What is a GCM Regional Collective?
How do I / we start a Regional Collective?
What does a Regional Collective do at its first meeting?
What is the goal of a Church Multiplication Hub
How ecumenical is the GCM Collective?
Is the GCM Collective a church planting network?
Missional Community, Gospel Community, Small Group... What’s the difference?
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What is a GCM Regional Collective?
A GCM Regional Collective is made up of, minimally, 5 leaders who come from and represent at least three different churches or church plants. It is best if the leaders that form a Regional Collective live within a workable distance from each other, preferably the same city, but at least close enough to effectively accomplish the goal of establishing a Church Multiplication Hub. These leaders have all spent time reading and discussing the GCM Collective Vision and Distinctives document and are in agreement with the same.
The size of a Regional Collective can be as big as you want, but remember, those that make up the Regional Collective are those leaders that have agreed upon the Goals and Distinctives and have pledged to “take ownership” and responsibility to see this happen in their city or region.
While many leaders and churches may participate in the activities, training and practices of the GCM Collective in your city, the leaders that form the Regional Collective are “owners” not passive participants. These leaders will give their time, talents and resources to establish a Church Multiplication Hub in their city or region which includes 6 functional components. See the Vision and Distinctives.
How do I / we start a Regional Collective?
Starting a GCM Regional Collective can happen in several ways. Start by getting online at gcmcollective.org and signing in to the “Community Login” section of our website. (top and right side of home page) This is where the Regional Collectives are formed and stay connected. Go to “Groups” tab and look for “Regional GCM Collectives” then see if a Collective is already formed in your area. Ask to join that group if you are not a part of it already. Then dig around in that group to see how far along the formation of that Regional Collective is and GET INVOLVED; make your self known and attend the next meeting.
If no Regional Collective already exists in your city or region, go to the “Site Group”, scroll down to the “View Group Map” and zoom into your city to see if there are others in your city on the GCM Collective site. Invite these leaders to come together for a first meeting to discuss the formation of a Regional Collective. Also invite anyone you know who would be interested in helping to multiply gospel communities living on mission in your city!
If you already have several relationships with other leaders in your city or region that you know are planting churches via starting gospel communities on mission, (or transitioning their church to this model) then check out the first meeting document and get started as soon as possible! Be sure to get everyone signed up in the Community at the gcmcollective.org website.
What does a Regional Collective do at its first meeting?
At your first meeting you want to do the following things:
- Introduce yourselves and speak about the context God has sent you to.
Some questions to help:
- What is your story of God’s calling on your life?
- What is the story of the neighborhood or part of the city you are working in?
- What are the rhythms of your culture?
- Each leader and church involved in the Regional Collective (name, contact information)
- Number of Missional Communities currently in each church that is involved in the Collective
- Number of years the church has been established
- Size of each church community (members, or those in missional communities)
- What do you hope to get out of the Regional GCM Collective?
- Talk through the GCM Collective Vision and Distinctives document. Perhaps, watch the video of our Director, Caesar Kalinowski, explaining the goals of the Regional Collective.
- Pick regular day/time to meet (we suggest at least monthly)
- Elect a person to be the moderator and main contact for your Collective.
- The moderator will serve the Regional Collective by organizing monthly meetings, setting the agendas, making sure things that are tasked get completed etc., and will serve as the primary contact with the GCM Collective Executive Team.
- Make sure that each participant in the Regional Collective is registered online at gcmcollective.org and joins your group on the site. If you do not have a group on the site yet, contact to set up your group on the site.
- Collect basic information
- Send basic information to
What is the goal of a Church Multiplication Hub
The Regional Collectives exist to establish GCM Church Multiplication Hubs. The goal of the Hub is to see rapid multiplication of Gospel Communities on Mission (GCMs, Missional Communities, etc.) in your city or region. We believe that when the 6 Functional Components of a GCM Church Multiplication Hub are up and running in conjunction with one another, leaders will move from seeing missional community growth by “addition”, and move to rapidly multiplying missional communities. As a reminder, our hope is to see 1 gospel community living on mission per 1000 people in every city.
How ecumenical is the GCM Collective?
The GCM Collective exists to help anyone who is trying to start and multiply gospel-centered communities in their context. The leaders who are participating in Regional Collectives have all agreed with our Vision and Distinctives and are working out the implications of the Gospel in their unique context, together. The GCM Collective has also made our theological, doctrinal understanding available here.
True ecumenism acknowledges and appreciates the diversity of understanding and interpretation of the Bible and the issues surrounding gospel-centrality in all of life, and encourages genuine dialogue to occur within relationship and community. We believe that while we hold to a strong theological “center”, it is necessary to invite leaders who may hold different interpretations into this dialogue with us.
The leaders of each Regional Collective are encouraged to “contend for the faith” and display the humility, love and patience that the gospel of our Lord Jesus implores, as they intensely, passionately, and respectfully listen to and share their heartfelt convictions with one another.
Will my participation in a Regional Collective just take more of my time as a pastor away from my own church? Is this just more busy work?
No, we really think it will save you time and multiply your efforts over the long run. When you look at the benefits of working as a team, across your city, having the 6 functional components up and running and at your disposal to efficiently develop leaders, you quickly realize that your investment as a leader in a Regional Collective is the most efficient way to see the multiplication of disciples in your church and city.
Is the GCM Collective a church planting network?
Yes and No.
In essence, leaders coming together to learn, share and work collectively across a city, region or the world, form a network of relationships. In this sense The GCM Collective is a “network”. A network of Kingdom relationships.
And it is our hope to see the rapid multiplication of gospel communities on mission, leading to our cities being saturated with the gospel. The Church is people and gospel communities are the church. In many cases, as missional communities multiply in a city they come together to form congregations and new “church plants”. This is a model currently being employed by many church planters.
The GCM Collective is not a traditional church planting network or agency in the sense that we do not determine where new churches should start and then send and financially support that planter. We exist to help leaders establish and multiply gospel communities everywhere!
Missional Community, Gospel Community, Small Group... What’s the difference?
Here’s how we see and say this...
A missional community is a gospel community that lives out the mission of God together–making disciples who make disciples–in a specific area and to a particular people group by demonstrating the gospel in tangible forms and declaring the gospel to others – both those who believe it and those who are being exposed to it.
Call them what you like...missional community...gospel community...small group...
If they are gospel centered communities that make disciples, that’s what we’re talking about!
What's the difference between a GCM Regional Collective and just meeting with other churches for a quarterly meeting to see how we can work together?
In our experience, it is rare that a diverse group of pastors getting together in a city have a clearly stated, common goal for reaching their city or region. And it is even more rare to have a proven method and components that are agreed upon with which to do this. The GCM Collective, and the Regional Collectives that make up this movement, have common functional components that they have committed to bringing “online” with the common goal of seeing 1 missional community per 1000 people in their city.