Why Small Groups Don’t Work — Good Thoughts from Geoff Surratt

Geoff Surratt has a series of good posts on why small groups don’t work. His solution? Check out the post to learn more.

Personally, I think mid-sized missional communities are a great way to do things, especially outside of affluent suburban areas.

The missional community model seems to address many of the challenges I see in the way we traditionally have done small groups in America:

1. Groups begin with an outwardly focused mission. Rather trying to retro-fit mission into small groups, mission is the core. Relationship and discipleship happen as a natural outcome of living life with a missional purpose.
2. Groups are big enough to make a real impact. 30 people on mission carries a much bigger wallop then 12. But the intimacy of the 12 is still intact. “Big enough to dare, small enough to care”
3. Coaching happens in the context of the missional community. Rather than an outsider trying to provide support and training, the “coach” (missional community leader) is in the mix with the small group leaders. They are on mission together.

I have barely scratched the surface of what missional communities could look like in an American context, and I have learned that we can’t just lift a model from another culture and try to impose it on our unsuspecting flocks; but I do believe that there are huge implications for this paradigm in the U.S. It brings together the positive aspects of small groups, house churches, mid-size groups, multi-site and mega churches into a missional, transformational context.

So that’s my five part small group rant. What are the implications in your context? What are the drawbacks and advantages? Where have I missed the boat?

The Why Small Groups Don’t Work — Good Thoughts from Geoff Surratt by Church Planting Journey, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.