How do you actually measure whether small groups are actually working? Richard Sweatman from Hunter Bible Church joins us to unpack what matters most – from clarifying purpose, to tracking attendance trends, to assessing leader health, group dynamics, and individual growth. He shares practical tips as well as pitfalls to avoid when appointing leaders or multiplying groups.

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TRANSCRIPTS:

The following is an uncorrected transcript generated by a transcription service. Before quoting in print, please check the corresponding audio for accuracy.

00;00;08;13 – 00;00;26;18

Pete

Get on Pete Hughes. And welcome to The One Thing. It’s a podcast designed to give you one solid practical tip for gospel set in ministry every week. Although I’m hoping we get more than just one. But we’ll see how we go today. The one thing is brought to you by Reach Australia. And we want to see thousands of healthy evangelistic and multiplying churches all over our country.

00;00;26;21 – 00;00;33;21

Pete

Yeah, small groups really important part of that. And today we have Richard Sweat from Hunter Bible Church with us. Welcome, Richard.

00;00;33;24 – 00;00;35;22

Richard

Thanks very much, Peter. Great to be here.

00;00;35;24 – 00;00;43;13

Pete

Now, like before we get into this episode, you’re a cultured man. A man of letters. You. What are you reading? Are you reading any good books at the moment? What are you reading?

00;00;43;15 – 00;01;03;07

Richard

Oh, it’s, reading lots of things in terms of, ministry books. Couple of highlights this year have been reading, leading from the second chair. An old classic that I’ve never really gotten around to reading, but, I was thinking, yeah, it’s time I got into that. So that’s by Mike Bonham and Roger Patterson, right. Got some helpful ideas there.

00;01;03;07 – 00;01;09;27

Richard

On leading from the second chair. And also the the book called The Heart is the Target by Mary Kay.

00;01;09;29 – 00;01;10;18

Pete

Oh yeah.

00;01;10;19 – 00;01;23;00

Richard

About preaching with passion and to the heart and yeah bringing about that impact and change and application from the whole process. So I find it very stimulating as I was prepared in a couple of talks.

00;01;23;02 – 00;01;25;15

Pete

Interesting. Are you reading any fiction?

00;01;25;18 – 00;01;40;23

Richard

Yes, at the moment. What are you reading? Other kinds. Well, I’ve just finished. I’m part of a book club, actually. Just, But, I’ve been reading a great spy novel by John le Carre. Love spy novels. A lot of ministry crossover with spy novels. I reckon that that’s another ten.

00;01;40;23 – 00;01;44;04

Pete

Wow. That’s a whole world we could go into. I we’ll leave that, but. Yep.

00;01;44;07 – 00;01;54;11

Richard

And, a book called The Pillow Book, which is, a very old book written by a Japanese woman in the Hagan court in about the ten hundreds in Japan.

00;01;54;12 – 00;01;57;09

Pete

So how could you, Mister culture? Well, no. Okay.

00;01;57;13 – 00;01;58;00

Richard

Not at all.

00;01;58;00 – 00;01;59;19

Pete

Well, out of my depth, but just.

00;01;59;19 – 00;02;02;17

Richard

Whatever’s, whatever’s handy. But, I love reading.

00;02;02;24 – 00;02;16;23

Pete

Yeah. Yeah, I’m glad to hear it. I’m going to put some of those on my list to read, so. Yeah, I’m looking for that. But that’s not what we’re here to talk about. You’ve press the play on another episode of The One Thing making the most of a small groups.

00;02;16;25 – 00;02;39;10

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00;02;39;12 – 00;02;51;18

Pete

From that, Richard, you’re one of your roles at Hunter Bible Church is overseeing the small groups at how many how many small groups are there at Hunter at the moment? Because it’s a big ministry that you look after.

00;02;51;18 – 00;02;56;06

Richard

Yeah, we have about 65 small groups right across the church. Yep.

00;02;56;08 – 00;03;08;09

Pete

Now what? What’s the actual purpose for small groups? Do you think? And do you think that how clear does that have to be for the leaders as and how clear does that have to be for the members as to what the purpose is?

00;03;08;11 – 00;03;31;07

Richard

Yeah. Very clear, very important. And a big part of what I did, 10 or 15 years ago when I started in this role, was to try and really clarify what are the purpose of our small groups, what are they for? What is their culture? And, so in one line, it’s very simple. At Hunter Bible Church, our groups are to be groups where people are growing together to become more like Christ.

00;03;31;10 – 00;03;52;17

Richard

And that’s a that’s an echo, really, of our general maturity prayer or maturity vision or goal. Growing together to become more like Christ. So there in that, it’s a one line of thing, easy to remember. And it includes growth, growing maturity. There’s togetherness there. This is a corporate, community type activity. And there’s a direction there’s a purpose to to become more like Christ.

00;03;52;19 – 00;04;15;16

Richard

Now there’s you could more you could say, but that’s, the essence of what the our groups are about. And, we found it very helpfully, I think, this beginning, beginning of this process to develop, what we call a just a one page infographic that has kind of the key aspects of gross group culture, just a one page with some icons and diagrams that, we just roll out every year.

00;04;15;18 – 00;04;31;04

Richard

So much so that people, they invent games to, to, to, you know, fill in the blanks kind of thing because it’s for some of them, it’s that familiar as they go through it each year, I still say, yeah, make sure you do this. Go over the cultural groups, this infographic at the start of it.

00;04;31;08 – 00;04;35;00

Pete

Why is that such an important thing for you to do to keep going over that again and again?

00;04;35;02 – 00;05;02;10

Richard

Well, everyone has different expectations for what Christ groups, all groups are about. And that can be your regulars who have been with you for a little while, and it takes a long time to change, or can certainly be new people who’ve joined, even if they’ve come through your, joining process. Whatever. Every opportunity you want to take to kind of clarify what the purpose of small groups, so, it needs to be done because people have different ideas of what small groups are about.

00;05;02;12 – 00;05;11;20

Pete

Do you find that people who come from another church have a very different view of what their small group is about, or what they are? They’re a small group from the church that they come from. It’s about.

00;05;11;24 – 00;05;31;12

Richard

Yeah, they may or may not. So one of the conversations I would have is like, have you been a part of a small group before? What was that like for you? What did you do together? What did you enjoy about that small group? And you can start to get a bit of an idea of, what they, their experience of group life was like and what, how close that’s going to be to their likely experience in, in our church.

00;05;31;15 – 00;05;32;21

Richard

00;05;32;23 – 00;05;42;29

Pete

How do you measure the health of a small group? I mean, beyond, you know, keeping attendance as some people keep attendance, some people don’t. Do you guys keep attendance of small groups?

00;05;43;02 – 00;05;46;11

Richard

Yeah. Well, that’s an important question. Are the groups healthy?

00;05;46;16 – 00;05;59;07

Pete

Because it’s. Well, that’s. Yeah, I realize that’s a different question, but. Yeah. Yeah, but just out of interest, you keep do you keep track of who how many people are going to small group. Because there’s there’s often what’s people whose name is on the list. Yeah. And then there are the people who actually attend.

00;05;59;10 – 00;06;00;19

Richard

Yeah. Well I’ll tell you what we do.

00;06;00;20 – 00;06;02;04

Pete

Okay. Yeah. So yeah.

00;06;02;06 – 00;06;20;06

Richard

So I can tell you how many people are in our groups. Right. And, that’s and I can tell you that’s as a proportion of I’ll say, regardless how we define that. So that’s a, that’s a key number. I, I, I’m concerned with so I know who’s in the groups according to the database.

00;06;20;06 – 00;06;20;22

Pete

Sure.

00;06;20;25 – 00;06;51;07

Richard

And then in terms of attendance, we have not chosen to do a regular week, submit a report kind of thing. Sure. I feel a little lot like that. That amount of information collecting, chasing, processing is not really where I want to spend my time. Okay? What we do instead is a, once a term survey to group leaders saying, is there anyone in your group has been less than 50% present at church or Grace group?

00;06;51;09 – 00;07;19;12

Richard

And we collect, find names, find out about that in that way. And, twice a year, we do, a snapshot. We call this a snapshot and say on this particular Sunday in this particular week, what how many of your group members were at church or group? Not the names. And that will tell us we have maybe on this particular week, 60% or 70% of group members there at, at group or church.

00;07;19;14 – 00;07;24;24

Richard

And that’s something that can give us data over time, a trend. Sure.

00;07;24;26 – 00;07;30;19

Pete

And so what are you asking in that survey to give an idea of how healthy the groups are?

00;07;30;22 – 00;07;56;25

Richard

Yeah, it’s a relatively recent thing, this one. But, what I’ve decided to do is really focus on three aspects of group health, and design questions around that. So the three aspects, leader health on the latest spiritually healthy, is the group healthy? The group dynamics, the, things that make up a healthy group and then what about the individuals, who’s struggling?

00;07;56;25 – 00;08;25;25

Richard

Who who are they training? Something like that. So the three components healthy latest healthy group and the individuals. Yep. Form the basis of this survey, which I’ve really tried to keep down as minimal as possible. Maybe just 12 questions. Sure. And that as we get that filled in and we assumed latest to fill that in, we can get a bit of an idea of the, the, the health of the groups based on the health of those three different areas.

00;08;25;27 – 00;08;26;23

Richard

So.

00;08;26;25 – 00;08;47;04

Pete

All right, so we if you look in the toolbox, there’s actually we’ve got a note of just what that survey looks like. So you’ve got an ID there. But yeah is the the health is one of those things that you’re particularly I mean, I know you’re asking questions about, leadership and growth, the, the group and the individuals, but what are you particularly looking for in those things?

00;08;47;04 – 00;08;48;20

Pete

What’s the what’s your key outcome?

00;08;48;20 – 00;09;10;06

Richard

Yeah. Well, our key outcome is overall is healthy groups that people want to go to and are effective in leading to Christian growth. So we do have a once a year survey as well across church that asks all members, questions like, do they enjoy coming to group? Do they feel like they growing at church? Do they feel like at group?

00;09;10;08 – 00;09;39;04

Richard

Do they feel like they group members care for each other? That kind of thing. So the health of the group, we do have a focus on maturity and growth. But we see the other aims as having, application there or ample purposes, I should say. So we do want groups that are also expressing love and care for each other, who are outward looking, praying for the lost, who are serving each other, serving the church, who have rich prayer and devotional lives.

00;09;39;06 – 00;09;43;08

Richard

But, yeah, we do want groups that are where people go.

00;09;43;11 – 00;09;47;16

Pete

Okay, is there an ideal size for the group?

00;09;47;18 – 00;09;51;27

Richard

Yeah, I think there is no simple answer to that. So.

00;09;52;04 – 00;10;09;03

Pete

I think because I’ve had some interesting conversations with Dave Moore, who’s on your staff team, and I think you and I may have talked a little bit about this as well, that. Yeah, it’s a, it’s a it’s not as clear as I think sometimes we think. But yeah. Tell me a bit more about your idea of the ideal size or some of the dynamics that are going on there.

00;10;09;04 – 00;10;38;21

Richard

Yeah. Well let me talk. Cut me off, interrupt if you like. But, there was a book called, Leading Small Groups that thrive. So I did a review on the Gospel Coalition, Australia website, and they had an interesting page there of, a couple of pages talked about group size. And they according to their research, they found that groups, experienced the most growth and change if they were kind of about an eight person size, or a 20 plus kind of size.

00;10;38;24 – 00;11;09;26

Richard

So there was a bit of a gap in the middle, which I think was, because at eight a size of eight, everyone contributes. But in a size of 20 plus, the leaders are forced to think strategically about small breaking up into small groups so that again, in that context, everyone speaks. But perhaps there’s this, kind of a valley in between there where of groups of 15, 16 where it’s maybe too small to split into groups, but it’s maybe too large for everyone to contribute.

00;11;09;28 – 00;11;36;24

Richard

So that’s I think that’s really worth thinking about, as to how we arrange groups and sizes, in practice. So there’s a real wide variety. So, because of having young kids and work and travel and sickness and babies, sometimes a group of eight can really be too small. And it’s a major stress for leaders. Will they have enough people each week to have a viable group?

00;11;36;27 – 00;11;52;02

Richard

Group attendance in our church is around 60, 70%. So on paper, you’ve got a group of eight. If you’ve got, people away, you can end up with a fairly small group. It can be a bit discouraging for groups that are a bit larger. Beneficial. There.

00;11;52;04 – 00;12;11;08

Pete

My my understanding is also there’s a little bit of demographic in there as well. So younger people are quite happy to have larger groups and participate that some older people prefer smaller groups to be a part of that as well. So there’s, there’s a lot of different things, but I wonder whether sometimes our small groups are determined by the number of chairs in someone’s living room rather than the group dynamics.

00;12;11;08 – 00;12;36;02

Richard

For sure. So, yeah, if you’re a pastor at a in a country church and most people have large houses spread out, it’s going to be very normal and comfortable to have groups much larger groups, maybe with kids and families in there as well. If an urban church, people have got apartments where they can fit maybe eight around the coffee table, then that’s, there’s a reality to that.

00;12;36;09 – 00;12;54;22

Richard

And, my attitude is often that we want to encourage people into leadership. So if I can encourage someone into small group leading in, they’ve what’s going to work for them is hosting with their wife and kids sleeping in, the kids sleeping in the next room, and it’s seven, eight people. Then I would still say, yeah, let’s go for it.

00;12;54;22 – 00;12;57;00

Richard

Let’s see how we can make this work. That’s good.

00;12;57;03 – 00;13;11;07

Pete

So what I’m hearing is there’s no role like that in terms of the size of a group. It could go up to 20 or could be as small as eight anyway. Well, and you were saying there’s a valley in between, but there’s a lot of different, variables in that whole process. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00;13;11;08 – 00;13;22;23

Richard

So I’m, I’m keen to have, have groups, have leaders, have things happening, have things happening in different locations. I’m not going to, sacrifice those things in the pursuit of some ideal size. Right.

00;13;22;24 – 00;13;44;26

Pete

Okay, okay. I want to move to the relationship between the small group and the church, because I know I’ve heard this a number of times where people have said, a small group is basically just a small church where 2 or 3 together there is Jesus. So that makes it a church. Is that true? Is, is a small group just a micro church, or is there a bit more of a complicated relationship there, do you think?

00;13;44;29 – 00;13;49;14

Richard

Yeah. I don’t think that’s true. I think there’s a much healthier relationship that we can pursue.

00;13;49;16 – 00;13;52;16

Pete

I like how you put that healthy relationship. Good. Tell me a bit more about that.

00;13;52;16 – 00;14;17;10

Richard

Yeah, well, I did a, there’s a whole book section on in that book I wrote with, Anthony Barraclough. The unmissable church book, which I’d recommend if you have a look on that. I’ve read a bit on, small groups. Can they be my church? But I think. No. Yeah, I think small groups, the danger of, like, the definitely in a small group, there’s elements of church.

00;14;17;10 – 00;14;36;27

Richard

There’s the word of God that people gathered, there’s fellowship of the Holy Spirit is at work. And it’s true what Jesus said were 2 or 3 are gathered. There I am with you. But, this, that doesn’t necessarily mean that your small group is a church. I mean, interestingly, when Jesus spoke about the 2 or 3, if things didn’t work out there, what did he say?

00;14;36;27 – 00;14;38;12

Richard

He said, go and tell it, then.

00;14;38;13 – 00;14;41;01

Pete

Go and take it to the church. He’s talking about something else. There is. Yeah.

00;14;41;01 – 00;15;06;03

Richard

He’s not promoting a, an alternate view of, church and small group there. But of course, there are times when a small group, maybe that’s the only viable way to be doing church together and, and countries in, in times. Sure. But, the danger of having small group as your church, I think, to put it simply, is that it becomes all about you and meeting your needs and what is comfortable and and helpful for you.

00;15;06;08 – 00;15;45;02

Richard

So the danger is that, well, here’s a group of people I know and that’s comfortable and I prefer it that way. He’s a group that makes limited demands on me. He has a group that suits my needs at the moment. What I’d love about, that small group having its place in a larger church is that the larger church just draws our eyes to so many things that the the heavenly reality of all peoples, nations gathered around Jesus, that more people than we can know account, a larger church compels us to meet the outsider, the new person.

00;15;45;02 – 00;16;11;05

Richard

Welcome them and encourage us in ministry. In that way, the wider church has the ministry of preaching, which I think is different to the to the teaching method of small group discussion, small group discussion. There’s a level of relational comfort, and we’re trying to kind of be polite and, and and but as a preaching message, the preacher can speak very boldly, and I want people to sit under that preaching.

00;16;11;07 – 00;16;34;00

Richard

So, look, there’s a few reasons. Yeah, yeah. The relationship what I would love to see in our small groups is small groups that are committed to the vision, the prayer, the goal of the wider church and, small groups where that vision of the wider church is expressed in reality in those groups. If your church is vision, it’s all about loving people.

00;16;34;02 – 00;16;37;13

Richard

Then we want to see that expressed in our groups where there is love.

00;16;37;19 – 00;16;54;06

Pete

I agree, that’s a really interesting point that you’ve made there that sometimes if we’re thinking of our small group as our church, that can actually come out of selfishness that I’m comfortable on, but it has the facade of going, oh, it’s all about community and it’s all about. But actually at the heart of it is a selfishness there.

00;16;54;08 – 00;17;04;01

Pete

Whereas if we really love the community that Jesus is building, then we’re going to go out into those uncomfortable places, the bigger places for some people, that might be uncomfortable anyway.

00;17;04;06 – 00;17;05;05

Richard

Yeah, that’s what I reckon.

00;17;05;09 – 00;17;14;04

Pete

Yeah. All right. What about, okay. Small groups, should they get reshuffled from time to time? What do you think on that? Because they are highly relational.

00;17;14;08 – 00;17;14;21

Richard

00;17;14;23 – 00;17;21;27

Pete

Do we hold on to the relationship? Do we broaden people’s relationship out arc. And this is a one that a lot of people struggle with. What do you think?

00;17;21;29 – 00;17;34;02

Richard

Yeah, we’ve been wrestling with this recently at Hunter Bible Church and, have for many years had a yearly sign up sort of process and, are looking at sort of shifting on that a little bit recently as we, as we grow.

00;17;34;02 – 00;17;38;22

Pete

So does that mean that people will be in a different group? AG generally, not necessarily.

00;17;38;28 – 00;18;12;02

Richard

So what we’ve, said is that it’s great to form new groups and go to different groups and meet new people. It’s also great to continue with people you know and build on those relationships, as we’ve always tried to be positive about both alternatives. And although we there has been, times and congregations where there is a lot of change from year to year, that’s often been kind of forced upon us by the nature of the congregation, young people graduating uni, moving, or gross things growing so much.

00;18;12;02 – 00;18;41;10

Richard

We do need to keep creating new groups or multiplying. So it’s a lot of times out of our hands. But I think, a few things to on that question of reshuffling or continuing, again, quoting from small groups that thrive, that book I mentioned, there’s often more health and growth in newer groups. So group health is strong in the first, one, 2 or 3 years, and surprisingly, after 20 years.

00;18;41;13 – 00;18;53;15

Richard

But that’s a bit theoretical for most people. So there is more health, I think, because you’re kind of meeting new people, and people are challenging on things that you’ve taken for granted. So there’s growth there.

00;18;53;18 – 00;19;11;24

Pete

Is there’s a there’s a comfortableness that we get with people as well. I realize that that can be a good thing in terms of being able to share with people. So just explain I so I been leading a fairly big small group, but I think we’re at 25 at the moment, 24, 25. And I had them break into small groups and then I wanted to reshuffle them after a time.

00;19;11;26 – 00;19;28;09

Pete

And they almost lynched me because they said, no, no, no, no, no, we’ve just got our relationships going. Leave them alone. Yeah. And so I you know, I said, okay, we’ll go for another term. And I said, I want to reshuffle them a little bit just to extend them a little, so they get to know each other better across that bigger.

00;19;28;12 – 00;19;33;12

Richard

Yeah. I think this is where. Yeah. Tuckman s stages of group formation are quite helpful.

00;19;33;13 – 00;19;33;19

Pete

Right.

00;19;33;26 – 00;19;58;19

Richard

And that’s been a factor as we’ve looked a bit further into continuing groups. So the stages of, forming, storming, norming, performing. Yeah. If you can groups let groups run for a little bit longer. You can hopefully have groups spending more time in that performing stage. So rather than redoing the norming storming phase, on such a regular basis.

00;19;58;22 – 00;20;04;12

Pete

So you’re justifying them, coming to, just about lynch me on that is like there’s always I really good guy. I don’t.

00;20;04;12 – 00;20;04;22

Richard

Think they’re.

00;20;04;22 – 00;20;05;24

Pete

Gonna get it because I.

00;20;05;24 – 00;20;07;18

Richard

Don’t think they’re being unreasonable.

00;20;07;21 – 00;20;10;27

Pete

Guy. Fair enough, I feel rebuked. Okay. Sorry. Keep going.

00;20;11;00 – 00;20;36;16

Richard

Yeah. So, but groups, if groups can continue and spend more time in that, norming performing phase, then we can look at having, more, more growth. And so what does that mean? Depends again, on the kind of stage of life, age group situations, things like that. Younger single people can form relationships more quickly. And so the cycle perhaps can be shorter there.

00;20;36;18 – 00;20;52;12

Richard

People who, full time work or, you know, with families or whatever it may or there’s they’re commuting distances that’s going to take kind of take longer for relationships to form there. So maybe perhaps the life cycle is a bit longer.

00;20;52;15 – 00;21;09;29

Pete

What about forming new groups like, I’ve had some very bad experiences of getting a group, growing it and then splitting it into two into two smaller groups and going from there. And everyone who is involved with it said it kind of felt like it was a divorce in which family, where was I joining and that sort of thing.

00;21;10;02 – 00;21;19;00

Pete

What do you think about how do you start new groups? Is there is the split and divide thing actually unhelpful because of those relationships, or is there a better ways of doing that?

00;21;19;02 – 00;21;47;14

Richard

Yeah, I don’t think there’s any secret magic way to have 100% success with multiplying groups. The two ways that are, common, especially if you don’t have a, a yearly sort of sign up process, that yearly sign up process does allow you to sort of predict group growth and create fresh groups. And and in anticipation. But for more of the ongoing, you’ve got the option of taking two leaders, maybe a core and forming a group.

00;21;47;16 – 00;21;57;18

Richard

Share them with new people or you’ve got the option of growing a group to the size of discomfort and then multiplying going into two different groups.

00;21;57;19 – 00;21;58;12

Pete

Veronica, that.

00;21;58;12 – 00;22;18;02

Richard

Process is going to be smoother if you’re at the same location. So some of the some of our churches have groups that say all meet on a Wednesday morning or a Thursday morning, gathered around on a Wednesday night or something. If you’re in the same venue, that multiplication thing, is an easier step because you still see the people before and after.

00;22;18;05 – 00;22;39;29

Richard

There’s still that kind of support around, if you’re moving to two different addresses locations, then it is more of a challenge. I think it’s still less doable with doing and not notwithstanding your negative experience in the past. But what I think you do need is probably more people than you think. Yep. And more energy than you think.

00;22;40;07 – 00;22;53;16

Richard

And, more investment in relationship. But, so that you are both groups are launching strong, but, I think it’s a valid strategy.

00;22;53;18 – 00;23;13;04

Pete

I don’t think I did a particularly good job of taking them through change management as well. But that’s a that’s a whole different kind of thing as well. But, yeah, but I actually took that as a good thing in that people felt a closeness of relationship there. So it wasn’t a completely terrible experience for me, but it did made me stop and think, oh, is this the best way to keep multiplying or.

00;23;13;07 – 00;23;19;01

Richard

Yeah, and I’d put something like that up in a sort of top tier change management situation.

00;23;19;04 – 00;23;35;28

Pete

When you when in terms of small groups, is there something that you’ve done that you’ve gone, oh, that did not work, or perhaps it’s something you’ve seen other people do and you go, oh, you should never do that. What’s, what’s the thing that you got? I wish people wouldn’t do this in small groups either from your own experience or from what you’ve seen of others.

00;23;35;28 – 00;23;52;29

Richard

Well, now, Peter, I’m I’m pretty easy going on what people do in their ministries. I don’t tend to judge, but, I think probably the thing I would really warn against is appointing gifted people into small group leadership who are not aligned with the church’s vision of small groups and your own vision of small groups.

00;23;53;01 – 00;23;53;23

Pete

Right.

00;23;53;25 – 00;23;54;13

Richard

So they might.

00;23;54;13 – 00;23;56;02

Pete

Be talk me through that. Yeah. Yeah.

00;23;56;06 – 00;24;13;08

Richard

So that a person might be, dynamic, engaging, charismatic, have good leadership skills, qualities. Great, perhaps with the Bible. But if they have vision for what small groups are of, is different to yours, that’s going to be a bad idea. Putting them in that position.

00;24;13;10 – 00;24;24;13

Pete

So not just about I mean, obviously we’re assuming that character is of good. Yeah. Good character. But you know, having the gifting is one thing, but actually having an aligned vision is actually a really key thing. Yeah. That’s what you’re.

00;24;24;13 – 00;24;34;10

Richard

Saying. Yeah I think small group pastors sleep well at night. If they are group if they are group leaders across the church, praying for or working for to the same things that you’re praying for and working for.

00;24;34;17 – 00;24;41;12

Pete

Okay. What’s the one thing that you would love churches and leaders to pay attention to with small groups?

00;24;41;15 – 00;24;59;22

Richard

I think the one thing that leaders and pastors should pay attention for is finding clarity on the purpose of their small group, of their small group ministry. With in themselves, with their teams and with their senior leader. Find clarity. Pursue clarity on that question.

00;24;59;29 – 00;25;18;24

Pete

Okay. Great. Great answer. Clarity. Really really important. All right. In the toolbox. We got a bunch of things in there. Richard’s kindly supplied us with some information. The survey we also will have a link to leading small groups that thrive. I think I’ve also I read it off to Richard’s recommendation. 80 is a great book for small group ladies.

00;25;18;24 – 00;25;35;06

Pete

It’s really got me stopping to think, if you’re not up to actually reading the whole book, there is, of course, Richard’s review of it and, unmissable church as well as you’ve written a couple of other books as well on small group, leading and, writing a small group study. So there’s some stuff there as well as a whole bunch of things.

00;25;35;06 – 00;25;44;17

Pete

So make sure you get into that. Think carefully about your small groups. Richard, thank you so much. It’s been really great to hear about the mistakes I’ve made and help me understand those. So thank you very much. It’s been great having you.

00;25;44;21 – 00;25;47;14

Richard

Thanks so much for having me, Peter. It’s been a pleasure.

00;25;47;17 – 00;26;05;25

Pete

If you found this helpful, you may want to sit there and listen to it with your small group leaders and take them through this just to kind of make sure that you are aligned in your vision and perhaps have that discussion about what is it that we’re trying to do as a church. But whatever you do, make sure that you are continuing to hear more of the great things that we’ve got.

00;26;05;25 – 00;26;16;17

Pete

And, listen to our other podcasts, the Reach Australia podcast, where we’ve got lots of great things from our recent National Conference on Peace Chatting. Some.