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Mar
6
F Leader , Paul Wilkinson

Social Space

By Paul Wilkinson

Social spaces consist of 20~70 people and are efficient at creating community, facilitation mission, and promoting spiritual practices.[i] Jesus’ social context was the 70 who were sent out in Luke 10:1. Many of our LIFE Groups function in this context on a weekly basis and even more LIFE Groups function like this during fellowship events.
Social spaces are crucial for our discipleship strategy, so, we must leverage them well. Part of that leveraging is to be sure that they function as a social space instead of a public space. It is very easy to allow a social space to become “preaching” focused instead of community led and they can become sources of mere inspiration as opposed to engaged mission. As group leaders, we must be vigilant to preserve the community feel while keeping the challenge and vision perpetually in front of our members.
To accomplish those tasks, we must nurture L, I, and E well. You have been called as the F leader and spiritual guide for the group; it is crucial that you develop a leadership team to handle these functions for the group. Through the L and I function (Love one another and Involved in biblical community), you will be able to develop the community feel needed for confidence in the faith and the carrying of one another’s burdens. Most groups have prayer time and send those prayers out weekly by email. Continue to do that but also consider tracking them to completion so that, eventually, there might be as many praises for answered prayers as there are petitions. Moreover, even when prayers aren’t answered in the way we’d like, by tracking them we can see how God is working in our lives. Also, don’t neglect your group fellowships because it is a non-classroom setting where people will inevitably relate in a different way. Pot lucks are always a strong way to go!
The E function calls for community engagement. This function has traditionally been the most difficult to sustain on a regular basis. Some tools that might help you are to find someone in your group with a particular passion. While everyone in that group might not share the passion, this person will nevertheless champion it and sway others to be on mission. Make that person your E leader. We can help find this person through PLACE data and the like. Be sure to have times of debrief and follow-up for the projects that you do. Debriefing will allow time for introspection on how God is working through the service and follow-up will help foster continued care, focus, and community with those you serve.
In short, to maximize the social space well, you must delegate. You cannot immerse yourselves in the Word the way that most of you do and the way we ask you to do while also juggling these other duties. Furthermore, a pivotal step in discipleship is raising people up into leadership roles consistent with their gifts and abilities. Do not cheat them out of these discipleship opportunities.
Meditate on the Luke 10 passage with how Jesus relates to the 70. Continue to focus on your calling as spiritual guide and shepherd while beginning to pray that God raises up from within your groups individuals with a heart for inreach and outreach. It will not come back void.
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[i] http://dandelionresourcing.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/Infographic-The-5-Contexts-of-Discipleship.jpeg

Feb
27
F Leader , Paul Wilkinson

Personal Space

By Paul Wilkinson

Our Jesus example of Personal Space is Jesus’ relationship to the 12. Recall that Jesus’ Divine Space was His prayer retreats with the Father and the withdrawing from the crowds (Mark 1:35 and Luke 6:12). Jesus’ Transparent Space was with Peter, James, and John (Luke 9:28-36). Those spaces afforded Jesus deeper understanding of His identity, firmer realization of His calling, fuller intimacy with close friends, and greater openness with trusted brothers. Personal Space provides a context for closeness, support, and challenge.
Personal spaces consist of 4-12 people so that many of our LIFE Groups will fall into this category. And even if a group has more than 12 members, I suspect that the membership will spontaneously split themselves into Personal Groups based on who they sit with each week and who they spend time with outside of LIFE Group time.
If your LIFE Group is larger than 12 people, then you should occasionally split them into groups of 4-8 for prayer time or group work. When I do mini-Immersions and Focus Groups that have >50 participants, I like to set the context of the lesson and then throw out a direct, thought-provoking question that they can wrestle with in groups of 4-8. I find that the depth of conversation, the sense of accountability, and the idea of ownership all dramatically increase.
Personal Spaces offer support. Do not forsake your prayer time, and prayerfully consider keeping track of prayers so that you might, one day, raise as many prayers of praise as prayers of petition. Do not trick yourself into thinking that discipleship is not happening if you are losing lesson teaching time (a tremendous challenge for me!). Teaching is only one dimension of discipleship, so be sure to think holistically and balanced about discipleship. The question is not whether we cover our teaching outlines in full, rather the question is whether our members are speaking and acting more like Jesus. If you have the opportunity to detour from the lesson plan to pray over a member or hear a testimony, then trash the outline. As my preaching professor said: no one knows what’s on your outline but you, so make your main points early so that if you hit a high moment where your sermon should end . . . end it!
We must challenge our group members. We have invited them into a discipling relationship that seeks to form, transform, and conform them into the image of Christ. Set clear expectations for them: Being a part of this group means ________. Being a follower of Christ means ________. And when they are not meeting those expectations, you should graciously challenge them to live into who they’re called to be. As shepherds, we must continually cast vision for our members when they lose it.
I think of one guy, in particular, who loved to teach doctrine so people would know what they believed. However, this guy never really modeled faith for his group by seeking to minister to them throughout the week. He just filled their heads with knowledge on Sunday morning without demonstrating and challenging them to live it. He was given a book called Conformed to His Image by a leader, and he was challenged, explicitly, to understand and focus on his own spirituality so that he would lead by example and overflow. Relationship built through personal space allowed this leader to challenge me. As you nurture this space, you will gain more liberty to challenge your group members more fully.