which a launch team is assembled, the Design Stage (4-6 months) in which detailed planning occurs, the Launch Stage (6-8 months), the Development Stage (8-12 months) in which the church systems from the Design Stage start to function, and the Strategic Leadership Stage (1 year and beyond) in which the church continues and grows.
Aspiring church planters will need to make a choice as to whether they are in the start small camp or the start big camp, and I strongly recommend reading thoughts from each camp before making a decision. Books by Stuart Murray, Alan Hirsch and Neil Cole support the start small position, whereas books by Rick Warren, Nelson Searcy and the current author support the start big position. The present book is easy to read and provides a clear process for starting a big church.