Eric Dunaway
small groups pastor
I wanted to take a moment to recap a few things that we shared at our most recent Keynote. If you've never been to a Keynote, or aren't sure what that is, check out this page that really explains what this environment is all about.
Last Fall I was driving down to Atlanta to visit a church that pioneered a program similar to GroupLaunch (By the way, I was able to attend this program. Not only did I come away with some awesome new ideas for improving GroupLaunch, I also joined a community group). But while I was driving down, I decided to listen to some workshop CDs from a groups conference I attended the previous Winter... exciting stuff. As I was listening, however, one guy shared something that really struck me.
You know, usually we tend to think of community in terms of how it connects us to people, or even to the organization. What this guy said, however, is that community is much bigger than that... he said that community literally connects us to our life's mission and purpose. It connects us to the very heart-beat of God. And he went on to say that if our church's group model has been built primarily on the concept of connecting people, then we're missing it... that really got my attention.
Since then, I've been working on strategically designing our group model in such a way that helps people connect, not just to people, but to their life's mission and purpose. And to explain how we would like to see groups approach this, I need to go back and explain a few things first.
The Purpose of Journey Groups:
Journey groups are the environment where we gather in small groups to experience deeper connection and growth as we pursue life together.
If you've been following our group model at all, you may have noticed that this statement has evolved a little over the past couple of years (if you actually noticed this, let me know... I would like to buy you lunch). But I love this statement because it really hits on three major components: the environment itself, which answers the where question (small groups); the vision and goal of our groups, which answers the what question (deeper connection and growth); and the values of group life, which answers the how question (pursue life together).
Now, to fully understand the implications of life together, we need to take this a step further.
The Mission of Pathway Community Church:
Pathway Community Church exists to intentionally influence people to seek a genuine and growing relationship with Jesus Christ.
That's great... but what does that look like? The leadership staff of PCC got together and asked that question several months ago. And we basically discovered that a genuine and growing Christ-follower is someone who pursues four vital signs of life. You've read about these vital signs of life in previous posts here and here, among others. But these vital signs are actually the values of PCC.
- Living a transformed life.
- Included in authentic community.
- Focused on ministry partnership.
- Engaging the mission as the hands and feet of Jesus.
So you might unpack it like this: Where do we want people to go? A journey group. What do we want them to do? Experience deeper connection and growth. And how can they accomplish this? By pursuing the four vital signs of life together. That phrase - pursuing life together - is really the critical piece in all of this.
A while back, I wrote a post titled Narrow the Focus, in which I explained an intentional approach to deeper connection and growth. In that post, we explore the larger concept of pursuing life together. But here I want to apply a few practical steps to go along with that.
- Pick a sign. This is an opportunity for you and your group to sit down over one or two meetings together, and settle on a specific vital sign that you will make your focus for the next few weeks or months. For example, our group made included in authentic community our focus.
- Set a goal. Once you've landed on the vital sign you will make your focus, narrow it down even further to a specific goal. Authentic community is too big. But setting a goal to learn everyone's names, birthdays and anniversary's is a specific and attainable goal. Even better, striving for accountability within your relationships is another example.
- Go after it. Now that you've got your focus and a goal, go after it. Pick a study to work through together that will help you accomplish your goal. By the way, we just unveiled a new format for our resource directory. We have taken every resource in our library and organized them according to the sign of life they will help us pursue. You can download the revised Resource Guide at Leaders Link: www.pathwaycommunity.org/leaderslink.aspx Take this a step further, and plan activities outside of your group meeting that will help your group achieve its goals. Whatever your goal is, get serious about going after it.
- Evaluate it. It's easy for us to make great plans with the best of intentions, but then never do anything with it. Be deliberate about checking in with your group to see how you're doing with your goals. Ask the question, How are we doing with this? And allow the group to be honest with their answers.
Keynote: The next Keynote is Friday, September 24th, 6:00-8:00 pm at PCC. Please mark your calendars and plan to be there.
- Groups serve together in squads of 3-4 people.
- Groups would only serve one service per month.
- We can schedule you and your group to serve during the service you typically attend, so it will require very little more time than what you're already giving to a weekend worship gathering.
- You will have a cool shirt to wear so you can easily be identified as a friendly and knowledgeable member of the A-team.
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