Ministry and Business

There is a growing list of entrepreneurs who have found their niche, not in launching new businesses but in launching new churches. It sounds strange and it probably is. But in a day and time when faith is becoming such a prominent part of our lives, this trend towards church planting by innovative, business-minded entrepreneurs is going to continue upward. With so many launching churches unlike a church has been launched before, it is difficult to ascertain consistencies in their strategy. Imagine for a moment, Google, Microsoft, Goldman Sachs, and Circuit City all launching at the same time. Those are the kinds of dynamics being experienced in church planting today as kingdompreneurs (entrepreneurs with a slant towards faith and business merging) tip the scales on the landscape of the US.

Twenty-five years ago, churches like Saddleback Church and Willow Creek Church did not exist. Today they are regarded as the most influential churches in the country. Led by Rick Warren and Bill Hybels, these two churches have become the gold standard of ministry. With their commitment to change and transformation, Saddleback and Willow Creek have gone from zero to over thirty thousand members each since 1980.

In that same time, Microsoft and Dell arrived on the scene and swept the technological landscape with their approach to software and hardware deployment. Today Bill Gates is the richest man in the world. Michael Dell is not far behind having started Dell in his college dorm room at the University of Texas-Austin.

The growth and principles behind these four organizations could not be more similar. With an approach to simplicity and leveraging new technology, Microsoft and Dell grew consistently and exponentially until become two of the largest companies in the world based on sales. In the same way, Saddleback and Willow Creek's leadership focused on people and leveraging the ability to meet their needs to grow dynamic congregations.

While Microsoft, Dell, Saddleback, and Willow Creek have accomplished tremendous things over the last quarter-century, a shift has taken place in the marketplace and is beginning to do so in ministry as new companies are springing up and accomplishing in weeks what it took Microsoft and Dell to do in years. Google and FaceBook are companies of the new order who have swept market space up in chunks as their technologies swallowed their competition.

Churches like Northpoint in Atlanta and Fellowship in Dallas are examples of the new face of ministry. Moving from a single campus to multiple campuses in different cities has pushed the envelope for what a church can accomplish in this century. This tectonic shift is not by accident. It is based on a leadership team and senior leader who are as business-minded as he is, ministry-focused. Andy Stanley at Northpoint and Ed Young at Fellowship lead these dynamic churches who are as innovative and market-savvy as any company in Silicon Valley.

With entrepreneurs who are looking to plant churches, marrying the lessons learned from both the marketplace and ministry together, churches are becoming credible institutions of impact, as opposed to houses of worship focused on Sunday mornings and Wednesday nights. When Ed Young started Fellowship Church almost ten years ago, he was looking to do church that connected with people like the ones he attended college with at Florida State University. When Ed Young looked out at the landscape of churches what he saw was good but certainly failed to connect with his generation of men and women. Beyond Sunday mornings and the five campuses that Fellowship has, they also launched a software company, aptly named, Fellowship One.

With all of these giants in ministry, there is no one who has redefined ministry like Bishop TD Jakes. As pastor of the 30,000 member Potter's House Church in Dallas, Bishop Jakes has married ministry and the marketplace to extreme lengths. Beyond his Sunday pulpit, Jakes oversees a media company, a music label and somehow finds time to be the executive over a community development corporation that is using four hundred acres of land to build Capella Park, an urban redevelopment that will include 1,200 residential homes, condos and retail space, a community center as well as a college preparatory academy named Clay Academy that opened its doors last fall.

With Bill Gates focusing on his foundation and relinquishing day-to-day operations of Microsoft to longtime associate Steve Ballmer and Rick Warren focusing on his P.E.A.C.E. Plan, the similarities between CEOs of companies and Pastors of churches are undeniable. With our world changing continuously, this should not be a surprise.

Jesus told His disciples, He had to be about His Father's business.