Churches have tried all kinds of ways to attract new and younger members - revised vision statements, hipper worship, contemporary music, livelier sermons, bigger and better auditoriums. But there are still so many people who aren't being reached, who don't want to come to church. And the truth is that attendance at church on Sundays does not necessarily transform lives; God's presence in our hearts is what changes us. Leaders and laypeople everywhere are realizing that they need new and more powerful ways to help them spread God's Word. According to international church starter and pastor Neil Cole, if we want to connect with young people and those who are not coming to church, we must go where people congregate. Cole shows readers how to plant the seeds of the Kingdom of God in the places where life happens and where culture is formed - restaurants, bars, coffeehouses, parks, locker rooms,and neighborhoods.Organic Church offers a hands-on guide for demystifying this new model of church and shows the practical aspects of implementing it.

NEIL COLEis a church starter and pastor, and founder and executive director of Church Multiplication Associates, which has helped start over seven hundred churches in thirty-two states and twenty-three nations in six years. He is an international speaker and the author ofCultivating a Life for God.

About Leadership Network xi

Foreword xiii

Preface xvii

Introduction xxi

Part One: Roots of the Organic Church 1

1. Ride Out with Me! 3

2. Awakening to a New Kind of Church 17

3. The Zombie Bride Lives! 31

4. A Dangerous Question 47

Part Two: The Organic Nature of the Kingdom of God 59

5. Kingdom 101: You Reap What You Sow . . . and You Eat What You Reap 61

6. An Enchanted Kingdom with Magic Seeds, Fast-Growing Trees, and a Beautiful Bride to Rescue 83

7. We All Began as Zygotes 91

Part Three: From the Microscope to the Telescope 107

8. Mapping the DNA of Christs Body 109

9. Epidemic Expansion Starts in the Genes 123

Part Four: The Epidemic Kingdom and How It Spreads 141

10. It Takes Guts to Care for People 143

11. Me and Osama are Close 159

12. The How-To of Spreading the Epidemic 171

Part Five: The Call to Organic Church 193

13. Falling with Style 195

14. Tales That Really Mattered 207

Notes 219

Acknowledgments 225

About the Author 227

Subject Index 229

Scriptural Index 235