Class Meeting Worshop

Kingwood More To Life Groups

First, I just want to share personally what the class meeting (and band group) but this wesleyan discipleship has had a strong impact on my walk and calling. First introduced to them in seminary. These groups first helped me to walk in faith in ways that I had not know before. I was introduced to the power of prayer and the movement of the Holy Spirit through these groups. My marriage is in a different place now because of our time together in a class meeting. Our faith is in concert together. Thankful for that.

Kevin Watson Book

This led me to want to get class meeting off the ground through whatever means necessary at my church. So several years ago I basically conned congregants (and who I saw as potential leaders) to come to a new study about a small group. I used Kevin Watson’s book and led them through the 8 weeks together. Anchored this in our Wednesday night activities and we started to work through it weekly.

We will share nuts and bolts of starting the groups later, but briefly, I asked people to see it through and stay open to what God might be doing.

Praying for 3 outcomes:

Some will be called to lead a group

Some will be called to join a new group

Others will help current groups become transformational

We were going to listen to God and God was going to bring clarity, not me.

These three outcomes happened every time

I repeated this process twice a year for 3 years

eventually training some laity to lead this incubation class

After 3 years we started about 18 different groups. Some of them did not get off the ground, or they fluttered out quickly. But some of them flourished and multiplied and reached unchurched people.

We had a young adult group, we had a group in a nursing home that was evangelizing in the nursing home and caring for the community in a vulnerable time of life.

Some fruit....

Participants of class meeting:

prayer team in weekly worship

school prayer gatherings

prayer and worship nights

foster and adoption ministry

Marriages were restored

Testimony:

Mondays have taken on a new attitude since I became part of a More to Life group! I can’t wait to hear how God is working in everyone’s lives on Monday nights, and I wouldn’t miss it for anything! The Holy Spirit meets us in that space each week and we hear an encouraging message, a hard truth, or an affirmation He knows we need. Building a strong small community within our larger church community also helps me feel more connected to the body of Christ. I feel like an actual Christian! Knowing that we are praying for each other throughout the week, and that I have a place where I can be vulnerable without fear is life-giving! –Emily P.

After my life changed for the worst, it changed for the better. Amid the embarrassment and shame, and the feelings of guilt and despair, was abundant grace and community that provided the first and most important steps in the renewal of the faith that holds my life together. Through an assignment for court-appointed therapy, I recently wrote my life story. In doing so, I became aware of the importance of community and accountability in my life, my choices, and in my behavior.

I looked back at all of the peaks and valleys of my story and discovered an interesting recurrence. I found that in the peaks there was always a community providing checks and balances in my life. Conversely, amid all of the valleys I experienced isolation. Be it physical or emotional, I found that my deepest spiritual deficit was always paired with a sense that I was alone. No one really knew me- or cared to. I believed that people loved me, but only because I presented myself without any baggage. My struggles were unique, and therefore a burden to others. My sins were mine to bear. Even after I got married and had children, I felt that I was saving them from pain and heartache by withholding my struggles and presenting myself as positive and self-assured. It wasn’t until my truth was thrust into the spotlight that I came out of isolation and into a community that KUMC provided, and welcomed me into.

Since then, honesty, vulnerability, and transparency have been crucial to my recovery, and rediscovery of the life that Christ wants for me. The More to Life group has provided me and others an outlet to rediscover Christ in our lives. We share the triumphs and the failures that we experience weekly, and are given the chance to be fully known and loved by a community of our peers. The group has provided a sense of spiritual, emotional and even physical community that I have been craving. I now have an outlet to pray and praise, and serve alongside my wife. Instead of leading parallel lives, our lives are interconnected and she is my greatest accountability partner. The same can be said for our More to Life group of twelve. The way we share and support one another is community as Christ intended within the church body. We are not intended to be a group of parallel lines, but a cord of many, woven and intersecting with one another. We are honest, vulnerable, and transparent, fulfilling a promise to look after one another in love. -Zach H.

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Training Leaders

Matt asked me to talk a little about training leaders. Some of this is born just out of experience of failed groups and just repeating the process…but also my doctoral project is working on specifically training class leaders for today’s church.

Disclaimer to all that are here today, I believe in these so much that I want to tell you to get them going however you can. I could not generate entire church buy-in starting from scratch. I had to work to create a critical mass through patient repetition and then once people were bought in there was some momentum.

With that disclaimer, one of the things I noticed is that groups largely were successful depending on the class leader.

Historically, (and Kevin can jump in here if I am wrong),

Historical Class Leader:

personal pursuit of holiness

working out their own salvation.... “fleeing the wrath that is to come.”

loving accountability

they had to help their members stay involved,

stay consistency,

and expectation to have spiritual discernment and wisdom in guiding people.

But the critical piece was finding ways to encourage and push them in this direction.)

devoutly committed

In many situations this was a life-long calling.

Leaders spent time in preparation in prayer,

attending to their own soul,

and visiting sick and absent members)

I am sure we could list other attributes but from most of the early testimony and writing we could agree on these.

In my experience in a modern class meeting, these things are necessary and important. Especially considering how important, Kevin and others have pointed out the class meeting to be as a means of grace.

“The class meeting was not just a means for facilitating mutual accountability; it was also a communal means of grace whereby men and women came to experience the reality of sanctification and the myriad levels of transformation that it entailed.” -Andrew Thompson

So two things I will touch on: the class leader in a meeting, and the class leader outside the meeting

Leading a Meeting: Much of this is taught in experiencing the class meeting. Using Watson’s book and modeling what it looks like to be a class leader.

Accountability

Early on I shied away from this because I was worried about pushing people away. Had to get over this.

Challenging people that do not share each week, or share the same thing, or struggle to see what God is doing in the life

Listening and asking questions

Kevin covers this. Goodness we are conditioned to offer advice after any share.

Belief that God is present and at work in the conversation.

Give example

Teaching the group to watch over one another

After someone shares, I might say “ok, if i were to ask a question her I might ask......”

Stop and pray immediately, asking people to pray, etc.

Leaders outside the meeting: Ongoing training, prayer gatherings, etc.

Belief in prayer and the grace of God

This is tough to gauge, no doubt. But something you want to encourage and teach

Ongoing accountability

Great if leaders are in a band group

provided monthly or every other month meetings of leaders to share struggles, testimonies, and to equip them there

Consistent support

Ongoing training: prayer, sanctification, leadership

Commitment to their group

Quit putting all your best leaders on finance and trustees and SPR....we need class leaders