(from Friday, July 18 - Mt. Pleasant, SC)
How would you measure success as a church planter? Imagine you are a pastor of a new church and the first week you have 340 people attend your first service...amazing huh?! What if your church got smaller and smaller every week for the next 6 months? How would you respond? Greg Surratt, Senior Pastor of Seacoast Church (ranked now as one of the top 15 most influential churches in America), met with the Catalyst Road Trip team and gave us a behind the scenes glimpse into the early years of their church. "Our first weekend we had 340 people...and we steadily grew from about 340 down to 150 over 6 months. I was so depressed, i wanted to quit...went to our elders, gave them my resignation and told them I'm failure and that it's just not going to work. They wouldn't let me. It was 5 years before we reached an average attendance of what we had our first week. We are the slowest growing mega church in history."
Sitting with Greg is like sitting with your buddy sharing stories and laughing at the twists and turns of life. Greg isn't forcing the church in a certain direction, towards a preconceived end; he is part of a story that surprises him all the time. The humility with which Greg tells his story leaves little wonder as to why the Lord is using him the way He is. Seacoast Church and their 13 satellite campuses have become a model for other churhces around the country trying to embrace the multi-site strategy. Yet, the only reason Seacoat started a multi-site campus was because their request to build another building on their property was denied. Blazing a trial for the multi-ste church strategy was not intentional - it simply brithed out of their faithfulness to follow the Lord one step at a time.
Their staff took great care of us...hopefully we will have a chance to come back on a weekend and join them for worship. Huge thanks to Joan and Pastor Greg for making us feel at home. Don't tell them we told you, but if you are ever in town and need a place to crash, make sure to look up Hotel Seacoast! They have proven that they will take ANYBODY! :) Thanks again to the team at Seacoast Church!
LV
on behalf of the Catalyst Road Trip Team
I have a BS in Nursing from Texas Christian University. I spent the first 4 of my 10 years as a Nurse in the U.S. Army. My specialty is Labor & Delivery and I spent my last couple of years in Nursing as a Nurse Manager. I am now a Stay Home Mom to 3 beautiful children and I have an Awesome husband, David. We love Catalyst because our heart is for the mentorship and training of leaders. I am super-excited to be attending the Catalyst Conference for the first time this year!!
