Most church small groups try to do too many things. They start out as a tool to help people build significant Christian relationships, but quickly morph into a catch all. Group members feel pressured to do it all, but they end up doing none of it very well.

Sermon-based small groups are basically a lecture/lab approach to the weekend message. People gather during the week to discuss the implications from the weekend’s Bible study. It’s simple and organic.

What are some of the advantages of basing a small group meeting on the previous weekend’s message?

• The key advantage is probably that sermon-based groups allow further discussion of the week’s message focus. In a dialogue environment, everyone is able to ask the questions they wanted to ask during the message but couldn’t.

• Sermon-based groups keep the entire congregation on the same page, and narrow the focus down to one conversation (in the small group and in the church). Rather than group members hearing one concept on Saturday morning and another in their group meeting, they are allowed to focus on one key concept at a time.

• Sermon-based groups expose people multiple times to a passage, principle, or spiritual truth, which a) results in everyone listening more attentively, b) it encourages note taking, c) causes most people to review the sermon again, d) and then ends in a spirited discussion with friends.

• Sermon-based groups build a great sense of community and mission. While different groups move through the material at different depths, they all still move in the same direction. It’s much easier to promote personal discipleship when everyone is doing the same thing.

• Because they’ve already heard the sermon, everyone comes to the meeting with at least 20-25 minutes of preparation (the length of a typical weekend sermon at Maranatha).

• Sermon-based groups also make it easier to mainstream new believers, since these groups tend to be less intimidating for those who lack any spiritual or biblical background. The truth is, if we want to disciple people, the best thing to do is not to separate out all the newbies.

• Rather than requiring leaders skilled in inductive Bible study, sermon-based small groups only need a facilitator who has a growing relationship with God and a heart for the people in the group.

What about burnout?

There are times when a group facilitator may need to take a step back from leading a group for a season, or when attenders just don’t click well with a group, but both may feel guilty about backing out. Some people also feel making a long-term commitment to a small group is too constricting for them.

Typical small group curriculum resources vary in length from 8-13 weeks long, and make it difficult for new attenders to catch up with the rest of the group. Sermon-based groups allow people to begin attending an established group, or begin a new small group anywhere in the process, and come in at the same point as everyone else.

At Maranatha, we will limit each “session” to 10 weeks. After a 2-3 week break, another 10-week session will begin. At that point, leaders can choose to continue leading or step down for a while. And attenders may elect to stay with the same group or try a different one. No guilt and no shame no matter the choices made.

What about adding new groups?

There is a common small group model which seeks to divide healthy, growing groups in order to create new groups. But this “dividing to multiply” concept is counter-productive if building community relationships is one of the desired results of healthy small group development. Just as a group is reaching a point of fostering healthy group relationships, it is asked to break the bonds that have developed. Why penalize a group for doing well and growing organically?

Rather than do that, at Maranatha we can introduce new groups at any point in the process, so our focus will be on starting new groups for the new people. On those rare occasions where a group grows “too large” we won’t worry about it. If it becomes unhealthy, people will stop coming and join another group. In a sense, each group has a natural “health and size ceiling” that takes care of itself.

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