Program
Doctor of Ministry
Year Approved
2016
First Advisor
Reed, Don
Abstract
This study is a qualitative study of the Prescott Foursquare Church and its transformation from a small, broken denominational church to a disciple making and church planting fellowship of churches. The project sought to discover the key trigger events or processes that brought about church growth in the Prescott church and led to the growth of a fellowship of over twenty-two hundred churches in one hundred and sixteen countries. The result of interviews of pastors and review of historical data of the church and Christian Fellowship Ministries was the discovery of a discipleship culture in the local congregation in Prescott and the churches planted out of that ministry. Three primary elements of development of the Prescott ministry were evangelism for a crisis conversion of new souls, empowered discipleship, and focused church planting. The culture of discipleship involves the members of the congregation sincerely seeking the good of others. It means helping others to find their destiny and place in the kingdom of God. Transformation by the work of the Holy Spirit occurred when disciples were involved in real ministry. Disciples are made in the going. This was important to the Christian Fellowship Ministries worldwide growth. Discipleship is viewed as an impartation and not mere information. The most important crucible of discipleship discovered by the Christian Fellowship Ministries was the dignity God gives to the local church. Within the local church are the personnel, the resources and means of accomplishing the tasks God desires. The local congregation is able to transcend smallness to reach out in world evangelism and church planting. When the local church is aligned to the will of God in evangelism for crisis conversion, empowered discipleship and focused church planting God provides the resources for accomplishing God’s his purposes.
Degree Name
Doctor of Ministry
Document Type
Doctoral thesis
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.
Recommended Citation
Gooding, J. W. (2016). Transformation of the Prescott Foursquare Church: Becoming a Church Planting Church [Doctoral thesis, Bethel University]. Spark Repository. https://spark.bethel.edu/etd/239