Inside Church Planting Movements: What 25 Years of Assessments Reveal        

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Leader’s Edge: Missions & Ministry

Inside Church Planting Movements: What 25 Years of Assessments Reveal

By: David Garrison

WIGTake Resources, 2026 

216 Pages 

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Summary

The book addresses the following questions: “Are church planting movements real? If so, how do we know? How do we know when church multiplication has occurred? Can we trust what has been reported? And if not, why not? How can we know the quality as well as the quantity of the work being reported? Can we really discern the truth from potential deception?” (pp. 11-12). To find answers for these questions, the author drew from several sources, chief of which is the Southern Baptist International Mission Board (IMB) research on 28 onsite investigations into reported church planting movements in Asia, Africa, Europe, and the Americas. The assessments yielded three categories of findings: church planting movements, non-church planting movements, and something in between. Moreover, the book presents three lessons as a result of the church planting assessments:  1. Not being afraid to ask questions; 2. What is discovered is rarely binary in nature; and 3. Movements and assessments make sense considering the shared goal of making disciples of all nations. 

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