Posted by: Frank Chiapperino in Untagged on
Oct 24, 2009
Small groups are great until the people show up! Community is messy
Messes of Biblical proportions
- God creates
- Adam and eve mess things up
- Cain and Abel kill and mess
- Noah drunk and naked mess
- Isaac and Jacob
- Jacob and Joseph and Brothers
- Moses
- David
- The list goes on and on
- The church at Corinth
- o Egos
- o Law suits
- o Incest
- o Drunkenness
Despite all the mess, the gospel is a gospel of hope and redemption for the messy community we create in our churches.
Pig Farms STINK
- How do you stop pig farms from stinking?
- Efficientlly design the transformation in the lagoon
- o You can't tell the stink to STOP
- o You can't ignore the stink in the lagoon either
- Don't we want to do that in the church with our mess?
- We have to be environmental engineers in the church and turn the mess into something usefull.
Sometimes MESS can be a byproduct of growth
Sometimes MESS can be a catalyst for growth and transformation
Types of Messes:
- 1. Sin mess - when people are living in sin in the group
- 2. Relational mess - when there is conflict in the group, when life touches life
- 3. Life mess - stuff that happens because we're people: job loss, divorce, health challenges
There is no formula or easy answers for dealing with mess in our groups.
Best Practices For Dealing With Mess
- 1. Acknowledge the mess
- 2. Identify the kind of mess (sin messes require grace and repentance, while life messes require care)
- 3. Have the right perspective - mess can be the byproduct or catalyst for growth
- 4. Ask good questions
- 5. Talk to the right people - there is a big difference between gossip and getting help
- 6. Give God the glory
- 7. Commit to the process - you have to fight through dealing with tough messes.
The Uptight Church Requirements
- You have to be spiritual
- If you show your flaws you've lost your walk
- In this group you look good but your get worse over time
Recovery Group Requirements
- You have to be screwed up
- If you show your flaws you're in denial
- In this group you look a mess but heal over time
Ways people grow in small groups
- 1. By suffering
- a. 1Peter 4 protect yourself by suffering
- b. A safe group is not a comfortable group.
- 2. By getting to the drivers underneath our life issues and problems
- a. Knowing how bad something is does not help us change
- b. Where is the brokenness that drives this behavior?
- 3. By learning new skills
- a. Everyone comes from a dysfunctional family and has needs due to their background. These needs will often be met in the group environment.
What produces safety in a group?
1. People feel safe when they know the rules.
2. A structured path and direction through curriculum or a knowledgeable leader.
3. Give a language. Two or three sayings that are insider language for things that are hard to communicate. It takes the sting out of difficult topics
4. Helping each other.
5. Establish group norms - a group will enforce its norms. If your group decides they are going to be sacrificial for one another then they will enforce it when members are in need.
6. Talking about where safety comes from.
Matthew 16:24-26 - one of Jesus' provocative questions, What good would it be to gain the whole world but lose your own soul?
The most critical quality of a group leader - leading from a healthy soul.
Symptoms of a diminishing soul:
Isolation
Apathy
Insomnia
Selfishness
Anger/bitterness
Being busy
Secret sins
Critical attitude
Fear
A healthy soul displays:
Joy
Confidence
Safety
Purpose
Energy
Attentive and Aware
Only you can put yourself in a place where you receive from God and if your soul is driving everything that happens in our life, leadership is inevitable and leadership is dangerous.
There is a relationship between pace of life and the health of our soul.
How does the soul interface with our pace of life?
Critical Question: How do I keep my pace of life in alignment with the current state of my soul?
Posted by: Frank Chiapperino in Untagged on
Oct 23, 2009
Environments of Grace = Life Transformation
This is HUGE for our churches. Especially for churches that want to reach people that are far from god. We will often use this phrase in our church: NO PERFECT PEOPLE ALLOWED.
We even had it on a sign at the front door for a couple of years. When people know they are accepted for who they are right now, they are much more likely to open up to us and to Jesus.
I love how Dave Johnson put it in his talk today, "If there isn't an environment of grace in our churches and our small groups people will never find the courage to be authentic." The equation at the top is so true in our small groups and our churches. When people feel safe, they can share the dark corners of their life with us and God can use those moments to allow us to participate in the healing process with someone that desperatly needs it.
I'll end with this line from Dave that sums it up, "Grace is the only thing I know that gives me the courage to bring things to light that I would tend to hide in the dark."
What a great way to start the conference today!
Relationships are an essential part of the Christian life. To follow Jesus and his teachings means we live in community with God, and community with others. The challenge we face in our culture is the busyness it creates in people's lives. The very people that we are called to ministered to and I believe social media is a tool we can leverage to enhance our relationships. So here are three ways you may want to try to apply social media in group life.
Create A Facebook Group
What's great about facebook is that it is growing exponentially right now. It is something that many people are already using in their daily routine to reconnect with old friends and stay connecting in current relationships. If we can take advantage of social tools that people are already using in daily life, it only makes sense that we will have more success. What's great about creating a facbook group is it allows people to communicate to the entire group quickly, share photos from group activities, and even have discussions about what was shared at group that night. Another convenient thing the facebook group can be utilized for is keeping a continuous prayer list.
Create A Group Twitter Profile
If you use twitter already you understand the networking value in a text message. Since you may not want to bother all of your followers on twitter with details from your small group, I would suggest creating a separate twitter profile for your group. Then have all your group members set up a twitter account. Depending on their web skills you may have to help them with this task during a group meeting, but don't forget to set them up as mobile users and to set your group profile "device updates." This way when you update the twitter status it will hit their mobile phone as a text message. Why is this helpful for a small group? Here is a quick list of reasons:
- -Reminders to prepare or do homework from group that night
- -Last minute change of meeting location
- -Cancelation of your group due to weather or unforeseen circumstances
- -Messages of encouragement through the week
- -Reminder of daily bible reading that will be discussed on group night
- -Prayer requests through the week
- -Have some fun
Try Tokbox or Skype
What we thought was science fiction 20 or more years ago is reality today. I can have a real-time conversation over the web with my brother in Hawaii and actually see him, hear him, and hold a great conversation on my computer in the comfort of my home. Skype and other online video tools are allowing people to maintain long distance relationships like never before. How can this enhance group life? If you have a group member that has to travel out of town, but they don't want to miss out on a great discussion, set up a laptop in the room and let them participate using the web!!! Or with other great tools like Tokbox, you can actually hold your entire group on the web, plus see and hear every person at the same time. Sharing life experiences, reading the bible, asking engaging questions, and praying together can all be done via video conferencing online. I must admit that I do prefer an "in person" group experience but these things can be done on the web and actually lead to a worthwhile experience. If you've not tried something like this yet I'd encourage you to give it chance and have some fun with some friends as an experiment.
If you've found some other forms of social media useful please share in the comments below.
And if you would like to connect with me using social media you can find my points of contact by CLICKING HERE
