Name: Gaorutwe Moabi

Student Number: 21640476

Module Code: RSM 320

EMPLOYING CHURCH PLANTING MODELS AS THE

RIGHTFUL DUTY AND FULFILMENT OF THE GREAT
COMMISSION: A CASE STUDY OF THE AFRICAN
METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH AS THE IMMEDIATE
CONTEXT

Submission Date: 31 August 2023

Contents
EMPLOYING CHURCH PLANTING MODELS AS THE RIGHTFUL DUTY AND
FULFILMENT OF THE GREAT COMMISSION: A CASE STUDY OF THE AFRICAN
METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH AS THE IMMEDIATE CONTEXT....................1

1. INTRODUCTION..................................................................................................5

1. CHURCH PLANTING MODELS...........................................................................5

1.1. Church House Model.....................................................................................6

2. CONTEXT AND PROJECT FOR THE CASE STUDY..........................................7

2.1. The African Methodist Episcopal Church.......................................................7

2.2. The Strategic Plan Implementation of the AME Church.................................7

3. CHALLENGES AND OPPROTUNITIES OF EVANGELISM IN THE AME

CHURCH.....................................................................................................................8

3.1. Challenges of evangelism in the AME Church...............................................8

3.2. Opportunities of evangelism...........................................................................9

4. AN IDEAL CHURCH PLANTING MODEL FOR THE AME CHURCH.................10

5. CONCLUSION....................................................................................................10

6. BIBLIOGRAPHY.................................................................................................11
 1. INTRODUCTION
The church’s checkered effort to target cities for Christ are not new. The Great
Commission recorded in the Gospel of Matthew is one of the many paradigmatic
codes of what is due of the church, and it affords the community church the
measuring tools that are fundamental in the plotting of new directions.

In the continued effort to address the mission, this paper comprises a critical
discourse on Church Planting Models – one of which I will list and describe – then
make a description of the context and project I chose for my case study. It is worth
mentioning that the primal context of my paper will be based on the African
Methodist Episcopal Church, hereafter AME Church, therefore I will identify the
challenges and opportunities for evangelism of the same. At the end I will identify an
ideal church planting model for the African Methodist Episcopal Church.

1. CHURCH PLANTING MODELS

Church planting is a concept that is unpardonable from the definition and character
of discipleship, which Wright (2010:94) defines as “the process where individuals are
taught/learn to replicate the life of Christ through mentorship and not only head
knowledge. Furthermore, “it involves following, obeying, and participating in God’s
mission”. It gives forth the idea of being missional, which is further substantiated by
the proclamation of salvation through Jesus Christ with conviction and passion,
calling people to Christ, exhorting them to renounce their false allegiances, and
spending their lives as disciples of Jesus Christ (Conn, 1997:19).

The health, purposes, and prosperity of a church is defined, refined, and determined
by its adherence to the prescription of the Great Commission, and in this like
manner, the children of God get restored to their rightful positions and place (Conner,
2012:1). The following are, amidst many, the church planting models that must be
devised forth for effective commissioning and discipleship.

1.1. Church House Model

The First Century Christians assembled in houses which were seen as the basic
units in which the city was composed. The phenomenon of household churches goes
back in ancient history during the Pauline mission and Jesus who was a resident at
and based his itinerant ministry in the house of Peter in Capernaum, an account for
which archaeology provides evidence that it was an early house church (Alastair
Campbell, 2007:667).

This model or rather strategy of planting a church is characterized by the

development of small congregations that are usually hosted in the homes of one of
the converts or congregants (Conn, 1997:206). Prince (2021:1) contends that “The
New Testament concept of ‘house church’ is a possible agent for discipleship and
faith formation amongst emerging adults in a globalized South Africa.”

Prince (2021:23) submits the difference between house churches and

institutionalized churches in a sense that the former is more appealing to millennials
as they view the latter with skepticism. Unlike the traditional or institutionalized
churches that are inclined to be program, event, and purpose-driven in character,
house churches are ideally positioned to make provision for a way of living a
Christian life communally in an ordinary household; it becomes a setting or a space
of ideation where believers adopt a corporate lifestyle and share their lives and
resources, thus rendering it relational, spontaneous, and organic. The ideals of being
missional are more espoused in the house churches than they are in traditional,
institutional churches.

Home churches were not necessarily rigid settings, in the contrary, they encouraged
informality and a wider participation of believers in the practice of “setting out the
food, eating it, and talking together as the meal progressed,” which is a practice that
made the church appear as though a dinner party (Giles, 2010:6). Acts 12:12 is an
account of the mother of Mark providing a home for the early Christians to assemble,
Paul in his letter to the Colossians 4:15 greets “Nympha and the church in her
house.”

2. CONTEXT AND PROJECT FOR THE CASE STUDY

2.1. The African Methodist Episcopal Church
The AME Church embodies sociological and theological features that are quite
different compared to other denominations. It was established in the second half of
the eighteenth century in the United States of America due to a revolutionary
retaliation to white supremacy in the Wesleyan Methodist Church. It has grown
globally, and it thus resonates with the experiences of black people (Booyse, 2010:1)
including the ones in the African continent such as South Africa, Liberia, Zimbabwe,
Botswana, Namibia, Zambia, Mozambique, Lesotho, Swaziland, Malawi, Uganda,
Tanzania, and Angola (Booyse, 2010:2).

2.2. The Strategic Plan Implementation of the AME Church

In accordance with the Strategic Plan Implementation process imposed by the
African Methodist Episcopal Church, one of the intentions thereof is to ensure that
there is a method devised for the enhancement of church growth and global ministry.
In this very regard, the AME Church will be my context and I will generate a case
study that is in tandem with the said denomination.

The handbook intends to assist the AME Church members to have a layman’s
understanding of specific denominational objectives, recommendations, and
processes of strategic plans; it also intends to assist the STP to make the necessary
transfers or impositions of responsibilities for the sake of implementation to the
relevant personnel in the church for the effective leading and development of the
church towards success.

The first recommendation and process is increasing church growth, and it is carried
out as thus: The Doctrine and Discipline of the AME Church 2004 contends that the
Presiding Elder must plant a new church quadrennially, an initiative that can be
enhanced through seminars, seminaries, annual department meetings, district
conference meetings based on church planting, and through the provision of budget
support. There should also be meetings convened between the Presiding Bishops of
various Episcopal Districts, Presiding Elders, Annual Conference delegates, and
other relevant representatives.

A series of additional strategies that can be employed for the sake of church growth
are: larger churches must sponsor the new church planting. There should be
pastoral adjustments made by the sponsoring pastor until the new church is
introduced into the Annual Conference. Courses on church planting must be
designed and delivered, and AME Seminaries must serve as centers for conferences
where particular attention can be given to the issue of church growth or church
planting.

The following is a detailed recommendation:

 “The Bishops’s Council will be asked to provide leadership in each Episcopal District to
make church planting a priority. They shall encourage holding Institutes create workshops
and seminars on all levels including investigating new strategies for church growth. AME
Seminaries will be invited to hold summits and courses on church growth strategies in AME
Churches, strategic evangelism, church planting. The Board of Examiners should
encourage, offer, and provide intense training in growing and planting churches.

The change strategy of the AME Church submits forth that the Presiding Elder
District can focus on increasing church growth by completing a feasibility study which
includes the demographics of the church, investigate new strategies to growth the
already existing churches, start and plant new churches, relocate and develop,
evaluate the existing churches and the abandoned properties, and therefore make
necessary recommendations.

3. CHALLENGES AND OPPROTUNITIES OF EVANGELISM

IN THE AME CHURCH
3.1. Challenges of evangelism in the AME Church
A long-held lamentation within the AME Church is that the Connectional AME Church
which is dominated by Americans is no different from a White Supremacist system
that enthralls the Black Negros. The preservation or retainment of Connectionism
leads to American control where African Districts are held captive and considered
slaves to a crude form of Americanism that holds no difference with colonialism
because decisions are made for and on behalf of Africans by a paternalistic
American wing of the church (Booyse, 2010:158). Substantially, it appears as though
the Connectionism of the AME Church supports a colonial enterprise in the sense of
Christian evangelism being understood as a subversive tool of Westerners to
undermine the African indigenous natives by displacing the cultural and religious
prowess of Africans through an American administration that marginalizes, ignores,
and silences (Yong, 2017:147-148).

The challenge is that the church is a Connectional or global ecclesia, however its
pursuit of reformation appears as if it is rhetorical, however this remains the
unpardonable nature of the AME Church which is all the more an impediment on the
missional and evangelical duty of the church.
The image of the AME Church in Africa is not good, there is a dire need to tell
resilient success stories. Diplomatic relations are fundamental, however the
autonomy of the Africans is compromised and forfeited. The challenge is that the
autonomy and independence for which Africans fight in the Connectional AME is the
very one that will enhance the esteem of the ones who are vulnerable and
disadvantaged to see things beyond denominational sugar-coated and rhetorical
image of the AME in Africa. The AME Church with its rich history in furthering human
dignity still embodies greater deals of injustice and inequality the derail the
capabilities of the church.

3.2. Opportunities of evangelism

There is a revered adage that the AME Church congregation boasts in: “The AME
Church is a teaching church”, which has proven true from time to time. It is also a
source and fundamental objective of evangelism which is the lifeblood for church
growth that can be enhanced through summits that ensure quality in the institution.
There can be an appointment of an Episcopal Director of Evangelism appointed for
the coordination of seminars and leadership training in evangelism and mission. The
Episcopal Director will mandated to provide evangelistic programs at Annual
Conferences, and ensure that such programs are carried out in prisons, hospitals,
and among the homeless, and they should address issues of rehabilitation of
children, young adults, and the unemployed, especially the ones who are Not in
Education, Employment, and Training (Booyse, 2010:184).

The Young People and Children’s Division of the AME Church holds an annual
Leadership Training Institute featuring a program that equips young people and
children, seminars that are of the like manner, however I feel like the church can do
better than it has been in the past: it must take its theology, ministry, and mission to
the people who have never been exposed to it in order to enable the oppressed,
exploited, and alienated people the opportunity to discover and mobilize themselves
successfully; that is the crux of empowerment as should be implemented by the
church. The church’s evangelical opportunity prevails as thus: by being able to
exhibit comprehensive doctrinal understandings and tremendously effective Christian
networks, it inevitably become a giant network that is effectively communicates the
gospel to the lost and destitute, and it able to proclaim the gospel to the poor. It is the
prophetic and missional duty of the church to ensure that it also ministers in a
transformative manner.

4. AN IDEAL CHURCH PLANTING MODEL FOR THE AME

CHURCH
The Wholistic Church Planting Strategy that is much oriented to the community is
ideal for the growth of the African Methodist Episcopal Church because in areas that
are charged with poverty and intense needs, the church with its equipping resources
bears a proclamation of liberation at the heart of its strategy, as thus, this
authenticates hospitality: sharing of households, finances, and resources. This
underlines the need for concrete interaction and intervention, and it shows a
commitment to a meeting of minds and hearts (Newlands and Smith, 2016:19).
Suchlike model or strategy ensures that the church becomes aware of its ignorance
and sows the desire to study more about its problems.

5. CONCLUSION
Having defined and illustrated succinctly the church planting model of House
Churches, I have come to learn that the contemporary church has digressed from
the true missional culture that is precisely scriptural. Still, the exhortatory scripture of
the Great Commission must still be adhered to, the declaration of Jesus in Luke 4
must be imitated, and the land, vast as it is, still needs workers on it, so that the
missional vision may be fulfilled through the planting of the churches, especially in
the African Methodist Episcopal Church.
 6. BIBLIOGRAPHY
African Methodist Episcopal Church Page i Draft Strategic Planning Implementation Handbook

Alastair Campbell, R., 2007. House Church and Mission: The Importance of Household Structures in
Early Christianity. By Roger W. Gehring.

Conn, H.M. ed., 1997. Planting and growing urban churches: From dream to reality. Baker Academic.

Conner, D., 2012. Church Planting Models.

Booyse, A.C., 2010. The sovereignty of the African districts of the African Methodist Episcopal
Church: a historical assessment (Doctoral dissertation, University of the Western Cape).

Giles, K., 2010. House Churches. Priscilla Papers, 24(1), p.7.

Newlands, G. and Smith, A., 2016. Hospitable God: the transformative dream. Routledge.

Prince, R.M., 2021. Exploring the New Testament concept of" house church" as a possible agent for
discipleship and faith formation amongst emerging adults in a globalised South Africa (Doctoral
dissertation, North-West University (South-Africa)).

Wright, C.J.H. 2010. The Mission of God’s People. A Biblical Theology of the Church’s Mission. Grand
Rapids, MI: Zondervan.

Yong, A., 2017. Apostolic Evangelism in the Post colony: Opportunities and Challenges. Mission
Studies, 34(2), pp.147-167.