What Happened to Small Groups?

Think about the evolution of small group ministries from its inception until now. What happen to small groups? What has become of this ministry today? Would it be fair to define small group ministry as a robust group of young believers who are actively engaging the missing? Or would we see a small group of Christians who passionately pursue intimacy and nurture in relationship. With all that said, I remember a very talented parachurch group that traveled across America offering training in small group evangelism. Small groups were being herald as the solution to church intimacy and church growth. The prospect was exciting.

The most creative idea I heard that weekend was the empty chair concept. We arranged our chairs in a semi-circle and the group leader sat an empty chair in the middle of the circle. He then emphasized the importance of filling the chair with one of our friends or neighbors in the coming week. This was my first experience with the empty chair and it pumped me up. But not only me, everyone was encouraged to think, “friend.” The session ended with a rally cry. And we kept it very close to our heart: “they might not come to a church building but they’ll come to your home.”

It’s been almost twenty years now. And I find it unfortunate that this may have been as close as we came to establishing a missional goal for small group ministries. If so, at some point in time we lost our way. Most small groups I’ve been involved with have become a home bible class study with no concrete evidence to offer that would show our care and concern for the people Jesus misses the most. And few have shown a concern for building relational intimacy with other believers. Maybe the format is not conducive to the accomplishment of those things.

Small groups never took off because of the natural tension that exists between nurture and evangelism. Nurture comes natural, evangelism does not. I can remember the dialogue—should we incorporate nurture groups and evangelistic groups as one or should we form two separate groups? There was never clear direction on this so we went with what came natural–hoping we could be evangelistic without being intentional.