We started off with a get-to-know-you game led by Mandy. We answered a series of questions, then compared answers. We learned that nearly everyone, excluding Bernie, Kim, and Mandy, waited to the last minute to do our homework in high school. We also learned of several talents our group-mates posses: Greg can play the recorder, Alicia can play the violin, Lisa can ride a unicycle, etc..
Next, we discussed why we continue to show up on Wednesday nights. Here are a few of the answers people gave...
- For the relationships
- For the social interaction
- For the dialogue
- Because of the diversity, e.g. some married people, some single people, etc.
- To grow...
- ...in knowledge
- ...by learning more about ourselves
- ...by learning how we can use our gifts
- For the accountability
Next, we moved into a discussion of what the mission of our home group is. We reviewed the values listed on the Visio Dei web site.
We started off by defining what growing as a learners per the values site. Then, we talked about what that means to us, practically. Here were some of the responses...
- Bible study
- Serving
- Taking action
- Recognizing what God's doing now, the on going story
- Recognizing that we are a part of the story
Then, we discussed some ways that we as a home group could be encouraging the individual members to be growing as learners. Some of the ideas were...
- To assign more responsibility to members
- To give updates, especially for those not in attendance, via blog, email, etc.
- To have a recap time at the beginning of a meeting to go over what happened the previous week
- To focus on teaching to the various learning styles in the group
After the learner discussion, we talked about that it means to be growing as a lover. Again, we took a look at the definition from the Visio Dei site. Then, we made of list of what that looks like practically. Some ideas we came up with were...
- Seeing needs and showing love
- That we are to be known by our love
- That love is a desire that leads to action
- That we are being challenged to love people different than us
- That love takes intentionality
- That love can start with a personal journey of accepting yourself
One idea that we came up with for how we can encourage one another to be growing as lovers was to keep a list of upcoming activities, no matter how far out they are. That way we will be reminded of what people in our home group have going on that they want other members to take part in. Another idea was to take a week and have everyone write down every time they think of or see a place where love could be shown. This activity would help everyone become more aware of new ways that they could be showing love.
We wrapped up our night with a discussion of what it means to be a giver. We discussed how this related to everyone discovering and growing in their giftedness. We also talked about ways people could be growing as givers within our home group. A few of those things were...
- Allowing people other than the servant team to be using their gifts
- Reaching out to new members to find out where they are gifted
- Encouraging people to do things that they are good at
I thought Wednesday night was a great night. I think our home group is an awesome community. We do a great job of providing a place for relationships to start and flourish. We love one another well. My hope is that by focusing on growing as learners, lovers, and givers, we can move from being just a great community to being a community on mission, a "missional community". If we stay focused on that purpose, I feel like we have the capability to do amazing things for God's kingdom.
3 comments:
it sounds like it was an awesome night! thanks for the update.. i think the blog is a great idea :)
Wow, that was a lot of work, Shannon. Thanks for bringing the blog back.
I can't focus to write my paper so I figured I would comment... it doesn't help that some of you all are skiing or playing in snow... but thanks Shannon for posting the updated information. Nice summary.
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