For small group pastors and leaders

Small Group Discipleship

Most small groups are good at belonging and bad at forming people. They are not the same thing, and a group can run for years doing the first while nobody notices it is not doing the second.

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Group vs discipleship group The four changes Size and length Is it working Questions

A small group and a discipleship group are not the same thing

A small group is a room where people know each other. That is genuinely valuable and most churches need more of it.

A discipleship group is a room where people are changed on purpose, in a direction someone named in advance, with somebody paying attention to whether it is happening. The second requires the first and does not follow from it.

	Small group	Discipleship group
Goal	Connection	Formation in a named direction
Leader's job	Host the room	Know where each person is
Content	Whatever the group picks	Sequenced toward the goal
Length	Ongoing	Defined, with an end
Success	People keep coming	People change and some start leading

Four changes that convert one into the other

Name the direction out loud. Tell the group in week one what you hope is different about them by the end. A group that knows what it is for behaves differently from one working through a book.
Give the hour a shape. Open, Word, so what, pray. Without a shape the group drifts toward whoever talks most, which is rarely who needs it most.
Move from discussion to practice. Most groups stop at what a passage means. The change happens when someone has to do something and report back. Reporting back is the part that works.
Watch individuals, not the room. A group can have a great night while one person quietly disengages. Track people, not attendance.

If you change one thing, make it the fourth. Almost everything else follows from a leader who actually knows where each person is.

Size and length

Four to ten. Under four and one absence kills the night. Over ten and the quiet people stop speaking, which means the people most likely to need the group have stopped participating in it.

Eight to sixteen weeks. Long enough to get somewhere, short enough to invite someone into and short enough to fix. Groups that run indefinitely almost never get evaluated, because there is no moment that invites it.

Mixed or single sex both work for study. For honest confession, single sex works far more often, and it is worth splitting for part of the time rather than pretending the mixed room is getting there.

How to tell whether it is working

People bring things up that did not come from the material.
Somebody other than the leader asks the follow-up question.
The midweek conversation happens without you starting it.
At least one person is ready to co-lead next time.
Someone has invited a person who is not yet a Christian.

If none of those are true after three months, the group is probably a good small group. Keep it, and start a second one with a different purpose rather than trying to convert this one mid-flight.

Common questions

Can an existing group become a discipleship group?

Sometimes, and only if you renegotiate it openly. Announce a new season with a new shape and a defined length, and let people opt in. Changing it quietly breaks trust with the people who joined for what it was.

What about childcare and logistics?

They decide who can come, which makes them a discipleship decision rather than an admin one. A group that excludes every parent of young children is not going to form your church's next leaders.

Do we need curriculum?

You need a sequence. Curriculum is the easiest way to get one, and a leader who can build their own is rarer than most churches assume.

See where each person actually is

Start Discipling gives group leaders a person by person view, not just an attendance list, so the fourth change is the easy one.

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