To continue this series, here I will issue 5 concerns I have with our structure of small groups. In the next post (tomorrow or Thursday) I will issue some specific ways in which my concerns affect our college ministries. But this must come first.
I want to make sure it’s clear that these are concerns, not condemnations. There is certainly beauty that takes place in many small(er) groups. I do believe however that these concerns are things we ought to take into consideration and honestly process through.
Of course some of these concerns apply only to some, not all, contexts and groups. But I do think that these apply to MUCH more than we’d like to admit. This structure we’ve instituted over the last 40 or so years, I think, needs to be evaluated clearly and honestly. This series is an attempt to help us do just that – especially in our individual college ministries.
An overarching question I’d like to ask for this is: Are small groups the BEST way to go about ministry with college-age people? Only you can answer that for your ministry – and I hope this conversation helps you in clarifying your position in the ministry in which you serve.
Here are my 5 concerns:
They have an illusion of accountability. Small groups are said to be a structure for accountability, but the truth is they are not. They are a structure for disclosure, not necessarily accountability. In a small group that meets weekly we are only accountable for those things we disclose to others in that particular group. This is “selective” accountability at best. To take this a step further we only disclose what we see in ourselves – which we know we are blinded to some things. In addition, we not only have to see the issue, but we must also want help with that particular area in our lives. True accountability comes when my friends know all my other friends. I can’t hide. True accountability comes when people see me – not at a men’s group – but with my wife and kids on a daily basis. People see all the areas of me, not just those I see in myself and disclose to others. This, is accountability.
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Chuck Bomar is pastor of Colossae Church in Portland, Oregon and founder of CollegeLeader (
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Thanks for starting this discussion! Here are some thoughts on your 5 concerns:
They have an illusion of accountability. I agree with what you’ve said, and there are definitely limitations due to selective disclosure and involvement in each others lives. But I think what you’ve shared as real accountability is very difficult to achieve. Small groups may not get to the pinnacle of accountability, but they can certainly come closer than what we’ve normally got going on in Christian circles. And I advocate that the small group isn’t simply a once-a-week one hour encounter, but that life is shared outside of it as well. Our leaders have generally all come to realize that meeting once a week simply isn’t enough.
They are centered on sameness. Maybe we’re different than other places, but that hasn’t been completely true for us. Sure they’re the same age group and life stage, but we have a wide range of spiritual levels (radically growing in Christ to non-believers) as well as nationalities (obviously many Americans, also Indians and Chinese students).
They can make discipleship more difficult. When you talk here about older mature believers, are you referring to adults? I’m guessing that’s what you mean. I completely agree that connecting college students with adults is one of the great challenges of collegiate ministry, especially ones that are not directly tied to a church. We are trying to establish an adopt-a-student ministry in our local churches to deal with this challenge. I see this from a little bit of a different angle, though. To me, having students disciple other students is key because we’re trying to teach them how to be disciplers. The skills they learn by discipling their peers will be skills they can implement for the rest of their lives – and hopefully ones that they’ll be willing to pour into the younger generations to come.
They can enable compartmentalization. This ties back a bit to what I said earlier – I think a small group meeting needs to be a catalyst for life outside of the group. That could mean serving together, random fun get togethers, intentional one-on-one time between different members or something else. But I think this objection can tie to much of Christian culture as a whole. I think for many people, church attendance is just as compartmentalized. I am more concerned about what students are doing with the other 160+ hours of their week.
They can enable (maybe even create) consumeristic mentality. This is definitely a challenge, and I think it goes along with what I said above. I think in all realms of ministry we’ve got to continually challenge, model and provide opportunities (to an extent, some of it just needs to come from them) for them to be outward focused. I think our natural tendency is to migrate toward the Christian bubble, whether it’s in collegiate ministry or church life in general.
I hope I didn’t come off too antagonistic here, because those are all legitimate concerns in small group ministry. But I think if we recognize that, we can take steps to avoid those challenges and make our groups that much better and more effective.
Jason, thanks so much for your feedback and insight into this conversation. i’ll try to respond to some of what you were saying, maybe bringing some clarity and food-for-thought to the discussion as well.
The type of accountability I’m talking about can be done, we are doing it in my church now. Is it difficult? Sure, maybe. But just in different ways. The hard part is our approach is completely different – you can’t do it “both” ways at the same time.
My definition of sameness – in this post anyway – is in age and life stage, not personality or spiritual depth. I should’ve clarified that. I think the more we have structure that values difference (life/age/personality/giftedness) is the right way to go. This means, at least in my church, where we don’t allow for an infrastructure that would enable people to devalue people who are younger or older – which obviously happens in far too many churches. so, we’re not even going down that path. Our structure only allows for college-age people to live life with older, more mature believers and vice versa. I talk a lot about this in my book, College Ministry 101. Now, as a pastor of a church we are creating the culture here in our church as a whole. And, it is working.
I agree with your very last sentence. But I would issue this thought: the definition of insanity is doing the same thing and yet expecting different results. I do think we need to change what we do. I’m not saying throw out the baby with the bath water, but I would challenge anyone who says we’re going to keep doing the same thing, but I think something different will happen than 40-50 years of history has shown.
Hope that helps….or maybe opens up other cans of worms.
What does your approach to accountability look like?
As far as the sameness goes, do you think that’s a legitimate possibility for a ministry that’s not tied to a specific church? Here are a couple of issues I face in that realm: first off, I’m not a pastor of any of our supporting churches, and only two of those supporting churches are even in our small college town. I’ve been very involved in one of those churches for 13 years now, and the other one I am currently interim preacher while they search for a new pastor. But I still don’t have a lot of influence to set a new culture in either one. Both tend toward separating people according to sameness: there’s the typical Sunday School approach with the old people together, the young marrieds together, the youth together, etc. This keeps college students away from the older generations. Second, many of our students either don’t attend any church at all or attend one that isn’t either of the two I have a connection with. Maybe I should make an effort here, but I don’t really know much at all about what goes on in those churches. Do you think a legitimate older-younger discipleship plan could work in that situation?
On the side, as I said before that’s why we’re working on the adopt-a-student ministry at those two churches. It seems there’s almost nothing currently that allows those two groups to legitimately interact with each other, so we’re trying to create a new way to make that happen.
well, our approach it community based. when i say community i’m referring to a group of people that live in a specific area/location. so, in our church here it’s geographically designated, not divided by age/life stage or sex. This means that i live life with all kinds of different people and families. they see me with my wife and kids, interacting on a daily basis. the approach is kind of like, “you don’t know someone until you live with them.” the more we live life together true accountability comes because it’s not based on my disclosure of only things i see, but instead over time people can see the whole me. i know that sounds “idealistic” but the truth is we live in this daily now. it’s not only sustainable, but can also be implemented even in a mega-church setting. people just need to pay the price of time and actually have to the life of a believer – in all aspects. this is the tough part because people don’t really want this type of accountability. But, in my mind, that’s ok.
in regards to your second question, i would say that it most likely cannot happen outside of the context of a local church. which is one of the reasons why i think everyone needs to be connected to a local church. however, believers from a church can offer themselves as mentors to college-age people, which means they would be “connected” to a church. my definition of connection has VERY little to do with attendance to any formal gathering. i do believe attendance could come, but usually because they were connected to a person first – – which is the beauty of your “adopt a student” approach.. i talk about this in the book a ton too.
your situation is not unique. i do think no matter the structure we find ourselves in, nobody is going to question us by individually connecting people to each other. and, again, in CM 101 i take this a step further and say that true connection happens “off the church campus.” i say that because too often we think of connection being at a service or in some type of group. these can provide intimate connection with others, but it’s not the only way. i don’t take that approach anymore. i stick to one connection at a time and have seen it REALLY pay off over time. but, time is the price to pay. no mass production is going to happen.
I am definitely enjoying your comments.
This all appears to be how you focus your college ministry. We focus on having it be sameness for an evangelistic purpose, that people groups are often reached faster by those who walk alongside of them in the same people group. It seems to me that college ministry may not be the mechanism to create multi-generational interaction. It also assumes the church as a whole embraces discipling of college students which doesn’t always appear to be the case.
As for compartmentalization, we challenge our leaders to create community and explain that it never happens on one night a week and then it is often bonded together deeper along a mission target focus. When they serve together, they love each other.
To try and combat the consumeristic mentality, we challenge all our groups to go through REAP devotion study together and have different people lead the discussion each week, even build it into your group by taking 20 minutes and saying every go Read these verses, Examine what they say, Apply it to an area of your life, Pray over it and then come back and talk about it.