Small Groups

From Search To Belong:

1. Community is not experienced mostly through intentionality. Community spontaneously emerges from environmental influences

2. Small groups are not the way a majority of belonging and community is experienced in a person’s life. Most of these experiences are in public and social environments.

3. It is unrealistic and unhealthy to expect 60-80% involvement in your congregation’s small group program. This usually results in a dependant-codependent relationship with your congregation. Anything over 30-35% is a little suspect.

4. Who are we to assume we need this much “intentional” control over someone’s life? Most do well to find significant community and belonging in their life outside of your congregation. Why invite them into an incestuous relationship where they are not in contact with others on a journey to find God?

People are desperately longing to belong. However, they want to belong to a healthy community in a healthy way. People are looking for real friends and family not the romanticized version of what those family and friends look like and act like. They are looking for a real home not a congregations 1950’s view of what this means.

It is time we put away our narrow definitions of belonging and community and seek to see how people want to connect and find ways to help them there.