We have a series of discussion guides for different aspects of discipleship:
• Experiencing God
• Spiritual Responsiveness
• Authentic Relationships
• Personal Transformation
• Disciplemaking
• Generous Living
• Sacrificial Service
• Community Transformation
Each of these Dimensions of Discipleship guides is a five-week study. For instance, let’s say you want your small groups to dive deeper into Generous Living. The Generous Living guide spends one week each on the following topics:
• Managing your time and resources for Kingdom purposes
• Using your spiritual gifts to bless others
• Giving your money generously and wisely
• Showing hospitality without favoritism
• Living out your God-given calling
Each week’s study includes a key question, some thoughts on the topic, related scripture passages, discussion questions, and action steps. What does this mean for your groups? No homework for those in the groups, and no preparation work for those leading them. Yet you’re still providing depth of content and scriptural principles.
The material and layout makes it easy to just download and use them. One church is creating a complete group structure around these guides.
First, they open sharing time by asking, “How have you experienced God this week?” The question allows people to share what’s going on in their lives personally and spiritually, as well as prepping them to pay attention to God’s work in their lives in the future (since they learn that they’ll be asked that question again each week.)
Then they read aloud the scripture passages and work through that guide’s discussion questions together.
They end their time by praying for one another (which has been deepened by the sharing time at the beginning) and by praying for others around them, that they would serve faithfully as the hands and feet of Jesus to the surrounding community.
You can start with any one of the guides. You don’t need to go through all of them, and they don’t need to be done in any particular order.
If you’d like to see a free downloadable document that unpacks and overviews each of the 8 areas, click here. If you’d like to see the discipleship guides available for purchase, click here.
Purchase our latest book: “The Discipleship Difference: Making Disciples While Growing As Disciples”