RUSTIN UMSTATTD Assistant Dean of Doctoral Studies, Associate Professor of Theology and Ministry
Dr. Rustin J. Umstattd serves as Assistant Dean of Doctoral Studies and Associate Professor of Theology and Ministry at Midwestern Seminary. He received his M.Div. and Ph.D. from Southwestern Seminary. Dr. Umstattd came to Midwestern after serving more than 15 years in student ministry. In addition to his role at Midwestern, he serves on the pastoral leadership team at Northland Church—a church with a passion for planting churches in Kansas City. Dr. Umstattd enjoys playing guitar, riding motorcycles, and watching science fiction shows with his daughters. He has been happily married to his wife Leslie since 2001.
MBTS How would you explain Northland’s philosophy and passion for church planting? RUSTIN UMSTATTD Northland Church has a long history of desiring to see new churches planted in Kansas City. This passion is driven by our understanding that each community needs to have a healthy church ministering to people in it. In the book of Acts we see Paul and others travel around the Mediterranean establishing new churches that then sent people out to continue the work of spreading the gospel. We want to be part of that same mindset where we send people out from our congregation to reach new people by starting new churches.
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One of our mottos is that we want to multiply churches, not chairs. Given the choice of having one thousand people on our campus each Sunday or having ten churches planted that are averaging one hundred people each Sunday, we believe that those ten churches will have a greater impact upon the city than our one location could have. We, therefore, want to disciple our members to be ready to leave our church and be a part of planting a new one. As those members are sent, room is made in our facility for us to reach a new group of people, who we then want to disciple to potentially be sent out to plant another church.
MBTS For those interested in church planting, can you give us a behind the scenes look at how to plant a church?
