Small groups are a big deal

Lee Stephenson: 00:00:08

Well, welcome everyone. Unfiltered Podcast My name is Lee Stevenson, my co host here with me.

Danny Parmelee: 00:00:13

I'm Danny Parmele from Converge Mid America.

Lee Stephenson: 00:00:16

And we're glad that you're here joining us.

We're having real conversations about church planting and we're excited today to be talking a little bit about small groups and what role small groups should play in the life of a church. Even early. Should small groups be a part of a church plant before they get started?

At what point should you launch small groups and just talking a little bit, even how small groups could potentially work. Talk to us a little bit about how small groups evolved for you, Danny, at epicos.

Danny Parmelee: 00:00:49

Yeah. Well, small groups was actually one of our most critical kind of discipleship and ministry components of our church.

I wish I could say it was all because that was my intentional master plan in the beginning, but for us, it was kind of an accidental thing that now as I work with church planters, I encourage them that if small groups are a part of their kind of discipleship path and process, then to consider what we kind of did accidentally. So what I mean by that is that we were a pioneer plan. So we started as a small group in our living room and we didn't have kind of a.

A launch large strategy, so to speak, with a group of people coming from another church. And we ended up multiplying that small group four times before we even really had an informational meeting.

And the reason that that happened is that we started a men's small group in our living room. And then of course, the wives and fiancees, they didn't know what to do with their time. So we're going to start our own small group.

So they started a small group. And then we saw, oh man, there's something kind of happening here.

So that's when each of those groups ended up multiplying before we did an informational meeting.

Now, the reason I say that I encourage other church planters to consider that is that then small groups actually became one of the key components for our church that we didn't have to kind of manufacture. It really did become part of.

Lee Stephenson: 00:02:19

It was just part of this.

Danny Parmelee: 00:02:20

It's part of the DNA and the fabric.

Lee Stephenson: 00:02:22

So we've done this from the beginning.

Danny Parmelee: 00:02:23

From the very beginning, and again, a lot of it. So what happened with our church as well is that I was preaching through books of the Bible.

And for me, it was not a high and mighty theological conviction that, you know, if you're a good pastor, you're going to preach through books of the Bible.

For me, again, it was like, this will be easier because then I can kind of just, I've got my sermon series, we're going through the book of Matthew here, type of thing. We also then connected our small groups to the sermon series. Okay, so again, it was only they.

Lee Stephenson: 00:02:57

Couldn'T do anything else, nothing else.

Danny Parmelee: 00:03:00

And maybe it wasn't that rigid in the beginning. In the beginning, this is what was provided, and so people just did it and it would be all right.

So once we had launched as a church, all right, so I preached on this, and then I would, that evening go and write up the small group questions and kind of distribute those to the groups. And what happened for us because of that is that it created a very easy, reproducible system.

So even within our first year, our system was, all right, there's going to be a leader in each group and there's going to be an apprentice.

So that you do have that intentionality of eventually multiplying to another group, but it was reproducible in the sense that people saw, okay, well, there's a curriculum that's provided. I don't need to be a Bible scholar to lead these small groups. So I'm just going to take this curriculum that's given.

I don't even have to study a lot because if I just come and hear the sermon, I'll at least be able to participate or facilitate. So that's what started for us kind of in the beginning and even kind of grew over time. And we, you know, solidified a lot of those systems.

We made mistakes along the way and wrestled through different tensions that I think a lot of people do with small groups.

Lee Stephenson: 00:04:16

That's good. Did you guys get pushback when you kind of say, hey, this is the only style of small group that we do? How did you manage that?

Danny Parmelee: 00:04:25

We just kicked anybody out that didn't want to do it that way. So absolutely. I cannot tell you the amount of times that people wanted to do a Beth Moore Bible study.

And I love Beth Moore and my wife loves Beth Moore. And it was like, well, we just want to do something different.

So, again, this is what we stumbled upon later is that we just recognized seasons of ministry. And for us, our kind of small group season tended to be follow the school calendar. It started in September and it ended in May or June.

And we kind of encourage then in summers for small groups not to meet and to give small group leaders a break.

But if people kind of wanted to, outside of the quote unquote system, there wasn't A sign of relation at a time that this was your opportunity to grab a couple people, maybe it's even people that weren't in your group before, and you can do a study on anything that you wanted to do. So for us, and that we did maintain all the way up until the time that I transitioned out of my role, and they still do it that way.

And the reason I say that is whatever you kind of deliver as your. Here's what we want taught in small groups is what we want it to look like.

If you build that fence, just understand that people are gonna go about 20ft beyond that fence. So if you build a really wide fence, it's gonna go even further than that, and you're just gonna have creep.

Lee Stephenson: 00:05:56

That, you know, will becomes way more difficult to manage.

Danny Parmelee: 00:06:00

It becomes way more difficult to manage, which, again, that could be part.

And if small groups are not a part of how you are seeing that God is leading you and your church in that discipleship process, then you do something different. I'm not saying this is the only way to do it, but for us, it was the systematic thing that when people came on Sunday, we want you to come on Sunday.

And then we're going to ask, which small group are you going to be in? That's what. We put all of our eggs in that basket. So.

Lee Stephenson: 00:06:30

Okay, okay, what. What was the expectation for you guys when it came to group multiplication?

Yeah, you know, did you want to keep groups together as long as they could? Was it an expectation like, man, we're going to rapidly multiply these groups and just constantly adding people to groups.

What was the procedure that took place there?

Danny Parmelee: 00:06:48

Yeah, so lots of. Lots of learning in there. In the beginning, we had kind of a very strict numeric.

All right, as soon as you hit 10 people in your group, then that group becomes two groups of five? We always said there was no such thing as splitting your small group. We had a small group swear jar.

If you ever said split, it's like, no, this is multiplying. That was really bad for us, this idea of taking 10 and making it five.

Because as you probably know, groups, it takes a while to even begin to build trust and relationship. And all of a sudden you can have a group and they're gelling great.

And then from above, while we hit the magic number of 10, now we need to go 5 and 5.

So what we learned is that when we hit small group multiplication, instead of just basing it on numbers, the main thing was, is do we have an apprentice leader that is ready to Go.

And when they would branch off to multiply to a new group, they would maybe take one or two people from that group, maybe nobody from that group to start the new group instead of saying, all right, we've got this whole group.

The other thing we'd say is maybe the main leader is the one actually that breaks off so that the apprentice leader is the one that has this group, because starting jelling, they're already gelling. And so they can kind of learn where the more experienced leader is, the apostolic leader, so to speak, to be able to multiply another one. So.

So that's where we landed more. It is always. It's a tension. So you might as well just say it's a tension, this whole open and closed group. And we never figured it out completely.

And I don't think anybody can figure it out that there is this balance of always wanting anybody in the church to be able to kind of join a small group. And yet at the same time, how do you foster and maintain true vulnerability and authenticity? That really only happens over time and over experiences.

So that's something that, again, I don't think there's a magic bullet to say, okay, well, a group is closed for this amount of time or open for this amount of time.

So we kind of had different times where we pushed small groups so people came into them, they could kind of join them whenever unless it was, you know, reached too large of a amount of people. So over 12, we really said, it's not a small group after that. You can't.

Lee Stephenson: 00:09:17

Who had the expectation of growing and connecting people to groups. Was that a shared responsibility between the church and a small group leader?

Was it mainly driven from the church perspective, or was that something mainly driven from the group leader himself?

Danny Parmelee: 00:09:36

What do you mean?

Lee Stephenson: 00:09:38

You know, when I look back on, we went through seasons with small groups, and there were seasons where we got a lot of pushback because small group leaders wanted to build a group, but they looked at the church that we were the ones responsible to build their group.

Danny Parmelee: 00:09:53

Oh, right. Yeah.

Lee Stephenson: 00:09:54

You know, and we found, like, that there was this turmoil that was creating that was unhealthy. And so we ended up eventually kind of going to the point of saying, no, small group leaders. You have the responsibility to build your own group.

So that way it's like, we'll give you a platform. We'll announce the fact that you're a small group leader, but that's basically where we stop from that standpoint.

Danny Parmelee: 00:10:18

Yeah, absolutely. So that's what we eventually came to the place with small group leaders that you are the leader of the group, so you really are the one.

Now, we did a couple big pushes during the year that was kind of like the open signup type of type of thing. But they were the ones and they were to lead their group in growing the group as well, too. So they could say, hey, you know, we've got six people.

As you're meeting new people at the church, ask the question, which small group are you in? And that's really how we tried to phrase it. Not, are you in a small group? Which small group? So just be like, well, I think I'm supposed to be in one.

Lee Stephenson: 00:10:54

Yeah, exactly. You're creating an assumption right away.

Danny Parmelee: 00:10:57

Assumption that it is right away.

And so when we did, and certainly there was sometimes it was circumstantial, but if you had a leader and no one was joining their group, maybe they shouldn't be a small group leader because they're not being intentional in reaching out to people and doing those and those types of things.

Lee Stephenson: 00:11:14

How did you create accountability with your groups and group leaders?

Danny Parmelee: 00:11:18

Yeah, so in the beginning, because we were very understaffed, I was director of small groups as long as lead pastor and janitor and accountant and everything.

Lee Stephenson: 00:11:28

You bring the hammer.

Danny Parmelee: 00:11:29

Yeah. So for that, we did like small group trainings and there was kind of a regular kind of check in in it.

I don't even remember what year it was now that we hired a small groups pastor that then continued to build out systems.

And it's hard because we had things where it was, okay, there's like a coach, and the coach has 10 small group leaders under them, and they're supposed to be meeting in these huddles, and you're just adding on these kind of different layers and people like different amounts of management, and some would just love these huddles. And conceptually, on paper, it sounds great. You kind of build the pyramid, and this person's caring for this person who's caring for this person.

But not everybody functions that way. Some people just want to run their group and not. They're not at another meeting, not at another meeting.

And they honestly aren't really deriving that much encouragement from these huddle groups. It's actually just taking up more of of their time. And other people loved them.

And so I don't want to say it was customized, but we kind of had to figure out different people's needs and to try to do it that way under our small group's pastor.

Lee Stephenson: 00:12:39

How did small group questions and stuff get written then?

Danny Parmelee: 00:12:42

Like, what was the process?

Lee Stephenson: 00:12:44

Yeah, what was the process? Knowing it was sermon based, but there's still a process to get the materials in people's hands.

Danny Parmelee: 00:12:50

Yeah. So as I told you in the beginning, it was because I probably finished my sermon Saturday night, so I didn't have enough time to write small group.

So I wrote the small group questions just in case anything change changed in the pulpit. It was. Yeah, it was literally Sunday night to where we. Over the last about five years that I was at epicos, we would outline and write the entire.

Well, we would outline the entire sermon and write all of our small group curriculum that the summer before, because we ended up publishing those in, like, hard copy books so that it. To equip our small group leaders.

And that for us was a really, really helpful thing because as part of a preaching team, it helped all of the pastors to really be working through the entirety of the book and to generate those questions. And as pastors, we wrote some of those questions. But our Ryan Boyer, our small groups pastor, then employed a team.

And that was really important for us, especially as we learned that the questions that we were asking as pastors were at times really missing the boat and including even gender wise, you know what I mean? You got three guys who are like, oh, this passage is about this. And this is a really good question.

And some of our wives are even like, what are you talking.

Lee Stephenson: 00:14:13

This is not what it's.

Danny Parmelee: 00:14:14

Yeah, this is not relating to me.

And so that was kind of broadened out where then these teams were helping write the questions, still feeding them then to the pastoral team and the preaching team to be able to put them together. And we basically just made two different questions.

There were ones that were directly from the text, so that literally, if anybody's reading these are factual things that are coming out of the text where the application ones were, the ones that were much broader and were going to be much more contextual to the people's lives in the small groups. That's really what we said in the small groups.

We wanted everybody to do both pages, but during the small group time, they were focusing on the life application ones.

Lee Stephenson: 00:14:55

Oh, okay. Okay.

When you kind of think back over the evolution of small groups, are there moments where you go, man, I wish we didn't do that, you know, and would have done something different if you were to do it again?

Danny Parmelee: 00:15:07

Yeah, I think definitely our. Our biggest failure was the kind of forced multiplication. And that was. That was driven by me. And I'm a.

I'm a growth person and want more Groups and more opportunity and it probably did kill community. So that was probably the biggest thing for us.

Lee Stephenson: 00:15:27

What percentage of your adult population did you shoot for to have in a group?

Danny Parmelee: 00:15:33

We shot for 65%. So for some that may seem high, for some that may seem low.

But we felt like if we're a church that's always growing and just understanding the reality that joining a small group is a pretty big step and intimidating thing that we would have 65, you know, between 50 and 65%. So that's the ratio that we always kind of tried to try to stay at.

Lee Stephenson: 00:15:58

Did you do anything for those that just don't like small groups? I mean did you have other avenues of discipleship?

Danny Parmelee: 00:16:05

Yeah. So again we tried to leverage summer for that and we had what we called discipleship nights which were mid sized groups.

We did some mid sized groups that were during the year but those were hard. And that's where we became into those kind of competing things like hey, join a small group, you know, get in one of these mid sized classes.

I think that both can be done. As long as it's kind of understood that it's not a one or the other that we would at least for our process.

We just, we really wanted people in small groups and so if these mid sized things were more of the on ramp to it, that would be helpful for us. What about you guys? Did you. Because I know a lot of.

And I don't know if you read Daniel M's book no Silver Bullets but I think he talks about that in a really great way.

Lee Stephenson: 00:16:56

Yeah, we, we kind of took a multifaceted approach. So small groups is a main area of discipleship and care that we wanted people to experience be a part of.

We operated similarly sermon based small groups and there was no other option. That was just the way it was. And we'd work on question development the week of.

So we weren't quite as adventurous and you know, go get them and overachieving as you guys were.

Danny Parmelee: 00:17:25

But has its drawbacks too.

Lee Stephenson: 00:17:26

So but and we'd publish those digitally and things of that sort so people could continue to keep up with theirs. But we offered, we called it Harvest U. And it was like a nine week curriculum based that we'd offer three times a year.

So we had a fall, spring and summer and things like Financial Peace University was always a part of that. And then we usually did some type of new believer experience or class or those that had questions and then usually like a book study in the Bible.

You know, I periodically do a book Study from Sunday. But typically we were more series driven than we were just constantly going from one book to the next book.

And so we would do those in that harvest you experience. And, you know, part of it is like, we just got to figure out where people go.

Because I noticed, like, there were certain people that it didn't matter how much we pushed it, they're just not going to go. A small group, but we didn't want to lose them.

We wanted to show, like, you know, we're sensitive, that we care for you and we want to find an avenue for you to be able to continue to grow in that. And some take it, some leave it, you know, and you're never going to get 100%, I don't think, when it comes to that.

Danny Parmelee: 00:18:41

Yeah, I think small groups, they're just a weird animal. I mean, if you think about, it's easy when you're the pastor and you know people and you kind of pick your group.

But it's like, even for us, as we move to Nashville, it's like, oh my gosh, we've been telling everybody for the last 14 minutes getting involved in a small group.

Lee Stephenson: 00:18:59

Totally, totally.

Danny Parmelee: 00:18:59

And now we're sitting there in church and it's like, hey, it's small group sign up time. And my wife and I are looking at you like, oh my gosh, we've been telling people we've got to do this and what if people don't like us?

What if, you know, what if we're with a bunch of weird people? What if we're the weird people? That type of thing.

But I do think that one of the great things and, and maybe even just to explain here that we didn't see our small groups just as Bible study. It really was for us, it is centered around the Bible and centered around what Jesus is doing.

But it really is that life on life and you know, the prayer and the care that's kind of happening kind of within that group and especially the larger you get as a church, the importance that everything isn't run through the pastor or isn't even just run through a staff member that we can say, and I would often say, hey, let's, you know, grow large but grow small at the same time. And I think that it's just a really kind of key component to it.

Lee Stephenson: 00:19:59

I know one of the things that always is challenging for churches and especially those in a portable setting is how do you do small groups? What do you do for children? Like, how do you handle childcare in those situations? What did you guys do.

Danny Parmelee: 00:20:14

So if you remember from one of the other podcasts, we didn't have children in the beginning.

Lee Stephenson: 00:20:17

Yeah.

Danny Parmelee: 00:20:18

And so I actually, our small group ministry in the beginning was. Was so robust, I was just beginning to think that we, like, hit something that was so amazing. It was really.

Lee Stephenson: 00:20:28

I'm going to write books.

Danny Parmelee: 00:20:29

I mean, oh, my goodness. We are knocking out of the park. I mean, we are. We have more small groups than some of the mega churches in town. And I'm like, yeah, we're doing.

And I realized it's just because no one had kids. So it was easy. Everyone. Yeah, 85%. Yeah. We went together and eat. And so we went from everything to the church is going to pay for childcare. Okay.

Then that didn't work so well.

Lee Stephenson: 00:20:56

Didn't quite work in the budget.

Danny Parmelee: 00:20:57

It didn't work in the budget. Then we tried, okay, you can hire a babysitter and everybody chips in on it, or you can have your kids and then just rotate one person.

I don't know what the answer is. I really. It is so challenging.

And we honestly, we found from a practical sense, this is a lot of times where, like, men's groups and women's groups just worked. And even for my wife and I personally, it's like, it's just easier. I stay home with the kids and you go to a small group, and then there's time.

You stay home with the kids and I'm gonna go to small group. Cause it's idealistic to get everybody together. But I mean, oh, my goodness. It's just. It's. It's nuts.

Lee Stephenson: 00:21:40

So we. We just kind of took the easy road and said, you figure it out on your own.

Danny Parmelee: 00:21:43

Figure it out. Yeah.

Lee Stephenson: 00:21:44

Yeah, we. We just. The same way we looked at everything, and nothing felt like we could drive it. And. And it was too big of a.

Of an issue to ignore, but at the same time, it was too big of an issue for us to solve on our own. And so we just said, hey, here's multiple options. Figure out what works for you as a group. And. And people were.

If they valued it, they'll figure out a way to make sure it happens.

Danny Parmelee: 00:22:07

Yeah. You asked me, so I'll ask you. Did you have pushback on a single thing? And so we both agree with that.

So I'm wondering if you've heard things from other pastors that. Why they don't do that and that it just works so much better and that type of thing.

Lee Stephenson: 00:22:25

Yeah, I don't know if I could say I've heard from other pastors that why it works better. I know a lot of people do it differently where they just give options and it's kind of like do whatever you want to do.

To me, that was too scary of a premise to give that much authority to put it that way to people that I had no understanding where they really were, you know, in the deep hearted things of the gospel and what their understanding was and how they, how they voice those things. And now we just gave them a platform to pour themselves into other people.

And so for us it was more of an accountability and trying to figure out how do we keep unity in the life of our church. And honestly, there's a practical element. It's like I've been in small groups, Danny, where, you know, you're doing a book study.

Like, you know, you read this book written by, you know, A.W. tozer and you sit around and talk about it and the reality was like 95% of the time nobody actually read the book, you know, in the group.

And they just kind of come and unprepared and just kind of pontificate about whatever came to their mind in that moment, you know, and, and so part of it for us was like, man, what, what changes people's lives is getting them in the word of God. Like that's, it's, they need to be reading their Bible and, and learning to apply these things and engage it in their, their daily walk.

And I thought, man, if we just move to sermon based small groups, they're getting 30 minutes ish teaching on that. So they're spending time getting an understanding of the context and some main points of this.

And then even if they don't revisit until they're a small group now they just spend an hour, hour and a half going through the same passage. We just got somebody spending two hours of their week and one passage of scripture that should change their life.

And so I felt like that became why we really philosophically made that decision. And yeah, we received pushback. I mean it was. People wanted to create their own studies and they wanted to show what they knew.

And all the pushback were from Christians. I mean, let's just be honest, that's who it was. People are new to your church and, and new to church in a whole. They don't know any different.

And they're just soaking it all up. And we just told them like, that's not how we do it, like this is who we are.

And I try to sit down and have a nice conversation with them, kind of explaining the philosophical bent as to why we do it this way. And some people are like, wow, like you actually thought this through, you know, and like I never thought about it that way and fully jump in and.

And there were other ones that just never could quite get there and they would try and eventually they end up exiting.

And sometimes a couple times we would have to have a hard conversation with the group because the group leader just decided I'm going to do my own thing anyways. And we'd have to rein them in.

Danny Parmelee: 00:25:26

Yeah, I think for us too the other advantage of doing the sermon based small group is that for new people in the church, Christian or non Christian, that they could enter in at any time in comparison to like, oh, we're going through this book, everyone else is on chapter seven. So if you want to, you have to go purchase this book, read seven chapters and then be able to engage in it.

Lee Stephenson: 00:25:51

So it seems expectation, you gotta catch up.

Danny Parmelee: 00:25:53

Yeah. Format of groups. Did you give a. What were your parameters for the format or did you leave that open?

Lee Stephenson: 00:26:03

As far as that was pretty open, yeah. Yeah. I mean we craft questions. We didn't hold people's hand to get through all the questions.

We tried to train them, like think practical, it's life on life. You're there to care for each other.

And we'd explain to small group leaders as we grew as a church and got larger, the needs are too great for us as a staff to tend to. And nor do I see in scripture why. It's just our responsibility. We're all on this mission together.

And so this is part of just being a faithful believer in person that loves people. Like you need to be invested in people's lives so we leverage that.

But we tried to do some ongoing training with our small group leaders just so that they felt like they were being equipped.

But we also told them like if you run into a situation that totally out of your safety zone and you don't know how to process or how to answer it, that's we're there for you in that and please come to us and talk to. But I mean we had groups that they ate together every time they get together. We had other groups that you know, they just do differently.

I mean our group we didn't get together until 8 o'clock at night on Sunday night. So we went from 8 to 10 o'clock at night and all the kids were in bed. And so that's kind of why we chose to do it at that point.

That allowed us being a pastor and having a Busy schedule that allowed us to do small group without taking, taking another evening from our kids.

Danny Parmelee: 00:27:31

Right.

Lee Stephenson: 00:27:31

And so that's, that's why we chose to do it that way too.

Danny Parmelee: 00:27:33

That's great. Yeah. For us, we, we gave some guidelines for it, but we wanted leaders to kind of figure it out.

And we kind of talked about different sections, like, all right, there's a prayer time, there's the reading of the word and then there's this kind of like community time, if you will. And we stress to people, it's never going to be 30 minutes. 30 minutes, 30 minutes.

There may be one time where it's like, oh my goodness, there's a crisis going on. You're praying the entire time. You never even pick up the questions. There's going to be those times.

There's other times where it's like, man, this is content wise. You're going to maybe have an opening prayer, but other than that, you want to dive in and check out all this stuff.

And other times where it's like it just needs to be this community time. And maybe you're just going out and have having fun and bowling together or serving together or doing something like that.

Lee Stephenson: 00:28:25

Awesome. No, that's great. That's great. I think that comes down to small groups can play an integral part of your church.

And I think the earlier you can get started, the better it's going to be. We were similar. We started before we ever actually launched our church. And so we were able to say, this is just who we are.

That's part of what we are. And we wanted our small groups getting involved in the community at least twice a year as well.

And so we work to create partnerships that we'd educate our leaders saying, hey, here's partnerships that we have in the community. Why don't you guys, instead of meeting one week, go serve together at one of these places?

And we tried to do as much and not every group did it, but a lot of groups bought into that kind of idea. And I think we picked up steam as the longer that we did that. But I appreciate you sharing and your own ups and downs when it comes to small groups.

And you're going to learn as you're out there, Pastor, trying to figure out what to do and just keep pressing forward and find what works for you in your given context.

Danny Parmelee: 00:29:23

Yeah. And my final words are that small groups are one of the more difficult things to do.

And it's messy and whatever you draw up on paper, it's not going to go that way.

It's not going to go that way, but it is worth it because as people really do lessen their dependence on staff and professionals to meet their needs, to have that community, you're empowering, you're raising up leaders. It's gold.

Lee Stephenson: 00:29:50

That's great, great advice. Thanks for being with us, everyone. This has been the unfiltered podcast and talking about real church planting things.

So until next time, keep it real.

Danny Parmelee: 00:30:11

La.