Rather than a Grouplink, every 8 weeks for the 2 to 5 people who might be looking for a small group from The Crossover, what if every month (or maybe every two months), we had a 2 hour Sunday night event that focused on the four element.
1. Connecting with God - through worship or perhaps some teaching on daily habits or spiritual disciplines.
2. Connecting with People - small group leaders are introduced and take the opportunity to pursue people who might be interested in their group. A success story might be highlighted.
3. Connecting Locally - a local community leader could come and speak about a local concern and give a clear opportunity for people to volunteer.
4. Connecting Globally - some info could be shared about our location in Haiti, or someone locally could come and share about their culture.
The purpose of this event (environment) would clearly be to move people to a specific opportunity that would deepen their relationship with God and His Kingdom.
Showing posts with label People. Show all posts
Showing posts with label People. Show all posts
Thursday, October 25, 2007
Insight into North Point
What a blessing to have a comment from Rich Barrett. Rich appears (I have had no other contact with him except his comment post) to be the lead pastor of a church plant named Access in Jacksonville, FL. It is a "strategic partner" with Northpoint (Andy Stanley's church). They have a blog here.
It was interesting to hear more about their process. If I'm hearing right, they have three environments with three purposes.
1. Sunday morning worship service - The goal here is to connect people with God. They call this the foyer. The foyer is not for the church person. It is for your friend. It is for you to bring your friend. Part of me thinks this isn't exactly true. Surely, you get something out of the Sunday morning worship. But at least, they are clear about process. This is the primary access point for new people.
2. Small groups - These are where they would say "transformation occurs." These groups mostly meet weekly, but some seem to meet less often, and somewhere I saw where they meet 2nd and 4th Sunday nights, which is an interesting option. They do not provide childcare but will pay for childcare at a reasonable rate. (Is this per family or per group?)
3. Grouplink - This is the movement piece. It is a strictly transitional environment. Grouplink is every 8 weeks, perhaps the 1st Sunday night of every other month. Grouplink is a 2 hour event, separated into two groups - singles and marrieds (I'm assuming that a woman whose husband will not come goes to the singles, which btw is divided by gender. No swooping...looking for a date.) "Assimilators" (that seems like a horrible name due to the Borg) help you find a group by life stage or geographic area, which you attend for 8 weeks. If you like the group, stay in the group. If you don't, come back to the next Grouplink and try again.
One funny video (above) suggests there are expected to be 50 people at each Grouplink. I'm not sure if this video was specific to Northpoint or Access.
A second funny video, suggests the group becomes your support group.
They also have a Serving option, but I don't see a purposeful flow into this one. I'm sure there are advertisements for opportunities, but it looks like it lacks the flow of the other three environments. To be fair, it looks a reasonable solution. I can see a flow into our Connecting Globally easier than Connecting Locally. We could have events, for both, that include an opportunity to learn about something local or global and then sign up for the opportunity to volunteer in that area.
I'll give them this. It is simple. The areas where I question are "The foyer is not for you" and "8 married couples or 12 same sex singles". But why should these be questioned? When you put it all together, with flow, it is deeper than any program could offer.
Thanks for the comment Rich!
It was interesting to hear more about their process. If I'm hearing right, they have three environments with three purposes.
1. Sunday morning worship service - The goal here is to connect people with God. They call this the foyer. The foyer is not for the church person. It is for your friend. It is for you to bring your friend. Part of me thinks this isn't exactly true. Surely, you get something out of the Sunday morning worship. But at least, they are clear about process. This is the primary access point for new people.
2. Small groups - These are where they would say "transformation occurs." These groups mostly meet weekly, but some seem to meet less often, and somewhere I saw where they meet 2nd and 4th Sunday nights, which is an interesting option. They do not provide childcare but will pay for childcare at a reasonable rate. (Is this per family or per group?)
3. Grouplink - This is the movement piece. It is a strictly transitional environment. Grouplink is every 8 weeks, perhaps the 1st Sunday night of every other month. Grouplink is a 2 hour event, separated into two groups - singles and marrieds (I'm assuming that a woman whose husband will not come goes to the singles, which btw is divided by gender. No swooping...looking for a date.) "Assimilators" (that seems like a horrible name due to the Borg) help you find a group by life stage or geographic area, which you attend for 8 weeks. If you like the group, stay in the group. If you don't, come back to the next Grouplink and try again.
One funny video (above) suggests there are expected to be 50 people at each Grouplink. I'm not sure if this video was specific to Northpoint or Access.
A second funny video, suggests the group becomes your support group.
They also have a Serving option, but I don't see a purposeful flow into this one. I'm sure there are advertisements for opportunities, but it looks like it lacks the flow of the other three environments. To be fair, it looks a reasonable solution. I can see a flow into our Connecting Globally easier than Connecting Locally. We could have events, for both, that include an opportunity to learn about something local or global and then sign up for the opportunity to volunteer in that area.
I'll give them this. It is simple. The areas where I question are "The foyer is not for you" and "8 married couples or 12 same sex singles". But why should these be questioned? When you put it all together, with flow, it is deeper than any program could offer.
Thanks for the comment Rich!
Monday, October 22, 2007
Why I Started This Blog
It seems to me that the church's primary priority should be discipleship in order to best "Seek His Kingdom" and "Follow the Risen Christ".
It seems to me that this isn't even close to the priority of the church. In fact, it is practically non-existent in my circles.
Glenn Smith says that there is a cone of priority for pastors and that the top of the cone (the most time spent) is programming and the bottom of the cone (the least amount of time spent) is discipleship and evangelism. According to Glenn, the cone must be inverted.
Discipleship and Networking (which always has evangelism as it's point) must become my number one priority, including my own personal discipleship.
After years of consideration, I place discipleship into a grid of 4 areas, and all of these areas end up having an infinite depth.
1. Connecting with God (worship, prayer, Bible reading, journaling, listening)
2. Connecting with People (forgiveness, grace, love, hope, healing, marriage, parenting)
3. Connecting Locally (meeting the needs of your community)
4. Connecting Globally (meeting the needs of your world - at least one difficult place)
My areas are similar to many others. Bob Roberts' T-Life has been most influential. But perhaps it is too complex.
Each of the areas influence all of the other three areas.
As I blog, my hope is to inform my thoughts on discipleship with the following books.
1. The Simple Church by Thom Rainer and Eric Geiger
2. The Present Future by Reggie McNeil
3. The World is Flat by Thomas Friedman
4. Good to Great by Jim Collins
5. The Forgotten Ways by Alan Hirsch
It seems to me that this isn't even close to the priority of the church. In fact, it is practically non-existent in my circles.
Glenn Smith says that there is a cone of priority for pastors and that the top of the cone (the most time spent) is programming and the bottom of the cone (the least amount of time spent) is discipleship and evangelism. According to Glenn, the cone must be inverted.
Discipleship and Networking (which always has evangelism as it's point) must become my number one priority, including my own personal discipleship.
After years of consideration, I place discipleship into a grid of 4 areas, and all of these areas end up having an infinite depth.
1. Connecting with God (worship, prayer, Bible reading, journaling, listening)
2. Connecting with People (forgiveness, grace, love, hope, healing, marriage, parenting)
3. Connecting Locally (meeting the needs of your community)
4. Connecting Globally (meeting the needs of your world - at least one difficult place)
My areas are similar to many others. Bob Roberts' T-Life has been most influential. But perhaps it is too complex.
Each of the areas influence all of the other three areas.
As I blog, my hope is to inform my thoughts on discipleship with the following books.
1. The Simple Church by Thom Rainer and Eric Geiger
2. The Present Future by Reggie McNeil
3. The World is Flat by Thomas Friedman
4. Good to Great by Jim Collins
5. The Forgotten Ways by Alan Hirsch
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