Redeemer Family,
Good afternoon! As you read this, I hope you have a cold drink in hand and your toes splashing in a pool/river/creek/ocean/bay/marsh/puddle. This letter is a long one, but it is VERY important! Please read all the way to the end. You can do it. I believe in you.
As our parish leadership has been preparing for the fall semester, we have been doing some serious thinking and praying about how to best answer a perennial challenge: “How can we make it possible for every adult man and woman at Redeemer to be a part of a Small Group?”
Small Groups are not Redeemer’s invention (lots of churches do them), nor are they a recent innovation (Christians have intentionally met together to help each other grow in their faith since the earliest days of the Church).
“And they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. And awe came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. And all who believed were together and had all things in common. And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need. And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.” Acts 2:42-47
This is a beautiful, simple, yet powerful description of how the first followers of Jesus organized themselves and their time. And, as you might have noticed, they engaged a regular rhythm of corporate worship (attending the temple together) and small group fellowship (breaking bread in their homes).
*Note: Lest you be tempted to think that this is a relatively small gathering of close friends, remember that this description immediately follows Saint Peter’s sermon at Pentecost which led to 3,000 people converting, being baptized, and becoming a part of the church. They needed a way to organize this big, new family. And while we are not a church of 3,000, we do need a way to organize our growing family as well.
As you might imagine, with all the different ages, life-stages, and diversity of work and family schedules in our parish, this is rather difficult. Our Monday - Saturday weeks do not all look the same.
But despite the complexity of calendars and schedules, we want to cheerfully (and stubbornly) resist the cultural tendency to become busier and lonelier and instead swim upstream in the opposite direction. We want to make time for the Lord and for each other.
So, with all this in mind, here are 6 adjustments that we are going to make to the way Redeemer offers Small Groups:
Adjustment #1: Change in Staff Leadership for Small Groups
Oldson Duclos has been serving as our Director of Community Formation for the past two years and, in order to best serve the needs of our parish, his job description is shifting towards an outward-facing Justice & Mercy engagement with our neighbors in the city. His new title is “Director of Community Care”.
The Rev. Lane Cowin will be taking over as the primary point person for all things related to Small Groups.
Adjustment #2: Expanding Small Group Meeting Times
In the past, we mostly offered Small Groups that met on Sunday or weekday evenings. Fear not, this is not going away! If your group meets in the evening and that time slot works for everyone, then rock on - keep it up.
However, to accommodate the diversity of work and school schedules, we will begin offering more Small Groups that meet in the mornings or mid-day times.
Adjustment #3: Adding All-Men / All-Women Small Groups
In the past, we only offered co-ed Small Groups. Fear not, this is not going away! If your group is co-ed and it’s working for everyone, then keep going!
However, to accommodate the diverse needs of so many different people, we will begin offering all-men and all-women small groups.
As you might imagine, this creates some overlap between our Small Group ministry and our Men’s and Women’s Fellowship ministries (which we think is great).
*Note: But what about kids? Some of our groups have the tremendous joy of whole families participating in the group together. Kids may share the evening meal with adults, play together while adults read scripture and discuss, and join in for the prayer time. These beautiful, multi-generational gatherings are some of best examples of the church acting like the spiritual family that it is.
But one of the things we’ve learned over the years is that not every person, family, or kid is able to participate in this kind of multi-generational Small Group. Therefore, by expanding our Small Group meeting times and creating groups where a Mom or Dad can participate in separate groups, we are hoping to make group scripture reading and prayer possible for everyone across a diversity of life stages, availabilities, and maturity levels.
Q: Does that mean we no longer care about kids?
A: Absolutely not! Our Nursery, Kids, and Youth ministries are all focused on engaging kids at their particular age and life stage.
Of course if you are a parent and you feel ready and able to bring your kids with you to Small Group, then band together with some other like-minded parents and go for it!
Adjustment #4: From Printed to Digital Guides
In the past, we designed and printed a new guidebook to accompany each sermon series and serve as a bridge between the Sunday worship service and the weekday small group. While we are keeping the same general concept, we will be shifting towards a digital guide in order to provide a more detailed resource for leaders.
Adjustment #5: Shift Focus from Sermon to Scripture
This is an adjustment that, from my perspective, is not a change but rather a reinforcement of what Redeemer has always intended. While I certainly care deeply about sermons, I think it is far more important for every person in our parish to read, study, meditate, and apply scripture together.
Sermons should be timely, but scripture is timeless.
Sermons are fallible, but scripture is the inspired, revealed Word of God.
Therefore, it is important that every Small Group major on reading and discussing scripture and minor on discussing the sermon.
Depending on the particular gifts of each Small Group leader, this may look a little bit different from group to group. Some groups may adopt a more intellectual, academic approach to studying the text of scripture, while other groups may adopt a more contemplative, Lectio Divina approach to meditating on God’s Word.
Either way, the important thing is that scripture is central to the Small Group meeting.
Of course many of our Small Groups already do this - great! However, for some of our groups, this will be a change.
To help with this adjustment, the fall sermon series will focus on simply expounding a beautiful little book of the Bible: the apostle Paul’s letter to the Philippians.
Adjustment #6: Recognize that Some Groups are Full
In the past, we often repeated the mantra, “There is no such thing as a closed Small Group.” While I believe our intentions were pure, I have come to see that our strategy left much to be desired. For example, many of the homes in which our groups meet are already maxed out for space. We wanted (and continue to want!) to be a hospitable, open community that welcomes strangers and visitors to join us. But going forward, I think the best way to do that is not to require that all groups be open, but rather to train more leaders and start more new groups.
We will open Small Group Enrollment in early August and all groups will launch the week following Sunday, August 24! If you would like to volunteer to lead a new group or if you are not yet part of a Small Group, we want to talk to you! Please reach out to Lane Cowin and she would love to help you take the next step.
Redeemer Family, I love you all so dearly and I hope that these adjustments are clear, make sense, and will lead to everyone’s good.
In the Father’s love,
