Vision
Passionately pursuing God’s calling for our unified church family.
What is Vision2025?
At Canaan, we have been praying for genuine revival. Revival is when God does a special work in the hearts and lives of His people—filling them with His Spirit. God brings us to repentance, giving us a boldness in telling others about Him, and provides us with a deep, passionate love for God and people. What would it look like at Canaan as we experience genuine revival?
Vision2025 is what we believe God desires Canaan to look like as we passionately pursue God’s calling for our unified church family.
The groups and organizations below are part of Canaan's outreach to share the Gospel and the love of Christ with our community.
Vision Goals
Bringing the Gospel to every home in the 63129, 63128, 63010 zip codes
LOSTNESS IN OUR COMMUNITY
We have a spiritual lostness problem in our St. Louis community. According to leading missiologists, 81% of St. Louis — our friends, neighbors, and coworkers—does not attend church regularly (including Catholicism). In the Midwest, there is only one Southern Baptist church for every 12,431 people.
STRATEGIC ACTIONS
Create and implement outreach team
Implement Saturate St. LouiS
Mobilize strategic off-campus Connection Groups
Mobilize Canaan body to launch new strategic campuses in these zip codes
Increase our St. Louis membership to 2,000 by having 7,700 Gospel conversations over the next 5 years
ST. LOUIS NEEDS THE GOSPEL
Research by Lifeway found that, on average, it takes seven Gospel conversations with one person before they trust in Christ as Lord. Although we know God is sovereign and can save anyone with just one conversation, we can conclude that we can’t talk about Jesus too much! 63.5% of Arnold and 48.5% of Oakville claim no religious affiliation.
STRATEGIC ACTIONS
Conduct training on understanding and sharing the Gospel
Emphasize and encourage relational evangelism
Track regular prayer and Gospel conversations through Connection Groups (with a goal of 25 per week)
Publicly share testimonies and victories
Effectively train all of our adults and teens to accomplish their individual covenantal commitments
EQUIPPING YOU FOR THE MINISTRY
The biblically-mandated job description for pastors and leaders is “to equip the saints for the work of the ministry.” (Eph. 4:11-12) This goal is about equipping you with the training, coaching, encouragement, and confidence you need to be able to walk in the Spirit and live out your individual covenantal commitments.
STRATEGIC ACTIONS
Launch ongoing training for each commitment as regularly scheduled programming
Develop, launch and continue digitally-based training for each commitment
Establish a team to implement, oversee, and evaluate this process making any adjustments as necessary
Track progress as training is completed
See a 40% increase in reaching, baptizing, and discipling 12-17 year olds
REDEEMING THE NEXT GENERATION
There are more than 25 million students between the ages of 12 and 17 in the U.S. If current trends continue, we will lose an entire generation of young people. From 2000 to 2018, there was a 38% average annual baptism decline in the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) in 12-17 year olds. We must be intentional about reaching the next generation for Christ and sending them on mission.
STRATEGIC ACTIONS
Equip every parent for discipling their students in the home
Set up and implement a prayer and fasting ministry for the students
Ensure every student goes through the training for their individual covenantal commitments
Implement a process through which every student is placed in a roll of service in accordance with their S.H.A.P.E.
Enact an evangelism strategy and training that is practiced and led by students
Teach students and parents to love each other as Christ loves us and to agree that there be no divisions among us
Launch at least one additional campus or church plant to facilitate the pursuit of our vision as everyone does their part
GROWTH BY MULTIPLICATION
In the book of Acts, they didn’t just grow by addition, they grew by multiplication. In fact, in the New Testament we see Paul had a role in planting at least 14 churches throughout his ministry. Biblically and historically, church planting and launching new locations is one of the best methods of accomplishing our mission as the Church. Multiplication must be a key component of Vision2025.
STRATEGIC ACTIONS
Finalize decision on location of second campus
Launch second campus by end of 2021
Achieve self-sustainment of second campus by 2023
Evaluate the feasibility of a third campus by 2025
Equip 75 faithful followers to effectively lead in discipleship and training of the next generation of leaders
DEVELOPING LEADERS
As a result of a genuine revival and new ministries being launched, new leaders are developed. Believers filled with the Spirit of God step up and boldly follow God into the uncomfortable. God also wants His church to intentionally train these leaders to powerfully invest in others for God’s glory.
STRATEGIC ACTIONS
Develop a process of identifying and recruiting new leaders
Develop and implement leadership training that applies to all spheres of leadership
Develop and implement a system for accountability and feedback to encourage leaders in their relationship with Christ and impact of their ministry area
Send at least 250 members on cross-cultural missions annually
CAPACITY TO SEND
Rick Warren once wrote, “The church of the future will not be measured by its seating capacity but by its sending capacity.” Barna Research found that less than 2% of American Christians ever share their faith. However, a revived church brings in the unsaved and sends out the saved on mission to share the Gospel. A church passionately pursing God’s calling will not be part of this statistic.
STRATEGIC ACTIONS
Increase awareness of missions opportunity to the Canaan family
Implement a training strategy to prepare people for the missions experience and sharing the Gospel
Educate the Canaan family on our corporate and individual calling to missions
Implement a prayer strategy for missions and our missions partners