Bill Donahue started at Willow Creek Community Church in 1992 and helped Willow be a leader in group ministry. But his influence has helped thousands of churches in the US and around world improve their small group experience and draw closer to Christ.
Over the last three years Willow has had a challenging experience as they have attempted to move to a neighborhood model for group ministry and they are ready to try some new things. That is where Donahue comes in. Here is what he said about it in a recent blog post:
Over the last three years, after an evaluation of the strengths and weaknesses of the Neighborhood initiative at Willow Creek Community Church, the church decided to return group life to the core of Willow. There were some positive experiences from doing the Neighborhood initiative, but Willow decided that the model had limited success. (For an evaluation, see my previous blog postings on this).
After taking a fresh look at what really constitutes biblical community, and learning from strengths and failures of the various expressions of group life for the last 30 years, the church has plunged headlong into a fresh expression of group life that encompasses the strengths of the past while trying to avoid the mistakes. And I have been asked to help.
My primary role will be to design the leadership development and support structure for this new era. With a variety of group sizes, purposes and formats, leaders will require a broad spectrum of experiences and services to guide them along. And with leaders who have anywhere from zero to decades of group leadership experience, it is clear that the support we provide must be readily accessible, customized, decentralized and use both face time and technology.
I look forward to hearing and seeing more from Willow Creek as they continue to experiment and try new things in group ministry. Click here to read Bill Donahue's original post.
Our Pastoral Care Coordinator, Steve Lybrand, recently had some conflict in a new group restore group he started. The group is called Making Life Work and it is focused on helping people deal with negative behaviors in their life and help them deal with dependency and co-dependency. Here is what Steve had to say about his recent conflict:
Last night after our MLW meeting we had a leaders meeting. An area of conflict came up. Not serious, but it did touch peoples emotions and the discussion reflected it. What I loved is that the issue was brought out, discussed in a heated fashion and the group came to a concensus with the two members it mostly effected agreeing to work out the details together. It is a classic example of what Patrick Lencioni describes should happen in The 5 Dysfunctions of a Team. Everyone got to speak, and though uncomfortable we stayed on track to resolve the situation.
How different from what many experience growing up in dysfunctional households. There are three rules generally learned in unhealthy personal or work environments; Don't speak, don't trust, don't feel. You see, in unhealthy environments speaking openly, particularly about difficult issues gets you in trouble. You can't trust because something which was perceived innocently last week might trigger an angry reaction this week. And you can't feel because those two create a crazy environment and feeling crazy is generally not an attribute. Ultimately nothing gets done and resentments build.
Often when people tell me that their group is going through conflict I tell them that it is heathy for them to work through the experience. Conflict is necessary for relationships to grow and if it is dealt with properly everyone can benefit.
How do you measure the progress of a small group ministry? How do you know if you, as a champion for small groups in your church, are accomplishing your goals? First, you actually have to have them! Kevin Stone, our Executive Pastor, is a big fan of the S.M.A.R.T. method. Goals must be:
Specific
Measurable
Attainable
Realistic
Time based
But the hardest part of that list for a small group ministry can be the measurable piece. That is where the functionality of web 2.0 tools can help. There are two ways we as ministry leaders can keep our finger on the pulse of our small group ministry.
1. Stories - You have to record the life events that occur in your group ministry and help them spread like wild fire! If you are plugged into tools like we have discussed a bit in this series of posts, you can use the web to help you do that. Listen to people in your church when they tell you stories of life change. Encourage leaders to share their group's life experiences on blogs, message boards, and other social networking tools on the net. If you don't have a place on the net to share these experiences use the message board on our small group website, it is so easy to use when you register for a free account!
2. Statistics - You have got to measure attendance in your groups. Especially as a group ministry begins to grow in your church. Here how measuring attendance helps:
It helps with enrollment retention. If we don't measure attendance and people stop attending a group, how do we know why they stopped attending? Maybe the group that they visited for a few weeks wasn't a good fit. By tracking attendance we can place a follow up phone call and try to plug drop outs into a group that may be a better fit.
It identifies a group of people that are committed to building community and spiritual growth. The people that are committed to group ministry and attend regularly are the same people that will serve your church, and volunteer their time when there is a need. There have been numerous occasions we have tapped into our small group ministry to get help. One significant moment that comes to mind was when we experimented with a Saturday night service. Our small groups signed up together to serve and help that service happen each week.
It helps make staffing decisions. As a group ministry grows there are decisions that need to be made about leadership development, training, and support. Without data to measure the need, how can you make a sound decision?
There are a few great tools you can use to help you gather data on your groups. Two that I have experience with are Fellowship One and ChurchTeams. If you have very little experience with this sort of thing I would recommend starting with the 30 day trial that ChruchTeams offers for free. There are two great features that I love about this tool.
1. It can link to your church website so people can enroll in groups online 2. It sends reminders to group leaders via email to post their attendance.
It is an easy to use affordable tool that will help you get started on the data collection path for your ministry.
Update: I just got off the phone with a church in Maryland that is considering ChurchTeams as a tool for their group ministry. The conversation resulted in addressing the same concerns I have for a growing group ministry - "Can I see when a new person doesn't show up?" The answer is yes! The web based software produces a report that you can pull up every week if you want to. It will show you every member of each group, who attened and who missed out.
Bill Donahue started at