So you want to start a ministry from scratch?
In September of 2019 we launched microchurch a non-profit ministry providing free weekly resources for home churches, small groups, home groups, and the like. In my 10 years of leading a home group, I found it difficult to find curriculum week after week year after year. Yes there are resources out there that you must pay for that are highly produced, high quality, with the latest and greatest authors, pastors and teachers providing lessons (for a nominal price). This price increases if you want to buy the study guides. There are also free resources we have found, but the content is not on par with most paid resources. So we set out to create 100% free weekly content that provides a video lesson with high quality curriculum that is Bible based taking you through an entire book of the Bible.
The microchurch model is based on Acts 2:42-46 which has 5 key elements which we call “pillars”. (1) Food, (2) Fellowship, (3) Scripture, (4) Prayer, and (5) Service.
We set out to model microchurch at Frank Phillips College (FPC) starting the spring semester of 2020. Having the curriculum ready to go through microchurch.com and on InstagramTV, we developed our marketing strategy. We bought 100 t-shirts, 40 gift certificates, over 200 rack cards advertisements, and offered free FPC cafeteria meals. We did an article in the local paper, email blast from the college to all students, placed rack cards on all cars parked at FPC the Thursday prior, and offered these free items to anyone attending our Sunday morning service on the college campus. I had also purchased a Nikon D750 with Tamron zoom lens given I was taking lots of pictures of Borger high school athletes and posting them on our FCA Instagram page. I started attending basketball and baseball games taking photos and tagging players on Instagram and got a large FPC student following. I advertised heavily on Instagram our microchurch kick-off at FPC.
Come Sunday January 26th, 2020 not a single FPC student showed up (except for my kids and a friend they brought). I did not have high expectations, but this was a bummer.
We continued for three weeks having a few adult friends of mine come and critique our set-up with good feedback for improvement. But no students came.
Then one Sunday (around the 4th week), one FPC student showed up. We had my twin boys and their friend, my wife and I, and this student from the Rodeo team. We did our thing where we showed the video, had the follow-up discussion from our curriculum, and invited her to join us at the FPC cafeteria for lunch. She invited a friend the following week. We now had a small group going!
She informed us they could not attend the following Sunday due to a rodeo they were attending in Odessa. This made us seriously re-consider the day and time we had chosen as not being the best (Sunday morning during church). Our thoughts were to try and attract students that were not attending church and provide a service for them on campus during normal church time. We had eaten lunch after church on Sundays many times and saw so many students there obviously not going to church. This was our basis for our initial meeting time. We immediately switched the time to Sunday evening at 7:00pm to accommodate them and their weekend rodeo schedule.
We had also emailed all of the FPC coaches to ask them for what they thought would be the best time to offer a Bible study for maximum attendance. Only one coach replied to our email. It was the head Rodeo coach! We offered to take her out to lunch and oh-boy what a great meeting! We learned of their schedule and even met two of the other rodeo athletes who happened to be at the same restaurant. Immediately we started attending Monday practices which was after I got off work from 5:00 - 7:00. We brought pizza every Monday and took pictures and posted them. To my amazement they were riding broncs and bulls every Monday! I got some great photos and started to make a few new connections.
On a whim, my wife and I decided to attend the 3-day rodeo in Odessa. I took vacation and we booked a hotel for 4 nights. I got some great photos and posted them on our @microchurch_ Instagram site. We attended Friday Cowboy Church and posted photos from that as well as performance photos from the girls that put on the church service. We were blessed to have lunch with two of the rodeo coaches and on a separate occasion took one of our microchurch attendees to lunch. One of the athletes from a different college lost her horse pre-performance in an accident, we sent her a letter of condolence. This trip was a blessing and gave us the feeling that this is where we need to be. We were not “rodeo” people before this, but God has his own plans.
Our Sunday evening Bible study has stayed steady. I am a former worship leader of 10 years. I’m teaching one of our students how to play mandolin. She brought me her broken mandolin and I adjusted the bridge up to bring the strings off of the frets, tuned it, and we immediately started playing. We are working on learning “The Old Rugged Cross”. One male rodeo athlete contacted me indicating he would start attending. Our Monday hang out time continues to generate interest and conversations just bringing pizza, hanging out and taking pictures.
Our experience gave us new insight on Jesus’ analogy of fishing he uses throughout the gospels. I am an avid fisherman, own a boat, and live near the largest lake within 150 miles. Sometimes you can have the perfect conditions: no wind, slightly overcast, all day to fish, no rigging problems, and no one around. And you catch nothing, not even a nibble. Other days all you get is a nibble (like our experience where only one coach replied to our email). Other times you catch a fish. All I know is if you think you have the perfect conditions to attract large numbers of fish, the Bible says otherwise. It wasn’t until Jesus said “throw your net on the right side of the boat” did the disciples catch any fish that day. Also, Jesus spent most of his time with the “good soil”. This is the soil that produces “a hundred, sixty, or thirty times what is sewn”. We plant seeds yes, but we are commanded to “make disciples”. Like Jesus spend most of our time with the “good soil”. What a blessing to be a part of a system where people come from all over America and the world to attend our small-town college for two years. We have the opportunity to teach and train them and send them off to do the same. Cherish those nibbles and fish you do catch. Water and care for the soil you’ve been given to tend. Blessed! - Brian