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T4T Training For Trainers: Chapters Thirteen Through Sixteen

January 24, 2012 in Missions, T4T Review with 0 Comments

T4T A Discipleship ReRevolution

T4T: A Discipleship ReRevolution: An Overview by John Lambert

Chapter Thirteen:Your T4T Package: Gospel Presentation

A “bridge” can move a person’ heart to listen, but only the Gospel can save them.  Acts 2:21; 4:12; Romans 10-13-17

What is the Gospel?

The good news that Jesus Christ provided redemption for us and that we can be saved by faith in Him.

Found simply in: Luke 25:45-48, I Cor 15:1-6.

Any presentation of the Gospel must include these core truths and a call for people to respond the the message.

How is it good news to the people you are sent to?

  • Animists: Jesus’ power over the spirits.
  • Buddhists and Hindus: Jesus’ power to break the cycle of rebirth and bring them to heaven.
  • Muslims and Jews: Jesus’ has the ability to break the futile attempt to gain salvation through good works.
  • Post-Moderns: Jesus offers true eternal relevance.  He changes lives.

The Gospel is always the same, never changing.  But the way you share it varies from place to place.   Continue Reading…

T4T Training For Trainers: Chapters Nine Through Twelve

January 16, 2012 in Missions, T4T Review with 0 Comments

T4T A Discipleship ReRevolution

T4T: A Discipleship ReRevolution: An Overview by John Lambert

Chapter 9:  ”Starting New Generations, Not Just Multiplying Groups”

T4T is different than traditional small group multiplication.  Instead of grow THEN multiply, it is launch and repeat.  You don’t wait for a new group to grow before launching new groups out of it.

These new groups become their own house churches or sometimes new small groups under the Lordship of Christ in a larger existing church.

Every new believer is potentially a new group.

The trainee may lead his family and friends to faith and incorporate them into his group.  At the same time, he is training them to be a witness to their circle of influence and launch new groups with them.

People you are training should not bring new believers to the original group but rather start a new group with them.  If they do, you must take steps to get them pointed back in the right direction.  If a new believer comes into the group, you should stay with the original lesson, but also be willing to stay after with the new believer and go through lesson one.

Generations of Groups

The author points out that the goal is get consistent 4th generation groups and for a CPM to emerge.  (How often do we lose sight of this or do not ever have it as something we are aiming for?  I would say more often than not.  This maybe why we don’t yet see CPM emerging in our own contexts though we have trained on it.) Continue Reading…

T4T Training For Trainers: Chapters Five Through Eight

January 6, 2012 in Missions, T4T Review with 0 Comments

T4T A Discipleship ReRevolution

T4T: A Discipleship ReRevolution: An Overview by John Lambert

Chapter 5: “How To Begin”

T4T is a process, not a set of lessons (The author drives this home!)

He says it is often misunderstood as a set of lessons or an outreach, but he says it is meant to cascade as a church planting movement, generation by generation.  Each challenge faced at each new stage in the process is still part of the T4T process.

Many learned that Ying Kai:

  • Had 6 initial lessons
  • Encouraged new believers to witness 5x per week
  • Had frequent training retreats for leaders
  • Used inductive Bible studies after the first initial lessons

But those same folks didn’t understand that T4T is an “all-in-one-process” that God uses to take a person from lostness to maturing disciples who can start new groups and train others to reproduce the process.  They just copied parts and were not successful.

What has T4T done?   Basically it has tied all of the basic parts of a CPM plan together well and enabled believers to naturally progress from one stage to another as they are trained: evangelism, discipleship, church planting, leadership development-repeating the process generation by generation.

Measuring Rod For CPM:  When groups consistently reach 4th generation with new churches formed in several places over a short period of time, then a sustained CPM has emerged. (One trainer, David Watson, says 200 churches in less than two years with at least 4 generations) Continue Reading…

T4T Training For Trainers: Chapters One Through Four

January 4, 2012 in Missions, T4T Review with 0 Comments

T4T A Discipleship ReRevolution

T4T A Discipleship ReRevolution  An Overview by John Lambert

Chapter 1: “Kingdom Come!”

This chapter starts with some impressive stats.  Since its inception in 2001, the CPM initiated by Ying Kai has yielded a conservative number of:

  • 1.7 million baptisms
  • 150,000 new church starts
  • 2,000 new churches started each month in places from high rises to factories

T4T is said to be influencing missions efforts throughout the world.

Steve Smith is introduced as a CPM Trainer and Ying Kai is introduced as the father of T4T.

It is said of T4T that it is about:

  • Cooperating with God to see CPMs
  • The Development of a CPM plan
  • God’s vision for a MOVEMENT
  • Majoring on practical ministry

The question that arises in Chapter One is, “What are Churches”?  Steve says in a footnote,

I will define this more later, but these are Acts 2 type churches that display the basic covenant and characteristics of that Acts 2 community whether they meet in homes or in dedicated buildings. Usually I am implying house churches or church-like small groups of a larger worshiping community.

Ying Kai had an end vision of 200 churches in his CPM plan.  He reached that in three months!  These groups were meeting in homes, parks, and factories.

Based on conservative reporting, researchers found 18 generations in this movement in only 4-5 years. Continue Reading…

T4T Training For Trainers: Background

January 4, 2012 in Missions, T4T Review with 0 Comments

T4T A Discipleship ReRevolution

T4T: A Discipleship ReRevolution:  An Overview by John Lambert

Background

In the world of missions, a new wave of the Spirit of God is moving across nations and people planting churches where there were little to none before.  This phenomenon has been called “Church Planting Movements” or “Church Multiplication Movements.”

In the book T4T: A Discipleship ReRevolution, missionary practitioners Ying Kai and Steve Smith seek to lay out the principles and background involved in one of the most explosive examples of “CPM” in modern history.

This book was born out of a growing hunger for missionary practitioners to understand the movement and how they can prepare themselves in their own contexts for a new move of God’s Spirit by implementing the key principles laid out in the book.

Asian Born

It carefully documents the work of an Asian couple (the Kais) working in an Asian context.  Contrary to some thought, it is not another Western import or new method.

After reading this book, I can confidently say that for the serious missionary practitioner this may be “the most important book you’ve not yet heard of.”

Among the global missionary community and those who have heard the term “CPM” there seems to be a lot of misunderstanding as to what the term really means.  A “CPM” is not a method or a strategy, but simply an observation of the phenomena of rapidly multiplying churches among a people group.   Continue Reading…