What does it mean for a church to be All In with small groups? A church being “All In” with small groups doesn’t necessarily mean that everyone is in groups or that the church doesn’t offer anything else for connection and discipleship. Being All In speaks more to the church’s focus.
If a church’s focus is connecting people into groups, then the strategy is to recruit group leaders and assign people to groups. If the focus is developing group leaders in the traditional sense, then the strategy is typically training an apprentice and dividing the group into two groups. Both of these methods can get a church part-way in, but not All In.
All In speaks to equipping and empowering every member to lead others. While pastors would love to see all of their people serving, the reality in the church world is that we’ve made leadership, discipleship, and service far too complex. Let’s face it, by the time church members complete their training and fulfill the requirements, they have probably convinced themselves that ministry is beyond them, and they need more training! We don’t have that kind of time. We need leaders now.
Small groups are the number one way of equipping and empowering your people for service. In fact, I would even say while groups are great at connecting, discipling, and caring for people, the primary purpose of groups is leadership development. The more groups you have, the more leaders you develop.
But, how do you do this in a way that’s not watered-down or just plain scary?
Get Your Church “All In” With Groups.
By developing an easy-to-use resource, anyone in your church can gather a few friends and do a study together. How about that? I just gave you a strategy to recruit “leaders” and form “groups” without using either one of those words. You don’t need to. It works as long as your people have friends.
Now, please understand, I am a recovering control freak. For years no one led a group unless I recruited and trained them. And, no one joined a group unless I placed them in the group or approved it. It was safe, but we quickly got stuck. I couldn’t recruit enough leaders. Groups weren’t growing. Then, we tried something.
Put Your Pastor’s Teaching on the Curriculum.
We delivered our pastor’s teaching on a video and made it available to our congregation. Then, we told people if they were willing to get together with their friends, then we would help them. We saw something amazing happen.
First, our pastor was more interested in groups than ever before. He made an investment by creating the video teaching. Now, he wanted to make sure it succeeded. While I had been handpicking leaders for the seven years prior, my pastor made the invitation to this series and we doubled our groups in a day.
Oh, and here’s the second thing — our people were more interested in groups too. If people attend any church, but aren’t connected to each other, the reason they’re there, other than Jesus, is the senior pastor. They connect with the pastors’ teaching and laugh at their jokes. They like their pastors’ style and personality. When pastors offer their people exclusive content for small groups, guess what? You are giving people more of what they already like. It’s an easy sell. When you offer to help them get started, they’re All In.
Isn’t Producing Curriculum a Lot of Work?
Honestly, producing curriculum is a lot of work. But, you don’t have to do all of the work.
But, isn’t it expensive? Well, it all depends on how you go about it.
What if my pastor doesn’t have an idea for the next Purpose-Driven Life? You don’t need one. The team at One Ten Pictures already has a curriculum for you. In fact, the study guide, teaching scripts, graphic design, and template are already done. You just need to add your pastor on video at an affordable cost.
If you think this is too good to be true, then go check out http://allinsmallgroups.com
What would happen if everyone in your church joined together to grow spiritually and to reach your community this year?
Pastor Kenny Luck shares his thoughts about “All In”
