So, we are way behind the eight ball in giving our small groups ministry some overdue attention. While we have had a pretty vibrant number of small groups meeting together for years to study a wide range of topics, it has been sort of running without any coordinated effort or inter-action across groups. This has worked well since each group enjoyed their little circles and overall were quite good at inviting any newcomers that might be interested. But lately after some unexpected losses from illness and moving, there are groups that are struggling to feel connected. We can't count on it that groups will meet just because they love getting together regardless of what they're studying. We also have newcomers who are not getting invited because the "healthy" groups are full, and the hurting groups do not feel it would be attractive or conducive to keeping newcomers enthusiastic about our church.
We are just realizing that someone needs to be more intentional about "checking in" with each of our small groups and also about encouraging leaders to develop new groups with an intentional spectrum of topics or styles. Basically we feel we need someone to begin serving a more coordinated vision for our small groups ministry.
But rather than try to develop our own job description from scratch, I am wondering if anyone would be willing to share some already thought-out statements. Realizing that our context may be different and anything we view will need to be altered to become our own, but still thinking it would be valuable to view any existing documents for comparison and as a launching pad.
Any other suggestions for how/where to begin providing more oversight and encouragement to this greatly needed ministry are also welcome.
Thanks for anything you may be willing to share...
Comments
Check out smallgroups.com put out by Christianity Today. Lots of articles on line as well as materials to download.
Steve
Boy who would have guessed that there's a whole website domain created just for supporting small groups with a name like that? Sometimes the answer is so much closer and easier than we can imagine! Thanks for the pointer Steve! There's a ton of stuff here ...although my genetic sensors are hurting because I may actually have to pay a little for it...I'll let you know if it exceeds my budget :)
I know what you mean. I hate to spend money too. You can search on their website for freebies. Might be a little out of date, but it's still good stuff.
Hi Reese,
I have some small group coordinator job descriptions. However, they are very specific to the congregations. In coaching small group ministry coordinators, I have found the garden illustration to be very helpful. Like a gardener, small group coordinators need to provide continuing vision, care and support for the leaders and groups. I use the following roles and questions as an outline for coaching small group disicplehsip leaders.
Roles in cultivating an enviroment for growth:
Picture – Who is God calling us to be?
Plan – How will we follow God’s leading in our context? What will our garden of small groups look like?
Prepare – How will we prepare our leaders and congregation for growing people through small groups?
Planting – How and when will we start? stop? What is our growing season? What are the lifecycles of our groups?
Protect and Problem solve – How will we care for leaders and groups?
Pruning – How will we develop leaders and groups for the future?
Propagate - How will we multiply groups and leaders?
Pause and Pray – How will we cooperate with God’s leading?
I'm going to be writing more about each of these roles over the next several weeks. If you would like a sample job description, let me know.
Sam Huizenga
[email protected]
Thanks Sam,
I really like the organic gardening image as well. Although I'm afraid the initial steps for whoever may answer the call to tend our small-group garden may have to coach a little transplanting or grafting of some flowering shrubs with untamed vines, as well as the usual opening up to more light and water ;-)
I would certainly still value seeing whatever job descriptions you're willing to share,so that our Ed Team folks and I may consider what aspects could apply to our situation. Of course, we will also be in need of good training and evaluation tools to offer or suggest...working on downloading some stuff from smallgroups.com right now.
Thanks again for all your insights!
Our small groups ("Life Groups") are on a schedule where there are 3 "seasons" per year where church members sign up each season for a group. Because of that, many of the tasks of our coordinator are related to the cyclical nature of organizing and promoting the groups, but here are a few bullet points from our description that might be relevant to working with group leaders:
Other tasks that might be helpful for any small group ministry:
I think training is a big one, and in a scenario where groups are ongoing, providing training on a periodic basis both helps your leaders learn ways to develop and keep a healthy group going.
We run on an 8-12 week season typically, and each leader is contacted as often as weekly through the season. All are contacted after their first meeting, and then the small group leader is asked how often they want to be contacted and in what way (phone or email usually.) I am in a different ministry role, but one that also means that I "check in" regularly with various leaders. Even if they don't need anything, they appreciate a call. Often, however, they have a question or two, and it gives me a chance to help them and just remind them I'm available if they ever need anything.
We also ask our leaders to help us find future leaders by identifying group members who demonstrate gifts that would make them a good leader. Sometimes these people are asked to fill in as leaders when the main leader can't be there, for example, and/or are approached to lead or co-lead a group in the next season.
I attended a small group training earlier this year that was produced by Saddleback church, and they had a strategy for splitting larger groups into two smaller groups so that the healthy group could multiply. Essentially, the leader would identify 1-2 people in the large group who might make good leaders, and over time, gradually trained them by asking them to lead smaller, then larger portions of the meetings. Or, the one large group would sometimes split into two smaller groups for a some parts of the discussion, then reconvene later to share what they talked about and close the meeting. Over time, then, some groups are able to split and then make room for more members.
They also said that in response to someone who wants to join a group, they will ask them to consider starting a new group (instead of joining an existing group) by finding others who are interested in meeting. They also mentioned that their church has a variety of "off the shelf" materials they can hand out to a leader to make it easy for them to get started, which may not be the case in your church.
Just food for thought, and I've heard before that smallgroups.com (as a previous poster suggested) is a great resources.
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