A New Mission

Firstly, I have to say that Peter was a great host and did an amazing job cooking dinner.  The food was excellent (and healthy!), but I will have to give him a 9/10 due to the over-steamed broccoli.  Sorry, Pete.  Maybe next time..

We spent most of our discussion talking about this article:  http://geoffsurratt.typepad.com/inner_revolution/2010/02/i-believe-in-small-groups-i-think-small-groups-are-an-essential-the-essential-element-of-living-in-christian-community-j.html

To summarize much too briefly, the article states that small groups are failing due to a lack of focus.  Rather than trying to build relationships, accomplish discipleship, or practice community service (etc.), a small group should have a focused mission around which it's built and from which the former aspects would naturally develop.  This allows all members of the group to be constantly aware of the singular purpose which drives all activities of the group.

So we spent the evening brainstorming some ideas for A New Mission, though we struggled at times with getting caught up in some of the details.  From the very start, we made sure to distinguish a small group's focused mission from the mission that we are given by Christ to make disciples of all nations.  We felt that a small group's mission should be more specific, though certainly not more important (and it definitely shouldn't detract from Christ's calling for us).

Please do some of your own brainstorming and praying this week.  Ask God for A New Mission around which He can build A New Group.  God-willing we will decide on our new focus next week.  Here are a couple of ideas that came up tonight:

• Since most of us are tech-savvy, we should hold regular workshops for the community of Norwalk so we can serve their technology needs and share with them our motivation for serving them without compensation.  This would be very difficult, so I can see God doing great things with this idea.  [Outreach/Service Focus]
•  We should discuss our most basic/core beliefs each week.  We would talk about the discord between our professed beliefs and our actions and how that points to something else that we actually believe.  Finally, we would devise plans to correct our actual beliefs.  This would also be incredibly difficult, fostering honesty and spiritual growth within the group.  [Discipleship/Relationship Focus]

Don't be limited by the format of these examples in your brainstorming this week.  I would like to see us with lots of ideas to discuss next week, so that it will be even more amazing when God draws us to the same one.