G12 Vision
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The G12 vision, also referred to as Groups of 12 or Government of 12, is a structure for church cell groups and church growth. It is based on the idea that each person should mentor and raise up twelve disciples in the Christian faith, and subsequently each disciple would mentor 12 other diciples.
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[edit] History
Cesar Castellanos developed the G12 strategy after visiting the Yoido Full Gospel Church pastored by David Yonggi Cho, who had successfully implemented a cell structure in his church in South Korea. Cesar returned to his church in Colombia with the revelation that God had spoken to him while he was in South Korea, and that God had given him a vision which would increase the size of his church. He subsequently formed his church into groups of 12, while his brother-in-law, Cesar Farjardo, did the same with the youth. From 1991 to 1994 his church grew from 70 to 1,200 members.[1] Between 1994 and 1999 the church grew to 20,000 cells with a regular weekly church celebration of 45,000 people. Soon they lost track of numbers and began to count in cell groups.
In the year 2000 church leaders around the world seeking to increase their church size, travelled to Cesar's church to learn about the G12 vision. Subsequently, in the year 2001, Cesar formed an international group of 12, with leaders from different countries. However by 2005, many of these leaders, including Cesar's Farjardo, left the G12 vision, which had by this time become a movement centrally controlled from Bogota and formed their own adaptations. Many of the original leaders however, have continued branches of the G12 movement following in Cesar's footsteps. One of these individuals is Adam Hoover, located in Tri-Cities, WA as well as Mark Driscoll in Seattle, WA.
[edit] G12 philosophy
The idea of the G12 is to reach out and disciple every member and also hold every member to accountability. The main leader would disciple 12 people, they would instate Christian values, teachings, prayer and ministry on a weekly basis until their disciples were ready to lead their own groups. Each disciple would find 12 new disciples and repeat the same process until there were 144. In theory this process should continue and the church would grow exponentially, without losing the accountabily due to the eventual size of the church.
[edit] G12 methodology
The G12 structure is found in some evangelical, predominantly charismatic churches.
[edit] Ladder of success
This is broken up into 4 parts with the sole aim of leading people to follow Christ and increasing the size of the church.[2]
- Win:- new believers are added to the cell through friendships and by utilising the prayer of 3.
- Consolidate:- after joining the cell, new believers are consolidated in the Christian faith and sent on an encounter.
- Disciple:- once the new believer has experienced an encounter, they are sent to the school of leaders.
- Send:- after about a year of discipleship, new believers are now called leaders and given authority to form their own 12.
[edit] Prayer of 3
This is when three disciples meet once a week and pray for three non-Christians each, nine in total for a period of a month, before inviting the people prayed for to evangelistic events called nets, with the hope that they will follow Christ. The prayer and invitations are continued until those people eventually make a decision for Christ.
[edit] Nets
Nets are crusades run weekly, where non Christians are invited to attend with the hope that Christs' message will touch them, and they will follow Christ.[3]
[edit] Encounters
These are weekend retreats, usually set away from the city in a conference centre.[4] Encounters generally last two-four days where there is basic Christian teaching, prayer and use of common symbolic acts to define the end of the old and beginning of the new.
[edit] School of leaders
This is a nine month course split into three ten week sections, where all the fundamentals of the Christian faith are taught, as well as the principles of the G12 vision.[5] It is usually co-ordinated and run by church members who have attended the school of teachers.
[edit] Homogeneous groups
Men, women, children and married couples are segregated while allocated to cells.[6] The idea is to avoid distracting single men and women with one another; to encourage married couples to become closer; and to help youth to be nurtured with their peers.
[edit] Concerns
Some people have raised concerns about the G12 vision, the way it has been enforced, the division it is causing and its legitimacy.[7][8] In being part of the G12 vision, church leaders have been forced to submit to the head church in Bogota. Since 2005, this has lead to many churches using the same concept as the G12, but changing the name and terminology, and in turn being cut off from the G12 vision directed from Bogota.
The G12 Vision is also criticised for several reasons such as spiritualization of number 12, pragmatism and creating a Catholic style hierachy among Protestants. They have often been criticized for their "cult-like" tactics in recruiting and securing new members. Most of the leading G12 churches in the UK have now left G12, despite Castellanos' warnings that adapting his special vision would lead to death.[citation needed]
[edit] References
- ^ http://www.revivaltimes.org/index.php/215.htm
- ^ http://www.revivaltimes.org/index.php/229.htm
- ^ http://www.revivaltimes.org/index.php/232.htm
- ^ http://www.revivaltimes.org/index.php/304.htm
- ^ http://www.revivaltimes.org/index.php/305.htm
- ^ http://www.revivaltimes.org/index.php/306.htm
- ^ http://members.tripod.com/celycecomiskey/concerns_about_the_g12_movement.htm
- ^ http://www.cellchurchsolutions.com/articles/coaching/concernsG12.htm
