Not all small groups are created equal. I have argued in previous posts that small groups provide the church with a very important element for spiritual growth and discipleship: community. But it can’t be just any sort of generic community. Small groups must cultivate gospel community! Fellowship that matters is fellowship drawn from that which matters. So with that in view I want to unpack my own philosophy of small groups. Effective small groups develop community by way of instruction, service, and life.
Instruction is an important part of developing a community, particularly instruction from the Word of God. Instruction from God’s Word puts us all on the same page. It unites us around the Mission of God, the values of His Kingdom, and the centrality of the gospel for all of life. Without these things our communities can easily devolve into mere social gatherings. We want more from Small Groups than clicks and social clubs. We want them to be places where the things that matter are discussed, reinforced, and applied to our specific life situations. Good instruction helps develop genuine gospel community in a small group.
It’s important here to add a caveat. Though we want to include some kind of instruction in our small groups we want to avoid the temptation to turn our small group into one more Bible study, Sunday School class, or intensive study session for our people. Instruction is important but the primary goal of our Small Groups should not be to disseminate information, we want a strong emphasis on “doing life together.” Sometimes a group can be so focused on working through literature, studying a passage, or discussing doctrine that they never actually get around to loving on each other, praying for each other, and investing in one another’s spiritual growth. At Cornerstone we talk about discipleship as a three-legged stool. Each leg representing instruction, fellowship, and worship, respectively. Each is important in holding up our discipleship structure. At our church our Sunday School classes are primarily about instruction, our corporate gather on Sundays is primarily about worship, and our small groups are primarily about fellowship. Each of those legs possess other elements of course (our Sunday morning service clearly includes instruction, and our Sunday school classes clearly include fellowship), but we emphasize a different aspect in each. So we speak of our Small Groups as capital F(ellowship) and lower case i(nstruction) settings. Our Sunday School classes, then, are times of capital I(nstruction) and lower case f(ellowship). Both are vital, they compliment each other, but we want to do our best not to confuse them. Small groups, though they include instruction, should focus primarily on fellowship. Instruction helps us do that, but it is not our primary goal.
Another way we can develop strong community in our small groups is Service. Accomplishing a common task builds community like few other things can. It orients a group towards a goal and creates memories. I have seen small groups serve together at a soup kitchen, adopt a single mom on their block, collaborate to oversee a church ministry part-time, and meet to pick up trash around the neighborhood on Sunday mornings before corporate worship. There are a million ways that your group can serve your community, your church, or others in the congregation. Brain storm and come up with a list. Rake leaves in the fall, shovel drive ways in the winter, visit shut-ins, or serve at a food pantry. In addition it is extremely important to find ways to serve one another within the group. As members of your small group become sick, face financial difficulties, struggle as single parents, or just suffer through melancholy, you as a group can wrap your collective arms around them, meet their needs, and serve together. Service is not only something the church is called to do, but it aids the development of strong community like almost nothing else can.
Finally, small groups that are effective develop community through “doing life” together. I understand that this is an ambiguous phrase. That’s partly by intent, though; after all, everybody’s life looks a little bit different. The key is to be involved in the details of one another’s lives. Too many small groups exist simply on the surface of life. They meet once a week (or once a month), they catch up, they pray for one another, but they aren’t overly familiar with the day-to-day, week-to-week reality of one another. Small Groups that are effective have to go beyond this. Think of the community described in Acts 2:42-47. Here we read:
42 And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.43 And awe[e] came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. 44 And all who believed were together and had all things in common. 45 And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need. 46 And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, 47 praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.
Clearly this is talking about the church as a whole, but it is the ideal that we want for our small groups too. This is the kind of intimate fellowship that doing life together creates. This can take many forms and shapes, but the key is to move beyond the formalities and surface level knowledge of another.
Some examples may be helpful. I have known small groups who ate weekly meals together. Good food often creates good conversation, and good conversation leads to good community. In other groups older women have offered to help young moms go to the grocery store. Any mother knows how difficult it can be to shop with kids; this simple act of service creates deep bonds. Men meet for external accountability throughout the week. Parents with kids have invited newly wed couples to come and attend family worship in their homes and see what their parenting looks like. Whatever the particular manifestation of this principle looks like in your group is not so important. What is important is that you get beyond familiarity with names, addresses, and specifically shared prayer concerns. You can’t possibly know how to challenge each other in growth, hold each other accountable, and serve one another’s needs if you don’t involve yourselves in each other’s lives. This is also why small groups should remain “small” (at our church between 10 and 12 people in a group).
Small Groups matter. They make a real difference in the kind and scope of discipleship a church can offer. But that only holds true if our small groups are healthy. Small groups that provide nothing more than one more study, one more formal meeting, one more activity in the church are simply duplicate other ministry efforts. We want something unique to happen with our small groups, we want them to provide a context for real intentional discipleship. We want small groups that build gospel community!
Sparrow & Heart Soul Care 