(Having a busy day? Feel free to skip to the video at the bottom of this blog for four quick tips building a discipleship community. It’s only 8 minutes and you can always always come back to this written portion when you have more time. )
When any of my Focus Group Leaders at Focus church is considering canceling on a night most members in the group are unable to attend, I remind them that when it comes to discipleship, size doesn’t matter. If you and one other person are getting together, they are worth your time and discipleship is worth the effort.
I remind my small group leaders that when it comes to discipleship, size doesn’t matter. If you and one other person are getting together, they are worth your time and discipleship is worth the effort.
It’s a weird cultural phenomenon that when it comes to churches in America we have decided that a normal, healthy church is represented by only about 10 percent (the mega churches). By definition this is not normal. You might argue that’s the ideal (I personally wouldn’t), but you definitely can’t argue it’s normal.
The reality is that half of all churches in America have fewer than 80 people in attendance. While it’s possible to argue that this means over half our pastors are failing, I don’t think this is the correct conclusion; and yet this is the message those pastors routinely receive. They are encouraged to see their church as failing unless they can break the 100 barrier, then the 200, then the 300 and so on.
Instead of being given permission to focus on discipleship in the community they’ve got, they are encouraged to change the community first, to add people to their community so they can reach some magic number. What if instead they were given room and support to gear down and focus on the things which drove them to become pastors in the first place?
Discipleship materials and trainings are almost always geared towards churches who have or anticipate more and more resources. The pastors of these “smaller” (actually normal sized) churches are implicitly being told they are a failure and that discipleship can’t even happen until they become a larger, more “normal” church.
I think most of that is just plain wrong and that’s why I’ve created a discipleship course geared specifically for these other pastors. Discipleship is just not size-dependent and there is no reason pastors can’t build thriving discipleship communities and enjoy the benefits of such a supportive loving growing community themselves at the same time.
Pastors are busy and with an online course they can complete it at their own pace. If you are a pastor, or love a pastor, I encourage you to check out the video below. It’s only eight minutes long and includes four quick tips which will help every pastor interested in discipleship.
Check it out, pass it on, and if you’re interested in the course, click the link below the video.
DiscipleshipMatters.online