Being In An MCG

When we put our faith and trust in Jesus for salvation we are not saved into isolation. We join the Kingdom of God - we are adopted into God’s eternal family. This isn’t meant to be just a nice idea, or something that’s only realised in eternity. God’s intention is that we participate in the community of His people now. There is no option in the Bible for ‘Jesus and me’ Christianity.

The community of God’s people is not to be an isolated, closed club, but a vibrant, sanctifying, outward focussed group of people who are “in the world but not of the world.”

As a local congregation grows in size, the ability to have a close relationship with everyone begins to diminish. So, at Disciples Church, as well as having our corporate gathering on Sundays, we also have smaller groups who can do life together through the week. We call these Missional Community Groups.

Our ambition at DC is that every member would be an active participant in one of our Missional Community Groups - not to see this as an optional extra, but rather a central and vital element of living out real and genuine faith, as a follower of Jesus.

This is why we refer to our Missional Community Groups as the “engine room of ministry,” and why we often say our groups are the “cake” and Sunday services are the “icing on the cake!”

If you have come to Disciples Church from another church, then you may feel that you already have a handle on small groups and how they operate. But what we have learned since the church was planted is that this might not necessarily be the case.

Yes, we gather through the week in groups, but the ministry philosophy behind our Missional Community Groups may be totally different to what you have experienced before. This can sometimes lead to misunderstandings or confusion about expectations. This is one of the things we are hoping to address in this little booklet.

A Missional Community Group is not a bible study group (where you can pop over to someone’s house for a few hours on Wednesday night but remain disconnected for the rest of the week). It’s not a social event a few times a month (that you can choose to attend if its convenient). It’s not a volunteer group for a particular service project. It’s not any one of these things because, in a sense, its all these things, and more!

When Jesus said to go and make disciples He had more in mind than simply getting people to attend a Bible study. His intention was nothing short of total transformation, which is why our Missional Community Groups focus not just on the proclamation of the Gospel, but on living it out as well.

As much as we want to make it sound attractive, life in our groups isn’t always perfect. Relational difficulties can often arise as different personalities and cultural backgrounds affect our interactions. But this is where the Gospel empowers us to grow in grace, repentance and forgiveness, and where God is glorified as we grow in love for one another.

Jesus gave us the Great Commission to go and make disciples of all nations (Matthew 28:19). This was not a command for the select few. Yes, some Christians have a specific gift of evangelism (Ephesians 4: 11), but that does not mean that everyone else does not need to actively participate in sharing the Good News of Jesus with others. We are all to be Christ’s ambassadors (2 Corinthians 5: 20).

With this in mind, we want our groups to be much more than inwardly focused social clubs. That’s why we have called them Missional Community Groups.

So often, we can get into a mind-set where all we think about is what’s happening in our own little world - we focus on our kingdom instead of the Kingdom of God. When we are doing life together in community, we can be encouraging one another with what is really important.

Together we can be strategising, planning and praying for how we can be reaching friends, neighbours and family. There’s a multitude of ways we can be engaging with people who don’t yet know Jesus, and together we can show them what it looks like to follow Jesus.

The strategy of large scale impersonal evangelism no longer seems to be as effective as it used to be. In an era where there is a degree of hostility toward religion and churches, we are finding that relational outreach efforts are proving far more fruitful. It takes longer, so it means being prepared to “play the long game,” but the joy that comes from seeing a soul won to Christ is awesome!

Jesus said that you will know who His followers are by how they love each other (John 13: 35). The Apostle Paul gives us a very helpful description of what that love looks like (1 Corinthians 13: 4 - 7). Our aim with our Missional Community Groups is that people would be able to see that kind of love in action.

Thing is, we like the experience of being loved, but by nature we are not that inclined to do the loving. So, it’s only when we are transformed by the love of Jesus that we can truly embrace what it means to love others. And being in a community means we have plenty of opportunity to practice!

The key is focus. We take the focus off ourselves, and we put the focus on others. What can I do to be a blessing to the others in my group? When our thinking is “others first, me second” we start to follow Jesus in the attitude He had in coming to earth to be our Saviour.

In Jerusalem, just after Pentecost, the early church experienced a sweet season of growth, which was characterised by an outbreak of love for one another that people found very attractive (Acts 2: 44 - 47). We believe that when people see the fruit of the Gospel being lived out in tangible ways in people’s lives, it will draw them toward an understanding of God’s love for us in Christ.

Our challenge then is to replace our “what are people doing for me” attitudes with “what can I do for someone else?” Practically, this can take many different forms. It might be as simple as dropping a meal around when someone is sick, minding kids while their parents have a date night, helping people move house, or maybe something on an even bigger scale. If you don’t know where to start, ask your leaders.

The Apostle Paul was very concerned that followers of Jesus grew in their faith (Ephesians 3: 14 - 19). The writer to the Hebrews scolded his readers for being ‘spiritual babies’ who weren’t growing in their faith (Hebrews 5: 11 - 6: 3). And Paul wrote to Timothy to encourage him to invest time into people so they would grow in their faith and be equipped to then invest in others (2 Timothy 2: 2)

Just so we are clear, discipleship is a pro-active process of helping someone follow Jesus so they become mature in their faith and equipped to help someone else.

This is not just about acquiring Bible knowledge. Yes that’s important. However, knowledge that does not result in transformation is ultimately useless. We don’t want to just know the Gospel, we want to see the Gospel lived out in real and tangible ways.

This means being real with one another about what’s going on in our lives, being transparent about our struggles with sin, and being ready to encourage each other to look to Jesus for our identity and our hope.

In our Missional Community Groups we are keen to disciple people (particularly our members) who are available, faithful, teachable and reliable. These are people who are serious about what it means to have Jesus as Lord of your life. If that describes you, our leaders will invest time in your life to help you grow. This may involve one-to-one meet ups, or small DNA (Discipleship, Nurture, Accountability) groups. Rather than a one size fits all Bible study, we aim to tailor discipleship to be the right fit for each person.

The mission of Disciples Church is to Make Disciples, Mature Disciples and Multiply Disciples.

Therefore the goal of our Missional Community Groups is making, maturing and multiplying disciples. People putting their faith in Jesus for salvation, becoming mature in their faith, and then people multiplying out to form new groups.

A Missional Community Group is not meant to be a cul-de-sac where the same group of people hang out together forever. For some people a cul-de-sac might sound safe, but for others it might sound terribly claustrophobic.

What we have found in practice is that as people grow in their faith together, their love for one another grows too, and then when multiplication happens it can actually involve some grief. We refer to these as “Gospel good-byes.” This is where you intentionally and selflessly choose to go and start again with another group of people so that you might encourage them to be on mission and grow in their faith.

Our prayer is that all our people might move beyond the “infant” stage to the “parent” stage. As this happens, it should be obvious when groups can multiply. When there are mature leaders who can disciple others, then these people can go and lead groups of their own.

Do you see the progression? People come to faith in Jesus, grow to maturity as they are discipled, start to disciple others, then go on to lead a group themselves.

Jesus saves, Jesus changes and Jesus sends. What we don’t want is for you to just settle. Following Jesus means participating in the work of sanctification (yours and others), and in the Great Commission.

Christian bookshops are filled with what seems like a limitless array of resources for Christians and churches to use. At Disciples Church, we have adopted a number of resources that are helping us in the task of making disciples. The list is not exhaustive, and we will add and subtract from time to time as we see the need, but here are some of the resources we are using at the moment:

Who is in charge of my group? And do I get a say?
Disciples Church will appoint mature and equipped people to lead each Missional Community Group. Our leaders may be singles or couples, and sometimes there are more than one couple who will co-lead a group together. These leaders are coached regularly by one of our Pastors, and they are in charge. But not without accountability and regular input from a Pastor or the Elders. The leaders of each group will make decisions about the activities of the group, social events, meeting rhythms, discipleship, and community outreach activities. But wisdom dictates that they should consult with the people in their group regularly, and listen to what group members have to say. That doesn’t mean the leaders have to do everything that is suggested, but they should do everything they can to listen and then make decisions that will be good for the whole group.

Can I change groups?
Maybe, but you need to have a good reason. When people are put into a group, a fair bit of thought and prayer has gone into making that decision. That doesn’t mean we always make the right decision, but we do want you to know that it isn’t a decision that is made lightly. There are a number of factors that are taken into account - things like demographic, lifestyle season, geographic, group capacity, perceived maturity, and so on. So if someone is to change groups, we’d like to hear a pretty mature, constructive reason why the change should be made.

What if I don’t like the people in my group?
Well, we have found that there will generally come a time when everyone feels like this! But not liking people is generally not a reason that we accept when considering a group change. The reason for this is that we believe the Gospel is powerful enough to bring us together, regardless of our personalities, personal preferences and interests. Often, it’s our differences that the Lord uses to refine us and sanctify us. Sometimes the issue is with the other person and God is going to use them to teach you patience and perseverance. Sometimes the issue is with you, and while you may not realise it at first, there is something about how you are treating the other person that God wants to change. As sinners, we naturally tend to respond to one another sinfully, but in the Gospel we have the power to change that, and even to love the unlovely. Your leaders can help you with this.

Can I mix socially with other people from church who are not in my group?
Yes. But here’s the thing; we need to be careful that you are not simply doing what is comfortable and easy. The philosophy of our Missional Community Groups involves a high degree of intentionality. We intentionally pour time and effort into people we are reaching out to, and people in our groups, so that we can do life with them and point them to Jesus. Often, this is not easy and comfortable. Often there are others we might prefer to hang out with. We get that. But we see it as a sign of growing maturity when people intentionally invest time in others for kingdom purposes, rather than just pleasing ourselves.

I feel my group is too big. Why aren’t there more, smaller groups?
Yes, sometimes our groups do grow to involve a good number of people. And generally, smaller is better to manage. However, we have resolved that multiplication will only happen once we have people who are sufficiently mature and equipped to lead a group, not when numbers reach a certain level. We would love to have more groups. That’s our stated goal. But we don’t want to see groups being led by people who aren’t yet ready to lead, because it just causes too much pastoral damage. In the end that’s worse than having big groups.

I really would just prefer a traditional Bible study. Why can’t we just do that?
The reason our groups don’t usually do the traditional weekly Bible study is that we have found them to be ineffective in making disciples. We believe the reason this is the case has a lot to
do with the fact that when you are in a Bible study group it is easy to ‘hide.’ You can attend,
not say much, maybe participate in a short prayer time, and go home feeling like you’ve done something - but the reality is, you’ve not really engaged in any truly meaningful interaction. Please don’t misunderstand - we think studying the Bible is a great thing to do. However, we have found that it works best in the context of a discipling relationship that’s grounded in transparency and accountability.

To conclude this section we feel we need to finish with a bit of a reality check. While we have high ambitions for our Missional Community Groups, experience has shown us that achieving all these things is not easy. However, two things spur us on: 1) we are very convicted that there are sound Biblical grounds for this model, and 2) we’ve seen it bearing fruit.

So, while we are excited to have our Missional Community Groups as the engine room of ministry at Disciples Church, we want your expectations to be grounded in a certain level of reality.

If your expectations are that:

• it will be easy to be vulnerable and transparent with your life;
• group leaders will always get it right and never slip up;
• you won’t have to contribute much;
• everyone in the group will always be nice and never annoying;
• people you are witnessing to will quickly become Christians;

then you are going to be frustrated and disappointed.

What we do know is that God is going to use all the frustrations and difficulties to refine and grow you. So our advice is, deliberately invest in your Missional Community Group. Work with and support your leaders. Invite people over to get to know them, and they you. Ask for help when you need it. Ask others if they need your help. Check in with people to see how they’re going. Don’t pull back when things get tough. Phone, text or use social media to engage. Make space for outreach, care and discipleship to happen.

Every month the Elders of Disciples Church meet to specifically pray for every single person in the church. It is our prayer that as you do life in a Missional Community Group you will experience more of God’s grace, more of His enabling power, and more opportunities to share the Good News of Jesus with those who don’t yet know our wonderful Saviour.