PresbyGrow

One of the significant issues in the failure of new church development centers on the selection of the Organizing Pastor. This is a critical decision that those tasked with hiring the Organizing Pastor often don’t know what skills and talents this specialized role should have and often end up calling a person who is not a capable church planter. This is a common misstep but a critical one.

So, a few years ago the PCUSA, along with some of our ecumenical partners, we began working with the Gallup organization to develop a simple but effective online tool to help determine if a person being considered for new church development work has the necessary gifts and skills to be an effective church planter.

The tool was launched last year and by our measure seems to be a very effective tool. The Office of Church Growth wants to make sure that you have access to this very useful tool. If you are on a Presbytery or church team that will be looking for an Organizing Pastor or are a Pastor who thinks he/she might be a church planter, this tool is a great way to begin your search.

The cost is $50 per use and is a very cost effective way to evaluate those Pastors you might want to interview.

We suggest that you use this tool BEFORE setting up any interview or face to face conversation and that you use this toll will all the applicants you are considering interviewing in order to have the capacity to evaluate them based on a common criteria.

For those who will be using this tool, we will be scheduling some training on how to interpret the results.

To start using this, please email Sherry Britton or you can contact her if you have any questions.