CCM:City South

"CCM:CitySouth is beginning to come to life"

The challenge of bringing the good news of the kingdom of God to a great city like Manchester has lived with me for more years than I'd care to remember. Manchester is a city with great diversity and complexity. The dream we had all those years ago is being amazingly worked out by a growing number of churches from many backgrounds in many different ways across Manchester.

Twenty years ago God gave us a vision to plant churches into the different communities of Greater Manchester (Hyperlocal). These churches were to be webbed together (Multisite) giving them much greater impact and profile across the city in a way they could never achieve on their own.

In January of this year I found myself sitting with a group of friends in the basement of a cafe/bar in Withington (South Manchester) dreaming about what a new church could look like in this community. It had all the energy, laughter and intentionality that captivated each of the previous plants. CCM:CitySouth is beginning to come to life.

A mile up the road, as you travel towards the center of Manchester in Fallowfield, CCM:City is gathering pace. After having started in September 2009 in a vodka bar with a small group of motivated people and a few ridiculous ideas we have seen some success. After a year in the vodka bar CCM:City moved to a theological training college where it is has gathered momentum. We have seen around 80 first time visitors since September 2011 and a number of them wanting a morning meeting. CCM:CitySouth is looking to fulfill this need as it also serves the local community.

If you want to follow our progress then check out on the CCM:CitySouth Facebook page as well as following Christ Church Manchester and me on twitter.

The rip effect

"Sending people out in small pioneer teams can help minimise this as fewer relationships are affected."

“The rip affect” is my way of describing what has happened to a number of churches around the country that have been involved in church planting. Some churches have planted out 3 or 4 times and then stalled in their own growth often for many years.

In my opinion this is mainly due to those people, who have stayed with the sending church, needing to recover from the loss of their friends who moved on to new church plants.

This is sometimes due to confusion with the strategy of trying to build a resource base before you send people out. This can happen because two philosophies are being operated simultaneously. One is where we spend the first few years building people together into a community, and then when we have achieved this you “relationally rip” that community apart by sending a number of people out. 

Sending people out in small pioneer teams can help minimise this as fewer relationships are affected. Also, effectively communicating the church planting vision encourages people to build relationships with those they will be planting with in the longer term.