Norway: Keys for multiplication of simple churches
What are the keys for multiplication in a Western context? Erling Thu, from Kristent Nettverk, shares how their network grew to more than 20 localities. One key for multiplication was just obeying the voice of the Holy Spirit. Besides this, purposely sending out people and finding the person of peace led to the planting of a lot of churches. To further facilitate multiplication, an apostolic team of twelve people regularly comes together to hear from God, encourage each other and strategize to plant new churches in the nation. Read on to learn more.
How did Kristent Nettverk start?
“In my early years I was part of a Pentecostal church. A few people came to Christ and attended our meetings. Unfortunately they didn’t have strong relationships and community life to help them grow in their daily walk with Jesus. During this time I got connected to a few house church people from the UK. I learned a lot from them about the ministry gifts and house church and decided to start a house fellowship. In 1981 we started working together with Noralv Askeland to purposely plant new churches across Norway. Out of relationship and sharing our hearts with people, new groups came into being. Kristent Nettverk was born. Right now there are simple church groups in more than 20 localities in Norway.”
How did the network grow to so many localities?
“In many different ways. Often God would give us prophetic words. For example, He gave me a word to go to the northern part of Norway: “You will find some friends there.” I went in obedience and looked for a ‘person of peace’, just like Jesus taught his disciples in Luke 10. I found someone God had already prepared to receive the gospel, and a new work started right there. We also purposely send out people. One day we received the prophetic word: “Go to Tromsö.” So we obeyed and sent out four families. They pioneered a network of small churches with 70 adults and many children. Our network also grew through conferences we organized. People from all over Norway attended these meetings and invited us to come over to help them start new churches. We have an apostolic team in place that helps foster the growth.”
How does this apostolic team function?
“Our apostolic team is a group of twelve friends that serve the simple church networks across the country. We come together every two months to pray, study the Word, share testimonies, strategize to plant new churches in new places, and train and release new leaders. There is a large sense of unity as we work together to see a grass root movement of disciples making disciples across Norway. The team came into existence through relationships we formed over the years. We recognized the grace of God in one another and started working together. One is more apostolic, the other more prophetic, and there are pastors, evangelists and teachers. All the five-fold ministry gifts are present in the team.”
What is your strategy for reaching non-believers?
“We had a time when we focused a lot on developing relationships with non-believers. But not many people came to Christ. One day, God spoke to us and said: “Relational living is not the power to salvation; the gospel is the power to salvation.” From then on our emphasis changed and we decided to focus more on sharing the gospel. Right now we encourage everyone to share the gospel with one new person each week. We teach people to listen and see in the Spirit and in the natural at the same time. From this place of sensitivity to the Holy Spirit they we look for opportunities to share the gospel. We call it: Spirit-led evangelism. Doing evangelism like this is relaxed. No striving or legalism, just listening and acting on what the Holy Spirit shows. Some of our people go out to do ‘treasure hunting’. They ask God for information about people they will meet on the street and God will speak to them about for instance a blue shirt, white hair or a dog. This is very powerful. They also pray for the sick and many people are being healed and come to Christ.”
Could you share few stories about this ‘treasure hunting’ and healing the sick?
“Sure. There was a lady attending one of our meetings. In that meeting the evangelist in our team saw a vision of half a clothes hanger. Afterwards he told her about the strange vision: “It is strange, but I saw half a hanger, and all the clothes were falling of. You need Jesus to make the hanger whole.” She broke down and wept. She just had told her sister: “My life is like half a hanger, my life is falling apart.” Right there, she gave her life to Christ.
Another young lady worked in a cafeteria in a hospital. She started to talk to a man who looked very sad. He told her that his granddaughter was very ill and that he was afraid she might die. She shared her own testimony about her healing and salvation. Then she offered to pray for the grandchild, which he allowed. Ten minutes after the prayer, the man received a message from the hospital. There was a dramatic change in his granddaughter’s health situation! She was recovering very quickly. The man gave his life to Christ.”
Source: Erling Thu, Kristent Nettverk
J Fokker