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Small group leaders, pastors, and more discussing strategies for growth and community in church groups. The Small Group Network is an international ministry that equips churches to engage in deeper discipleship and community.
James Browning: Hello, and
welcome to F G squared.
Steve Gladen the global pastor of small
groups from Saddleback church polls
from his over 25 years of experience.
To encourage and equip listeners like
you to lead small group ministry.
So let's listen and learn together.
Derek Olson: Welcome to Sgd
Steve Gladden on small groups.
Derek here with my man, Steve.
How are you Steve?
Steve Gladen: I tell you, I, I don't know
if I am, uh, uh, happy tired, uh, I know
I'm not sad or anything like that, but
we we are in the midst of,
uh, a, a downsizing move.
So it's, uh, causing quite the, uh, uh.
Stress and strain and cleanup of
everything in our house as we, uh,
go down to a smaller sized home.
So it's, uh, it's just, you know,
it's a, it's a lot of trying to purge
and throw away stuff, but, uh, at
the same time, keep the things you
want and, and just keep it moving.
So I, I guess we could say
it's a, it's a spring cleaning
Derek Olson: So that's why you,
Steve Gladen: but we're moving.
Derek Olson: why you look so wasted.
Um.
Hey, I, I feel for you 'cause moving is
one of those things in life that I think
most of us would agree that we detest
Steve Gladen: I, I, I can understand why,
you know, you hear those stories of people
who lived in their house for 60 years.
I get it.
I get it.
They kept procrastinating.
Then all of a sudden,
boom, they're with Jesus.
Derek Olson: well.
I am sorry for your pain.
And, um, it's interesting how, uh.
Your real life experience is
dovetailing with our topic today.
Huh?
Steve Gladen: Yeah, I mean, we're,
we're, we're gonna talk about some
spring cleaning for you and some, uh,
some Ks of spring cleaning the letter K.
Uh, but it, it also came a lot.
I.
Uh, just from, uh, our, our own part
as we're re-looking at our small group
ministry, trying to fine tune some things,
uh, get some more clarity from Andy.
So, uh, I think they'll all resonate
with each one of us, but we'll keep
'em high level enough so that you don't
get lost in the world of Saddleback.
But also be able to see, uh, how each
one of these will play a critical
part in your own small group ministry.
Because oftentimes, uh,
just like in a home.
Clutter happens.
And so often in our own small group
ministry, uh, a lot of clutter can build
up and you're all of a sudden you're
just like going, how did that happen?
How did we keep something like this?
And so, uh, I think it's gonna have some
great relevance for you as you're, uh,
you'll be able to parallel them to your
own small group ministry and, and take
into account of, do you, do you, do you
need to do a little spring cleaning?
In the areas that we're gonna talk about.
So we have four Ks.
If you hang till the end of the
show, you may even get a fifth one,
Derek Olson: The four Ks of small
group ministry, spring cleaning.
That's very Rick Warren.
Ask Steve, I can tell you.
Worked with him for about 25 years.
Steve Gladen: uh, or a
little bit longer either way.
But yeah, it bleeds into you.
Derek Olson: let's jump into number one.
The number one K is kinship with leaders.
Break this down for us.
Steve Gladen: Yeah.
So, uh, I think one of the things,
uh, for us, I think this is a big
time, it is separating, we all
wanna connect with our leaders.
We all wanna contact our leaders.
Uh, all through small group ministries,
many different people go, I want
to have two connections with my, I.
With people who are leading
groups or may have wanna have
one or something like that.
I think one of the things that
I'm seeing more that we need just
to, uh, brush off the playbook a
little bit and, uh, spring clean.
This one is the word kinship.
And, and I put that there specifically
because many times we gotta move
away from just being able to
check off the box and say, I made
that connection with that leader.
To building kinship with the leaders,
and this goes into the point of
getting to know who they are.
Uh, we talk a lot about
hard and soft data.
And the hard data being
what we want to discover.
Soft data being what they wanna share with
us and, and sharing about who they are.
Whereas, uh, the hard data
is what we wanna know.
And I, I think one of the things I
would just, uh, ask each one of you
that are listening to this is how
much do you know how much kinship.
Have you built with your leaders
so that you know who they are and
that it's more than just, um, the
surface level things, but being able
to know, do you know their story?
Do you know their family?
Do, do you, do you know,
you know, what excites them?
Do you know their hobbies?
Do you know what consumes their time?
Do you know what their talents are?
And this is all a part of just
like when you get to know people.
Derek and I have had a relationship
over a decade, and there's pieces of
him that I wouldn't know unless we
took and spent some time together.
So one of the things I would encourage
you to spring clean on is, is move away
from just the contacts to your leaders.
Really talk about the kinship.
And kinship is a great word that you can,
uh, look up, but it, it talks about going
into the deeper layers of a friendship.
And so you may go, well, good lord,
how am I gonna have time to do that?
And what I would say is, you, you
don't have time not to do it because
you've got to get to know the sheep.
The sheep have to get to know you.
And the only way that they're gonna
know the voice of the shepherd.
Is being able to spend
some time with them.
I think one of the things we talk about is
you gotta smell like the sheep, and part
of that is when you do kinship with them,
it, it could be spending a coffee with
them and talking, nothing, nothing about
groups, but just interacting with them.
And the more you build the kinship, the
more they're gonna be the people who,
who will come alongside you in battle and
want to hang with you as much as possible.
Derek Olson: Yeah.
What's that old saying that
people spell love as TIME time.
So I like your point about how
you can't afford not to spend the
time with people and Yeah, in my
experience, um, in ministry, you
know, it was always so encouraging.
When a leader would out of the blue want
to hang out or, or just spend some time
with you outside of working on ministry,
you know, and just showing that they care.
And, um, I remember from my old days of
youth ministry, man, those kids probably
never remembered a thing I preached, but I
know, I know they remember, you know, um.
Again, going out to coffee or just
the fun things we would do right.
Go me showing up at their sports
games and, and everybody's essentially
the same like that we're wired
to be cared about and so great.
Great.
Steve Gladen: I, I think you're bringing
up a great point there too, because it
really is that whole point is that it
they, they won't remember what you taught
'em, but they'll remember how you made
'em feel and you can't do that with a
quick check-in and being able to leave
a voice message or something like that.
So I love what you're talking about.
So kinship with leaders, first thing
to look at in your spring cleaning.
Derek Olson: two is keep clean data.
Steve Gladen: Yes.
You know, we always say that little
phrase data is king and, uh, I
guess we could be on this war.
Is it data or data?
I mean, we'll, we'll, we'll just, you'll
hear it both ways on the podcast through.
The Pacific Northwest version and
the Southern California version.
But, uh, uh, it'd be a good time to
go through your data and start to look
through how much of this is correct
and how much of it is clean data.
Again, you can't make decisions
off of bad data, and data is
always going to be your friend.
Data will tell you different things, and
it can be the insignificant, what can be,
can appear, the insignificant things of.
You know, when does the group meet?
'cause you can say, well that's
not very important to to know about
until you're trying to plan an event.
And you don't want to have it a churchwide
event, you know, cascade or conflict with
when the majority of your groups meet.
So data can help you in many different
ways, but what I've found is, you know,
as I've been at Saddleback 28 years,
we're always discovering bad data.
But there's a good time, and we're
doing this with our teams as we're,
we're getting together, just saying,
Hey, this is gonna be a time we're
gonna focus on data and clean it up
and figure out, as we're spending time
with our leaders, you know, when can
you fit in discovering, you know, what,
what's the best data we have on them?
And part of that you can do in the beauty
of technology is be able to send them out.
You know, here's what we
know about your group.
Here's who we know is in your group.
You know, this is when we know your
group's meeting and stuff like that.
You just tell us.
It's if it's right or wrong.
If the technology is there with you,
a lot of times they can just clean
it up and they can add, or they can
subtract, they can change, and then
they can just give it back to you.
But I think periodically, because
even my eyes get off my own
group data in the database, uh.
I was looking at it, uh, gosh, I think
this was a couple years ago and I was
looking at it and I was like going, it
says our group is targeting 40 year olds.
And I'm just like going, oh my gosh, the
forties were a little bit long time ago.
And so, but it was very painful to check
two boxes up and you know, with that.
But the thing I would say is this
periodically, and this is in your
spring cleaning, bring a focus check.
On data and say, Hey, this week we're
all gonna focus on this to make sure
this amount of data is all clean,
and you can decide that on your own.
For us, generally it is, we're just
trying to look at, you know, we have
the right leader, we have the right
people in the group, we have the right
day and time of the group meeting, and
then you can kind of build from there.
Derek Olson: Keep clean data or data.
Moving to number three.
This is a little bit different kind of K.
It's the silent kind.
It is.
Know your playbook.
What you referring to here, Steve?
Steve Gladen: Yeah.
And this is a, another thing that you can
brush on with, uh, the people that are
volunteering in your small group ministry.
If you're a larger small group ministry
and you have other staff with there.
It's trying to keep your,
your playbook clean.
One of the things that we have at
Saddleback is we have a one page macro
playbook sheet, and then we have a more
detailed one, and it's good to, again,
get everyone to take a fresh look at it.
Kind of get them to say, what's
one thing that you may have missed
from before, uh, that you forgot.
Uh, what's something that you know
is sticking out to you, uh, as
something that's a little bit more
current that you need to address?
Um, some of you, you may look at
what's outdated in our playbook.
Uh, the scary thing is, is that
usually when we, uh, do a spring
cleaning, a look at our playbook,
we discover that words have changed.
Some things have changed, and.
Life is busy and we just forget about it.
Uh, if you don't know anything about
the playbooks and you maybe don't
do your church, uh, again, if you
wanna email me, steve@saddleback.com,
I'll give you access to our single
page playbook and our playbook.
But the point is, is that everybody runs.
If you, uh, uh, I was gonna say,
everyone runs off a playbook If you've,
uh, ever played an organized sport.
They will always have a playbook
that everyone is, is working off of.
And if you don't have the playbook
of what's essential for your
small group ministry, what can
happen is, is drift happens.
And knowingly or unknowingly,
people create their own playbooks
and can get you off kilter.
And so what you wanna make sure that
you have is fresh eyes on your playbook
and be able to look at it and say,
okay, this is what we're after and this
is what we're trying to accomplish.
Derek Olson: Know your playbook.
Number three.
Moving to number four, Kindle leadership.
What's that look like?
Steve Gladen: You know,
I just couldn't help.
I know you said Kendall Leadership,
but I'll jump into that.
You know about Know Your Playbook.
I was just thinking do, do the
Washington Huskies, did they play off
their playbook this past fall season?
Derek Olson: ouch.
Shots fired.
Um, hey,
Steve Gladen: Coming, coming from the, the
National Champions, Ohio State Buckeyes.
But anyways, I, I digress.
What was number
Derek Olson: well, I, I've just gotta
Steve Gladen: a.
Derek Olson: say that for anybody
that knows anything about the
college football world, that's kind
of what we're joking about here.
And I salute you.
Ohio State, the Ohio State, for taking
down the most evil team in the world.
The organ ducks are
archrival, so well done.
Steve Gladen: that's a fun game to watch.
Again, we'll watch together sometime.
Derek Olson: I'll fly down to Kelly
just so we can watch the highlights
of that beautiful heavenly game.
Steve Gladen: That beat down.
Derek Olson: All right, so yeah, we
said number four is Kindle leadership.
Steve Gladen: Yeah, and I, I think this
is the one that is super important, is
that you need to have a pathway to Kindle
and build leadership in every person.
So let me dissect this for you.
For one, as a pastor, you need to have
your pathway as as a pastor and be able
to say, what are those different levels?
How am I training our pastors
to, to be the best they can be?
And what's that pathway look like?
Then there's also a pathway for our
community leaders who help oversee
our leaders, and we wanna have
a pathway from being a community
leader to being a minister.
Then with our host to lead our small
groups, we wanna have a pathway
from being a host to being a leader.
And then with our people that are
in small groups, we want to have
a pathway from being an attender
to being a member of a group.
And you can't kindle next
steps in leadership unless you
know the pathway of each one.
And so what I would challenge
you to do in the spring cleaning
motif that we have going here.
Is to think through.
If you don't have 'em, then you
know, start to figure out what
is it that you want to have.
If you wanna see ours, if you, uh,
wanna go to saddleback.com/small
groups, you can scroll through that
page and there there will be different
pathways that you can look at, uh,
that will help you discover what we do.
But even with that, we're right
in the process of making 'em
a little bit more simpler.
A pathway doesn't have to be complex, but
you do have to know what are the three
or four steps for a, a group, a tender
to be the member you want them to be.
There has to be the, the three or four,
maybe even more steps for wherever
you're bringing a host in to being
a leader that that qualifies them.
The same thing for the people who are
helping you in small group ministry.
How do you move them from being a
community leader or a coach, whatever
you call them, to being a bonafide person
who's a minister working alongside of you?
They may be volunteer, but the
main thing I'm talking about in
this is oftentimes we're not even
looking at their development, and
that's something that can slip away.
I know every one of us wanna do it,
but you have to have some metrics
in place to see how you're doing it.
Derek Olson: Well said, well stated.
Those are the four Ks of small
group ministry cleaning brought
to you by Steve Gladden from his
mind, and I always thought it was
funny that your initials are SG.
It's kinda like you were
born for small groups.
Steve Gladen: I was pre a little bit
of Calvinism creeping in there that we
were, I was destined to, to be that, but.
Derek Olson: Steve, any final
thoughts on these four Ks?
Steve Gladen: Well, you know, when, when
you get those all dusted off, what what's
gonna be great is I throw in a, in a fifth
K right there, and that is kick spiritual
butt, uh, because there's nothing more fun
than if you've been on a team and you win.
It is so wonderful, and so often
we always say, you know, you hate
losing more than you love winning.
But the the point is, is that when
you're victorious, when you, uh, taking
the time to do some spring cleaning and
dust off some stuff and kind of look at
these four Ks, the fifth K comes natural,
because often the older I get, the more
I realize it's who I do ministry with.
More than what I do.
And when you get these, uh, spring
cleaning things done, you find out
that you build a little bit of team
and camaraderie and you'll find
out that you're, you're winning so
much more when you dust off these
things and do that spring cleaning.
So get that fifth one in there and
you'll have a whole lot more fun.
Derek Olson: those that stayed
on the whole episode, they just
got blessed with a fifth K.
Well, that's your four Ks, or I should
say five Ks of smug group ministry, spring
cleaning, and, um, take those to heart.
They will, uh, make your small group
healthier and more vi uh, vice.
You'll be more, it'll have
more vitality than ever.
So, uh, we wanna
thank everybody for listening, watching.
Do us a favor and like this
podcast, uh, if you're on Spotify
or YouTube, leave us a comment.
If you can give us a five star rating
on Spotify, that would be great.
And even better, share this with somebody
that you think would be encouraged by it.
We hope you are encouraged.
And, uh, until next
time, have a great month.
Steve Gladen: Come back
with me, everybody.
James Browning: Thank you for listening.
Don't forget to subscribe
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