Practical Church

One of the most helpful and interesting things for church planters is to hear the stories of other church planters. In this special edition episode of the podcast, you'll hear the church planting journey of Adam Pickard and Citizens Church.

Welcome to welcome to episode 200 of Practical Church Planting.

Click here to learn more about Citizens Church and/or to connect with Adam.

Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get practical tips delivered right to you. For free resources to help you plant a church thrives, check out practicalplanting.com.

Have questions or want encouragement from other church planters? Join the Practical Church Planting Facebook group.

How do you know the difference between desiring to plant a church and when you should actually pursue that desire? As we all know, God's timing is often different than our own. The good news is there are some tangible markers of when you should begin your church planting journey. In this episode, we share five signs of when you should actually pursue planting a church.

Welcome to welcome to episode 199 of Practical Church Planting.

Here are the five signs we discuss in this episode:

• Your willingness to serve at a smaller church with a no-name pastor
• Your willingness to raise your own financial support for a church planting residency
• Your willingness to submit yourself to an assessment process
• Your willingness to let your spouse make the final decision on your church plant
• Your willingness to live in a lower society-economic status than your friends

Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get practical tips delivered right to you. For free resources to help you plant a church thrives, check out practicalplanting.com.

Have questions or want encouragement from other church planters? Join the Practical Church Planting Facebook group.

Sermon prep takes a lot of time and effort. But what if there was a way to reduce the amount of time it takes and make your sermons better? In this episode, we share six practical things you can do to spend less time on sermon prep without reducing the quality of your sermons.

Welcome to welcome to episode 198 of Practical Church Planting.

Here are the six things you can do to reduce your sermon prep time that are discussed in this episode:

• Schedule and uninterrupted 3-4 hour time block
• Schedule sermon prep at the same times each week
• Prioritize sermon prep for when you are at your best
• Give yourself a defined end time
• Use online/software tools
• Use a sermon outline

Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get practical tips delivered right to you. For free resources to help you plant a church thrives, check out practicalplanting.com.

Have questions or want encouragement from other church planters? Join the Practical Church Planting Facebook group.

Most church planters have a desire to connect with other churches and pastors in the area. The problem? It's hard developing those relationships? The good news is there are some things you can do to help you connect with other churches and pastors in your area. In this episode, we share six specific things you can do to help you not feel so alone.

Welcome to welcome to episode 197 of Practical Church Planting. You can listen to this episode below, or subscribe to the podcast and get our episodes delivered right to you.

Here are the six things we discuss in this episode:

• Ask to take pastors to coffee or lunch so you can hear their story and ask questions about their experience
• Have specific questions and bring something to take notes
• Follow up with three takeaways
• Be careful how you promote your church online
• Attend their church on a Sunday
• Find a local pastor gathering and prioritize going

Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get practical tips delivered right to you. For free resources to help you plant a church thrives, check out practicalplanting.com.

Have questions or want encouragement from other church planters? Join the Practical Church Planting Facebook group.

Pastors are called to care from people and emails come from people. If you have trouble staying on top of your email, you're missing out on loving your people well. The good news is that email doesn't have to be overwhelming. In this episode, we share with you seven practical things you can do today to stay on top of your email and love your people well.

Welcome to welcome to episode 196 of Practical Church Planting.

Here are the seven tips we discuss in this episode:

• View unanswered/forgotten emails as a problem
• Don't view your inbox as a task list
• Create separate folders if necessary
• To stay at Inbox 0, live by these two rules: Only open it once & deal with or move it once you do
• Unsubscribe to all emails the first time you receive them
• Deal with all currently/inboxed emails
• Check your email less.

Afraid you might miss something critical while clearing out your inbox? Simply send an email like the one below to all the critical people in your contact list:

Subject: Got a pressing issue I haven't dealt with? Can you re-send your email?

Hi Friends,

I've decided to get to inbox zero and start organizing my workflow in a new way.

To that end, today I'm going to delete every email that's over 30 days old.

I apologize for not getting back to you on the relevant matter. If it's still a current issue for you, do you mind resending me the email?

I promise I'll be responding much faster in the future.

Thanks! I appreciate you!

Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get practical tips delivered right to you. For free resources to help you plant a church thrives, check out practicalplanting.com.

Have questions or want encouragement from other church planters? Join the Practical Church Planting Facebook group.

There has been a lot of talk about the "new normal" that COVID-19 has created. The truth, however, is that we are not currently living in a "new normal." COVID-19 will certainly change a lot of things, but our current season is not how life will be like forever. This means that there are some normal things that COVID-19 won't change, and we want to be sure churches continue to do things well. So what exactly are some of those things? In this episode, we share four specific normal things COVID will not change.

Welcome to welcome to episode 195 of Practical Church Planting.

Here are the four normal things we discuss in this episode:

• The importance of the physical worship gathering
• The importance of online engagement
• The negative or positive effect of livestreaming
• The need for local community

Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get practical tips delivered right to you. For free resources to help you plant a church thrives, check out practicalplanting.com.

Have questions or want encouragement from other church planters? Join the Practical Church Planting Facebook group.

We often hear about the difficulties of ministry. But does ministry have to be as miserable as we can sometimes make it sound? It does when we believe five particular lies about what ministry has to be like. If you want your ministry to be life-giving and instead of life-sucking, you'll want to see if you have bought into any of these 5 lies.

Welcome to welcome to episode 194 of Practical Church Planting.

Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get practical tips delivered right to you. For free resources to help you plant a church thrives, check out practicalplanting.com.

Have questions or want encouragement from other church planters? Join the Practical Church Planting Facebook group.

We all know what it is like to have new people come visit your church only never to see them again. At the same time, we know growing churches have somehow figured this out. The good news is there are tangible things we can do to help new guests return. In this episode, we share 5 things you can do to make it more likely new guests will return.

Welcome to welcome to episode 192 of Practical Church Planting.

Here are the 5 differences we discuss in this episode:

• Follow up is quick and intentional
• Social media is engaging and consistent
• There is an intentional follow up plan in place
• New people are recognized every week
• The Sunday environment is warm and friendly

Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get practical tips delivered right to you. For free resources to help you plant a church thrives, check out practicalplanting.com.

Have questions or want encouragement from other church planters? Join the Practical Church Planting Facebook group.

We all know what it's like to wish we could have done things differently. When it comes to church planting, the mistakes we make can sometimes have big consequences. I (Dylan) have made a lot of mistakes that, and six in particular anyone can learn from. Check out this episode and see if you are doing any of these six things.

Welcome to welcome to episode 192 of Practical Church Planting.

Here are the six things Dylan would have done differently that we discuss in this episode:

• Have smaller runway
• Have clearer next steps (particularly at initial meetings)
• Not focused on big dreams
• Have more confidence in making decisions
• Quicker feedback loops
• Spent more time finding a network/church planting residency

Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get practical tips delivered right to you. For free resources to help you plant a church thrives, check out practicalplanting.com.

Have questions or want encouragement from other church planters? Join the Practical Church Planting Facebook group.

Do you know if your church's website has everything it needs to answer the most pressing questions people have when visiting your site? Are new guests not coming because you don't have the most vitally important information on your homepage?

Here's what we know; if we make it hard for people to find the information they need, we may never see them on a Sunday. In this episode, we share six of the most important and basic things your homepage needs to connect with new guests. Don't miss out on connecting with more people because you are missing any of these six things.

Welcome to welcome to episode 191 of Practical Church Planting.

In this episode, we discuss these six things your church's homepage needs:

• Physical address
• Service times
• Plan a visit
• If you are meeting in person or online due to COVID
• Pictures of people at your church
• Give option on your menu
• Plus a bonus tip!

Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get practical tips delivered right to you.

Have questions or want encouragement from other church planters? Join the Practical Church Planting Facebook group.