RALEIGH, N.C. — Of all the things The Summit Church could be known for — its size, reach, worship experience or more — Pastor J.D. Greear would choose one thing.

“What we want to excel most at here is multiplication,” Greear said at the 2025 N.C. Baptist Disciple-Making Conference. “Of all the things that could characterize us as a church, of all the things you could notice about us, we would want it to be multiplication.”

And Greear encouraged nearly 1,500 pastors and ministry leaders from across North Carolina and beyond to prioritize multiplication through personal disciple-making and church planting in their own congregations during his keynote address at the conference, which was held Tuesday, Feb. 25, at The Summit Church’s Capital Hills campus in north Raleigh.

“Multiplication is at the heart of the Great Commission,” Greear said, adding that “disciple-making ought to be the core of our ministries.”

Under Greear’s leadership, The Summit has grown from a plateaued church of 300 to a multisite congregation with more than 12,000 members that meets in locations across the Triangle region of North Carolina.

Greear has led The Summit in a bold vision to plant 1,000 new churches by 2050. In the last 15 years, the church has sent out more than 1,000 people with church-planting teams in North Carolina, across the country and around the world.

During his address, Greear spoke on the power of multiplication and shared some practical ways churches can cultivate a disciple-making culture under the power of the Holy Spirit. They were: prioritize reaching people; pursue growth unashamedly; provide a clear pathway; practice multiplication at every level; and pick Jesus over you.

Quoting Christ’s words in Luke 19:10, Greear said Jesus’ priority during His earthly ministry was to “seek and save the lost.”

“We multiply in order to reach people,” Greear said.

And although talking about church growth has fallen out of favor in recent years, Greear said, “If you don’t grow, you can’t multiply.”

Greear also encouraged pastors and ministry leaders to develop a discipleship pathway or “growth track” for believers.

“We define discipleship at The Summit Church according to five identities — five identities we believe that defined Jesus’ life that should also define our lives,” Greear said. “And we’ve attached a couple of first practices to each of those identities.”

For The Summit, those identities are: worshiper, family member, servant, steward and witness.

While acknowledging that the identities and accompanying practices do not reflect the totality of what it means to be a disciple, Greear encouraged attendees to develop “a system that you can use to guide people and develop processes around.”

“Our pathway doesn’t need to be yours, but I just encourage you to provide a clear pathway and grow people in it,” Greear said.

Greear said multiplication isn’t just expected of church staff members or church planters. It’s also expected of lay leaders who lead small groups or serve in other ministries of the church.

Greear also warned that multiplication can be costly.

“Sending means giving away things — people and resources that are precious to you and your church,” Greear said. “And that means you’ve got to care more about the kingdom of God than you do your own little kingdom of ministry and your own name.”

In a later question-and-answer session, Greear was joined by Todd Unzicker, executive director-treasurer of the Baptist State Convention of North Carolina, to discuss a variety of topics related to ministry and missions. Unzicker served alongside Greear on the pastoral staff of The Summit before being elected to lead the work of N.C. Baptists in May 2021.

A significant portion of the conversation focused on believing God’s promises and trusting the work of the Holy Spirit in the life of the church.

“Nothing you do without the Holy Spirit is actually going to make a difference anyway,” Greear said.

Conference organizer Brian Upshaw, who serves as director of ministry strategies with N.C. Baptists, closed the event by praying over attendees who gathered in smaller groups to pray. Upshaw shared prayer prompts and led prayers for attendees to apply insights gleaned at the conference, for boldness in witnessing and reaching the unreached, and for God to show pastors and ministry leaders their next step in disciple-making and church multiplication efforts across the state.

“We need every church in North Carolina to multiply,” Upshaw said. “We need more churches throughout our state. So we need every church in North Carolina to be a part of that movement so that we would see a multiplication effort.”

Upshaw and other leaders expressed a sense of movement and momentum among pastors and church leaders at the conclusion of the conference.

“It’s been a great day,” Upshaw said. “It just seems like there’s a whole movement going on. We say the slogan, ‘a movement of churches on mission together,’ but I really sense the Lord bringing a movement.” 

Chandler Donegan, who planted Faith Franklinton just six weeks ago, said he was challenged and encouraged by Greear’s remarks about trusting God’s promises and provision in local church ministry.

“Do we really believe what Jesus said about the Holy Spirit and the church?” Donegan said. “That’s what I’m taking away. Do I doubt what God can do in my church? Do I doubt what God can do in my town?”

Donegan also said he took away a number of practical applications from both the plenary sessions and breakout sessions. The conference included nearly 20 breakout sessions on a variety of topics led by pastors, ministry leaders and church practitioners. The Disciple-Making Conference kicked off with a preconference session on church revitalization held at Fairview Baptist Church in Apex the evening before the daylong event.

The nearly 1,500 attendees marked a record turnout for the annual conference, which also saw a new high of nearly 1,700 people preregister for the event.

(EDITOR’S NOTE — Recordings from the 2025 Disciple-Making Conference will be made available in the near future at www.ncbaptist.org.)