Growing or Dying Revisited

Moving from a self-focused to an others-focused ministry mentality

by Dan Lentz

I want to follow-up a bit from the discussion on my last post, “You are Either Growing or Dying” The premise of this blog entry is that if a small group is continually focused internally, and never actively reaching out beyond themselves to serve and invite new participants, then that group is on a course toward death. With that said, I also believe the central issue in the group health vs. group outreach discussion revolves more around values than results.

For instance, my current small group has remained nearly static for over a year. We basically have the same people we had a year ago at this time. I constantly ask myself the questions: Are we healthy? Or are we on a death spiral? Should we just blow the thing up and do something new?

While I’m not quite ready to state that our current condition is one of complete health, I do know that our values run both internal and external. Over the course of this past year, as we’ve met for the benefit and growth of one another, we’ve also maintained a prayer list specifically for people we are reaching out to. We’ve had a few “outreach parties” where we’ve invited unchurched friends to enjoy game nights and movie nights with our small-group members. We’ve done service projects for folks with special needs outside our church, and we’ve maintained relational contact with many of these folks.

So the question is, over the past year, have any of these activities resulted in a new committed member of our small group? The honest answer is NO. But, the love of Christ continues to spill out of the group onto other people. And our value is that we will continue to keep our group vessel tipped enough to keep Christ’s love flowing out from ourselves to others.

I will close with another analogy: Our small groups are like airport runways—necessary for takeoff, but in order to fly you have to go beyond the runway at some point. Otherwise people start thinking they are airport baggage carts when in reality they are airplanes. It's a tragic loss of identity. Others-focused ministry has a unique power to remind us of our identity as disciples of Christ, not consumers of religious goods and services.

posted by Dan Lentz on May 25, 2010 11:41 PM

Related Tags: Dan Lentz, group growth, outreach

Comments

I believe that a group does not have to grow for it to be living or dying. I also do not feel that a group should be focused on evaluating itself all of the time. I encourage the small groups that I oversee to evaluate one time each year. At this time it is appropriate for them to allow others to join and recommit to each other for another year. I think this provides clear expectations, deeper relationships, and a good balance between being internally and externally focused.

I think that a group is a great idea to grow with, however, sometimes we can't reach our purpose soon, so we keep trying and trying because we have a big desire toward reaching the target soon. so keep working, think for new ideas always, focus on what you want , and ask jesus always for the steps.

God Bless