The Gathering Network

From the First Century to Our Own

Imagine Jerusalem, Antioch, or Ephesus in the first century. Small gatherings of believers meet in homes—sharing meals, taking the Lord’s Supper, reading the apostles’ letters, praying, and strengthening one another to obey Jesus despite opposition. The gospel spreads through ordinary disciples as they lead their households, share Christ in their networks, disciple new believers, and form new churches from city to city and region to region. There are no programs, large buildings, or celebrity teachers—only the Word, prayer, the Spirit, fellowship, and an expanding web of disciples, leaders, and churches living under Jesus’s reign.

You can participate in that same way today. The Gathering Network exists to help church leaders recover the simple, multiplying pattern Jesus gave his apostles—proclaiming the gospel, forming communities, raising up leaders, and strengthening churches through the Word, prayer, fellowship, and the Spirit’s power. We translate that apostolic approach (AD 30–95) into a clear, modern pathway for today’s homes, neighborhoods, cities, and regions. When believers walk this path together, disciples mature, leaders multiply, and churches reproduce with clarity, simplicity, and Spirit-given power.

Welcome to The Gathering Network

We are pastors, church planters, and Christian leaders committed to seeing the gospel advance as believers start, strengthen, and multiply churches. Whether you’re leading a congregation, preparing to plant a church, or taking early steps toward discipling others, we want to come alongside you with encouragement, training, and practical, biblical resources. Our prayer is that the churches we serve will grow in faith, love, and joyful obedience to Jesus—so that the gospel spreads to the ends of the earth.

Our Vision

We exist to start, strengthen, and multiply churches by building up the body of Christ in four key contexts: in homes, in cities, in regions, and throughout the world. The apostles utilized those four categories to advance the gospel, and we believe they remain essential for the church’s mission today.

Our Mission

Jesus gave his church one mission: to make disciples of all nations (Matt. 28:18–20; Acts 1:8). We pursue this mission by:

• Gathering regularly in homes to take the Lord’s Supper, study God’s Word, pray, and minister to one another in love.

• Training believers to evangelize unbelievers, disciple believers, and raise up new leaders within their personal networks—family, friends, neighbors, and co-workers.

As disciples multiply and leaders are developed, new churches form and spread for the glory of Jesus.

Get Connected

This website is designed to serve you—whether you’re looking for a biblical approach to ministry, fresh tools, or a network of like-minded leaders. Contact us for more information. Ask a question, start a conversation, or explore joining the network. We’d love to hear from you.

On the home page, you will find information about:

Start Here

• Why We Exist: Enduring Challenges of the Church and the Way of Jesus and His Apostles: An overview of the enduring challenges facing the church and the biblical pattern we are recovering.

• Our Approach to Making Disciples: A summary of the disciple-making pathway and how each part works together.

• The Path to God: Our Approach to Sharing the Christian Message: A simple way to explain the gospel clearly, relationally, and biblically to anyone.

• The Discipleship Series: Our Core Curriculum: Step-by-step lessons that help believers grow and quickly begin teaching others.

• How to Start and Lead a Gathering: A practical guide for launching and leading a simple, biblical gathering in a home.

• Frequently Asked Questions: Straightforward answers to common questions about gatherings, discipleship, and leadership.

Go Deeper

Network Leadership Documents

• Our Network Design: How Everything Fits Together: A holistic description of our approach to starting, strengthening, and multiplying churches.

• Vision: Starting, Strengthening, & Multiplying Churches: Our desire for the future: to the fill neighborhoods, cities, regions, and the world with churches.

• Mission: Make Disciples of All Nations: Jesus’s Great Commission expressed in practical, relational, reproducible terms.

• Core Values and Purposes: The core convictions that unite our network and guide our decisions.

• Strategy: The Apostolic Cycle: The simple pattern of evangelism, discipleship, and leadership development seen throughout Acts.

• The Message: The Apostles’ Missionary Proclamation to Non-Christians: A clear summary of how the apostles proclaimed the gospel to unbelievers.

• Sound Doctrine: The Teaching of the Church for Christians: The essential truths believers must know, live, and pass on to others.

• Gathering in Homes: The Weekly Assembly of the Church: A biblical picture of how early Christians met, shared meals, and encouraged one another.

• Apostolic Alignment: Our Underlying Goal: How we keep all our work aligned with Scripture, the Spirit, and the mission of Christ.

• Core Concepts: Our Unifying Vocabulary: The shared vocabulary that unifies our teaching, tools, and training.

• The Gospel: Jesus Died and Rose from the Dead to Save Sinners: A deeper look at the gospel we proclaim and its implications for life and mission.

• Apostolic Implementation: How the First Churches Started, Strengthened, and Multiplied (AD 30–95): A biblical and historical overview of how the first churches started, strengthened, and multiplied.

• Church Planting Movements: Advancing the Gospel to the Ends of the Earth: Insights into how the gospel spreads through simple, reproducible patterns of ministry.

Our Leadership Development Process

• The Path of Church Leaders: The stages of development that prepare men to lead with character, clarity, and skill.

Resources for Training, Coaching, and Evaluation

• Evangelism Training: Practical tools that help believers share the gospel naturally and confidently.

• Discipleship Training: Training that equips believers to help others grow in faith and obedience.

• Leadership Training: Resources for developing teachers, shepherds, planters, and network leaders.

• Individual Coaching and Prayer: One-to-one support that strengthens personal growth, obedience, and fruitfulness.

• Group Coaching and Prayer: A relational environment where leaders learn, pray, and grow together.

• Evaluation: Frameworks for evaluating faithfulness in ministry.

All Network Documents

• All Network Documents: A complete library of our discipleship, leadership, and church-multiplication resources.

We would be honored to partner with you in advancing the gospel—the good news that Jesus died and God raised him from the dead to save sinners. In obedience to Jesus’s Great Commission, this is the message we must take to our neighborhoods and to the nations.