New Questions for Measuring Group Success

Why the numbers game doesn't tell us if groups are accomplishing their mission

I consulted a small church of 50 members in Pennsylvania that embarked upon a small group journey ten years before they contacted me for support. They hired me to assess why they were not growing. In our first discussions about their history, they shared the titles of books they initially read, promising spiritual and numeric growth, relational evangelism, and "success" if they launched small groups. A decade later, they remain a congregation of less than 50 but didn't know why they had not grown numerically.

During my initial visit, I found a few things they could do differently to grow larger in numbers. More than any other discoveries for improvement, I found that they were doing a lot of things right. There was so much good going on in this small church! Sadly, it was all hidden beneath the discouragement that resulted by asking the common, normal questions about their small groups.

So I asked a different set of questions oriented around MissioRelate. I discovered that group members were actually sharing life together; they were counting the cost of being in relationships that mattered; they were investing in people who did not know Jesus and helping them find the cross and then Lordship; they were involved in their communities, shared their lives with the poor; and they practiced simplicity and mutual sharing. When I entered with MissioRelate questions, I found small seeds of something awesome, yet the church and groups were not seeing the explosive growth promised in all the small group literature. To read more, click here.