Dennis McCallum
Dwell sees itself as an underground indigenous house church-planting movement.
- Underground means that our growth is primarily through neighborhood groups, not through large worship services or seekers meetings. It also implies the leaders of home churches are all lay people (i.e. they are not professionals, but "tentmakers"). Even when staffers lead home groups, they receive no compensation for that part of their ministry. A church planting movement is a grassroots movement, not a staff-driven movement.
- Indigenous, means the leadership for the home churches has to come from within the home churches themselves via a process of personal discipleship. Dwell leaders would ask even experienced leaders from other churches to spend time in a home church becoming one of the trusted leaders in that group before sending them out with their own group.
- House Church-planting movement, means the development of such groups, if carried out properly, should lead to multiplication, or exponential growth, unlike plans where a central office arranges groups from lists of applicants and leaders. In a church planting movement, the impetus for planting churches comes from within each group. Church planting also implies that the groups are relatively self-sufficient for ministry, as opposed to groups that are heavily dependent on program-heavy worship services or the central leadership of the church.