Page 3 of 3But with the new video curriculum by Rick Warren, we were able to simply say, "If you have a VCR, you can be a star." That enabled ordinary people to say, "Yes, I can host a small group in my home. Where's the video?" It really lowered the bar on who could lead a small group.
At one weekend of services, about 3,000 people said yes to opening their homes for 6-8 weeks. I was half overjoyed and overwhelmed.
Were these first-timers? That is, for most of them, was this their first experience in a small group?
Glen Kruen and Tom Holladay helped us create a survey, which showed that those who had signed up to be hosts had been, on average, Christians for 14 years and attended Saddleback for 10 years; many had attended small groups or even led groups before. We calculated that some of these people had heard more than 500 messages from Rick.
When the dust settled, our team trained more than 2,000 new hosts and launched another 2,300 groups with more than 20,000 people going through Rick's six week study on the Purpose Driven Life called "40 Days of Purpose."
How many extra staff did you need to guide these people through training?
We hired more than 50 part-time staff members who served as coaches. Each coach served 25-50 groups. This was a big help as you might imagine. Some churches, though, don't have the resources even to hire part-time staff. In our consulting with Lifetogether, we help church leaders coach and train these "leader of leaders."
Can an ordinary church pull off small groups well?
We've consulted with hundreds of churches of all sizes, using our Purpose Driven Group™ curriculum, Doing Lifetogether™. It's one thing to get a taste of the purposes through the "40 Days of Purpose" campaign; I have yet to meet a church or even a small group that hasn't been affected by it.
But Day 41 can be traumatic, if the church small group leadership is not prepared for what's next. Saddleback is in the process of writing and releasing numerous curriculum series for this specific reason.
So what were some of the ministry-altering principles you learned through the process?
You can launch a small group ministry overnight during a small group campaign, but sustaining those groups and developing those leaders are completely different issues. That's where it all can break down.
One discovery came when we had to train, literally, thousands of new leaders. We couldn't do that in classroom. So we came up with the "just in time" leadership training for new hosts in an off-campus, decentralized format. In essence, the training is in the video or DVD curriculum. In both Saddleback's curriculum and the Doing Lifetogether electronic curriculum, there are additional clips of training—just when you need it.
Another critical piece is small group supervision. We don't advocate the traditional coaching model.
Where was it most messy?
If you take the risk to launch new small groups, it always ends up a little messy. One new small group leader once told that he and his live-in girlfriend were so excited about the 20 people they had coming to their group. We had no idea that she was his girlfriend and not his wife until he told us.
I ended up marrying the couple in a break-out room at Saddleback filled with their small group cheering them on. The couple was the most mature of the entire small group, so once I married them, we let them continue to lead the group. That same group had a baptism, with six of them being baptized by their spiritual shepherd. That group is still meeting almost seven years later. God is good!
The key question is, "What is the point of "40 Days of Purpose"? Or any spiritual or small group campaign for that matter? It's simply an organizing principle, program, and process to help the people in your church live healthy, balanced, Purpose Driven Lives.
It's not just about connecting people into community for the sake of community, but changing community through community in order to convert our culture for the sake of Christ.
Brett Eastman is CEO and founder of Lifetogether, Inc. Receive a free enewsletter by going to www.lifetogether.com, the leading resource on small groups, with more than a hundred articles for pastors, church leaders, and, especially, small group leaders.
Copyright © 2006 Lifetogether.
