Never shy of a challenge, Bishop Al Stewart has touched down at Mars Hill Church in Seattle for the Acts 29 network's church-planting ‘boot camp’.

Later this week, Sydneyanglicans.net will feature an exclusive reflection from Bishop Stewart as he emerges from the boot camp, which is running Monday March 9 and Tuesday March 10, and the World Church-planting Summit set for Wednesday.

For now, Bishop Stewart has told sydneyanglicans.net he will be paying particular attention to Acts 29's strategies for using technology well in ministry and assessing church planters.

"I think particularly we need to understand how to assess potential church planters, because not everyone's suitable for this and if people aren't assessed properly there can be a very high burnout rate and people get damaged," he explains.

"With proper assessment, the success rates improve dramatically, so I think Acts 29 is going to have a lot to teach us about church planter assessment."

These are just some of the drawcards which have drawn Bishop Stewart to America " although he laughingly refers to an extra motivation.

"The other one is, I like big cars and hamburgers. Why wouldn't you go to America?"

Fresh from his own February conference at which he joined with Andrew Heard from Central Coast Evangelical Church and Steve Chong from Kirkplace and RICE to launch plans for a nationwide church-planting network, Bishop Stewart says planting missional churches is "one of the key strategies in reaching Australia with the gospel".

"We need to strengthen and grow our existing churches, but plant new churches that particularly engage with our culture."

The church-planting trio flew out yesterday for the camp, along with Guy Mason of Docklands Church in Melbourne and Mikey Lynch from Hobart’s Crossroads Presbyterian Church.

All five were invited by the Acts 29 Network to be at the boot camp and the international church-planting summit following on Wednesday.

"There are many people around the world learning to plant missional churches, particularly in England and America " we can learn a lot from Mark Driscoll and the Acts 29 Network," Bishop Stewart says.

"There's lots to learn, and we'll need to unpack it in our Australian context."

The group will also see some other church-planting sights, including Sovereign Grace ministries, a church-planting network of over 80 churches.

Bishop Stewart will arrive home on March 18.

About the boot camp

Pastor Mark Driscoll has used the leadup to the boot camp, pertinently titled The Call, to articulate his goal of increasing churches in the Acts 29 network from over 200 to 500 churches in less than three years and over 1000 churches in less than 10 years.

In order to achieve this goal, Driscoll has called for men "who care less about padding their resumes and getting their vacation days than about seeing lives transformed and legacies altered for generations."

Those teaching at the camp include Matt Chandler from the Village Church in Texas, PJ Smyth of NewFrontiers and GodFirst Church in Johannesburg, and Acts 19 planter Dave Bruskas and director Scott Thomas.

Topics include the calling of church planters, the call to preach and the call to endure "the hardships of planting a church in the midst of a generation of idolaters".