Focus on Reproduction, Mentor's Guide, MG12

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F O C U S O N R E P R O D U C T I O N

share the Gospel across the barriers of culture, class, race, and language, and gender?

2. Review again together the PLANT model of church planting. Why does such a rendering of church planting help us as we begin to seriously prepare to evangelize in urban neighborhoods unreached with the Gospel. 3. Describe the biblical concept of oikos. What is the biblical distinction between the term patria as it relates to the biblical idea of oikos? 4. How does the association of oikos with the concept of the “family of God” help us better understand how important this concept is to Christian discipleship? 5. In looking throughout Acts and the NT, what insights do we glean about the nature of oikos and the spread and development of the Kingdom in the early church’s experience? List out five key insights you get from observing the many times the term oikos is used in conjunction with evangelism and church planting in the NT. 6. How was Christian discipleship and body life lived out in the actual structure of many of the household churches spoken of in the NT? How does their experience give us insight into the kinds of relationships early Christians experienced in the context of their oikos ? 7. What kind of conclusions can we draw about the nature of evangelism and church planting from looking at the biblical data about the oikos and its role in the early church? To what extent are these conclusions valid for us as we begin to think seriously about how we might begin to target and penetrate urban communities with the Gospel today? The rationale for more churches is that every person in an area will have an opportunity to hear and know the Gospel, and receive or reject Jesus Christ as their personal Savior through the witness of a reproducing church. God’s number one chosen instrument to proclaim the Good News continues to be the Church. God’s plan to reach the world continues through his Church. Note the spread of the Good News through new churches in the Book of Acts. How many places can we suggest new churches were started from the Jerusalem and Antioch churches and listed in the Book of Acts according to the context and later references?

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