The NewThing Network

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An Attender's Look at The Hitchhiker's Guide to Multi-Site

Written by Jim Egli

16 members of the Vineyard Church (Urbana, IL) set out at 5:30am on Saturday, June 7, to take in Community Christian Church’s (COMMUNITY) “Hitchhiker’s Guide to Multi-Site,” an experience designed to help churches discover what a multi-site church looks like on a typical weekend. As we entered their leadership meeting (called Leadership Community), we were greeted with loud music and an environment that was more like an edgy service rather than a leadership team meeting.” 

After 15 minutes of worship, Eric Bramlett (Creative Arts Director at COMMUNITY) —after making some Cubs/White Sox jokes—started the meeting by introducing new leaders. This was done very enthusiastically. There was lots of laughing, shouting, and clapping. As the new small group interns, small group leaders, and ministry leaders stood up and were introduced, the band played and people went “ape crazy” to welcome them. It was a lot of fun.

Besides putting the names of new leaders on the screen, they also asked unnamed new leaders to stand up. They then sang a crazy, wild rock and roll song to welcome the new leaders.  Basically, you sensed that they wanted their leadership meeting to be a fun, crazy time and they did a wonderful job of pulling this off.

After the large group time, their leaders broke up into campus teams for the final portion of the morning. While their teams were meeting, those of us there for the Hitchhiker’s event, moved upstairs for a Staff Q&A.  You can download a copy of the Q&A session notes here.

Later that afternoon we had the opportunity to tour the Naperville-Yellow Box Campus. The building tour was very instructive. Here are a few key things I learned:

1. There are junior high small groups meeting on their campus during each of their four weekend services.
   
2. There are no high school services at any of the weekend services. Instead they encourage high schoolers to contribute by serving in kids, or junior high or other weekend ministries. (They use the word “contribute” a lot. It is one of their three C’s—Celebrate, Connect, Contribute.) High schoolers have their own small groups in neighborhoods similar to the adults.
   
3. There are also Wednesday evening ministries for the junior high and high schoolers at their campus.
   
4. The four “Experience” service times offered at the Yellow Box are Saturday at 5:00pm and 6:30pm and Sundays at 9:30am and 11:00am. During the 11:00 service there is also an “Icon” service offered in their theater. That venue seats 230 people and the service runs about 70 adults. The Icon service is more contemplative and has some more ‘traditional’ elements such as responsive readings. It draws people from more liturgical backgrounds that may connect with things from their childhood church experiences.
5. Their office arrangement is a very open design. Almost all their staff, including the senior pastor, are in one very large room with different clusters of desks according to various teams. They said that they have found this fosters a lot of collaboration and is very effective for productivity. When we were there the one person at their desk in corner of this large room was the senior pastor. His desk was no different than anyone else’s though it was one of the desks near the large outside wall of windows.
   
6. Their building was built in two phases. The first portion was erected in 2001 and the second portion was completed in 2007.
   
7. Their main service called “Experience” is held in an attractive “Gymnatorium” which seats up to 750 people.
   

Sunday Morning Naperville Downtown Site Visit

After a hearty breakfast at the Country Inn & Suites we checked out and got back to the Naperville - Yellow Box at 7:30am. We split into two groups there. I put some of our team in both groups so that we could see as many sites as possible. I went with the group that visited the Naperville Downtown and Montgomery Campuses.

The vision of the Naperville - Downtown site is to be a presence in downtown Naperville. However, they are still working hard to get a downtown site. Right now they are meeting at Naperville North High School.  We watched their set up process and several of their team spoke to us and answered our questions. Here are some helpful things I learned:

1. They use Portable Church systems which provides resources for church plants and other churches that must set up everything from scratch every week—backdrops, tables, sound systems, partitions, etc. An entire portable system could cost in the neighborhood of $90,000.
   
2. The Naperville Downtown site is just five minutes from the Yellow Box site. It was started to draw people away from the 11:00am service at the Yellow Box. It currently has one service at 10:10. The school auditorium that they use can seat 800 people. They curtain off the back so that it seems the right size for their crowd that averages 270 people.
   
3. They used to rent some of the upstairs high school class rooms, but found that it was better to create classroom space using tents and fences in the common area that they were already paying for that space. This made their kids area more accessible and also saves them about $17,000 a year in rent.
   
4. Bill Carroll, the Campus Arts Director for the downtown site and overall Arts Champion, told us that when they are launching a new site they put the new site pastor on full-time staff nine months previous to the launch and then bring on the half-time worship and children’s pastors six months before the launch.  He works with the new worship pastor intensely for four months before and following the launch.
   
5. The Campus Arts Directors used to plan their worship set together and all use the same songs. They did this for years and only stopped less than a year ago. Each site now determines its own set. They have four worship teams that rotate at the downtown site. The worship team the morning we were there was a high school team that sounded great and actually seemed to be using more Vineyard type music than the Yellow Box—by which I mean more God-directed worship songs.
   
6. There is a very strong emphasis on raising up new leaders throughout COMMUNITY.  We heard this repeatedly throughout the weekend. Words like “reproduce” and “reproducible” were used continually. It permeates their culture.
   

Montgomery Campus 9:30am Sunday Morning Service

The Montgomery Campus is the only location in a traditional church building. On Saturday evening this site has in-person teaching from one of the teaching staff. On Sunday morning, however, the two services at 9:30 and 11:00 are done using a videocast of the Saturday evening teaching given at the Yellow Box.

The sanctuary seats 200. There was just a handful of people there when the service started but when things were under way I counted 67. (The 11:00 service is most likely considerably larger.) The crowd was a mix of ages, overall not as young as that of the Yellow Box. It was almost all white but there was a little color there.

The Culture of CCC

The leadership of CCC has done a fantastic job of infusing a consistent culture throughout their church. It did not matter who you were talking to—pastors, staff, or contributors—or what site you were at, the same values and terms were expressed over and over again. Here are some that stood out to me:

1. "Helping people find their way back to God.” This phrase was expressed repeatedly. It is the mission of the church and everyone knows it. Methodology was all just a means to this end.
2. Reproducible – people consistently talked about reproducing leadership and keeping methods and technology simple so that things could be easily reproduced across campuses.
   
3. The 3C's– “Celebrate, Connect, Contribute” are repeated emphasized in all their literature and their language. They want people not only coming to worship, but connecting in small groups and contributing. Besides involving adults, they proactively engage teens and even children in ministry roles. The three C’s are what make up their circular logo. They want to create 3C Christ-Followers.
   
4. Small groups are highly valued. All staff are encouraged to lead one. Small group leading and coaching are seen as the primary channels for developing leaders for new campuses and new churches.
   
5. Fun – The church has an upbeat, positive, fun atmosphere.
   

My Take Away

The weekend was extremely valuable and our team had a wonderful time! I learned a LOT about how multi-site actually works. Here are some key conclusions.

1. Multi-site does not mean adding other sites by simply recording your message on video and sending it out to some other locations. It is an entire reproduction mindset that means mobilizing leaders and teams in new communities to reach an expanding number of people. I know you may be thinking, “Duh! Of course, Jim!” But really, this is an entirely different and exciting mindset that means expanding the kingdom and reproducing leaders and disciples in exponential ways. It is not so much an add on to what a church is doing but a new way of thinking and working.
   
2. Multi-site is one of the best ways to reproduce healthy growth in a cost effective way—the most bang for the buck when it comes to time, energy, leadership, and money. At the same time it is costly. CCC wants to start new campuses strong so they give them energy, paid staff, equipment, and advertising. Launching a new location in the Chicago area might cost from $150,000 to $250,000. That might be different here in rural Illinois but it is not necessarily cheaper than church planting.
3. Multi-site complements and does not replace church planting. As Happy—our senior pastor—has said, we need to do both.
   
4. We need to clarify our vision and develop an overall strategy. Part of this should be sending a team to the Multi-site Practicum in Atlanta, GA, November 3-4 of this year!