- Soon they began to start doing evangelism and gathering disciples into groups.
- They met in homes during the week, not on Sundays. We didn’t want them to meet in competition with the traditional church. They didn’t do marriages, communion or baptisms. Their primary role was to disciple people.
- We taught our workers how to run inductive bible studies rather than just preach at people.
- We placed a big emphasis on training. Traditionally training in the region is in a lecture or preaching format. We made our training “hands on”, relevant, interactive and fun!
- The emphasis has been ‘release’ rather than ‘control’. We created local groups of leaders (mature people from existing churches) to serve the new groups.
- We have used very simple training materials.
- Not only are the congregants expected to mentor 12 disciples--newcomers to the church--but they must also encourage the disciples themselves to become leaders.
- leaders have to follow four steps:
- Win new adherents
- Strengthen the adherents' Christian beliefs
- Take them on as disciples
- Send them off to replicate the process
- To complete the nine-month program called "The Ladder of Success." Each leader meets with his "cell" (often in his home) apart from larger Sunday services. Disciples learn fundamental Christian doctrines as well as techniques for problem-solving, teamwork and leadership.