"He turned the desert into pools of water and the parched ground into flowing springs; there he brought the hungry to live, and they founded a city where they could settle. They sowed fields and planted vineyards that yielded a fruitful harvest," Psalm 107:35-37 NIV

What is a Simple Faith Community

A simple faith community is a church at its most basic level: a group of people committed to Jesus and to each other who gather regularly for teaching, mutual edification, worship, prayer, and cooperatively engaging in God’s mission to the world (Acts 2:42). Simple faith communities are fully functioning “grass-roots” churches that can meet in any location and at any time, with or without seminary trained or professional ‘clergy’ in each body. Simple faith communities exist to take the ministry of the church beyond sacred places and times and into the places where people live, work, and play. As Ed Stetzer has stated, "When the church lives out its mission, it will be founded on the Gospel, evidence true discipleship, positively impact society, and become the body of Christ in whatever cultural context it develops." What is Missional - A Short Answer "Jesus told us to go into all the world and be his ambassadors, but many churches today have inadvertently changed the "go and be" command to a "come and see" appeal. We have grown attached to buildings, programs, staff and a wide variety of goods and services designed to attract and entertain people. "Missional is a helpful term used to describe what happens when you and I replace the "come to us" invitations with a "go to them" life. A life where "the way of Jesus" informs and radically transforms our existence to one wholly focused on sacrificially living for him and others and where we adopt a missionary stance in relation to our culture. It speaks of the very nature of the Jesus follower." Rick Meigs

Leadership and Accountability

The only way to realize the potential impact simple faith communities is to think beyond planting individual churches to establishing a strategic fellowship of simple faith communities. Thus, while each simple faith community exercises autonomy in unique decisions relating to that specific body, they are not fully independent but are operationally and missionally connected to one another in the form of The River. Each simple faith community is subject to the counsel and accountability of an area missionary and/or the lead church planting missionary of The River. The majority of leadership needs for individual simple faith communities will be met by mature members exercising their gifts within that body, under the pastoral direction of the Community Shepherd and the Church Planting Missionary. The River will maintain close ties with Life Baptist Church and other partnering churches for the purposes of godly counsel, accountability, and strategic partnership.