Somewhere along the line, while we were working overseas, "Small Groups" started in relationship with churches. This seems to be the current method of pastoral care in a church, so we are learning about that. Ideally, every person in a church should belong to a small group - usually these do not exceed twelve or so people. The small group can be a group of friends who sign up together or it can be totally disparate people who just sign up at random. The latter is the kind of group we belong to. The members of the group are interesting. We were sixteen, but lost a couple because of scheduling, so we are down to fourteen.
Our leader is a gentleman who is a retired college professor and lost his wife a couple years ago now. He is well organized and makes a good leader. We have been in groups before where the leader was in the clouds and had no idea how to lead and that was sort of frustrating at the time. But this group is one of people from different walks of life, and we seem to interact together rather well.
Besides the leader. there is a couple who do not come to the church but know the Lord. They have been disappointed in the church and so do not join, but they are friends of our leader and they fit in well with the rest of us. He is a former pilot and she was a flight attendant. They met while flying the same airlines and married - have no children but something like eight cats! (which they do not bring to small group thankfully!) Another couple both work at TFC, came originally from the northand, are college grads. There is a former police chief of our town with his wife, people in their early fifties. And they love the study and fellowship. There is another couple, originally from the north and have always been Alliance church members. Besides us, there is an Alliance missionary widow and a retired missionary couple. So we come from different backgrounds, sometimes have different perspective on things, have good discussions and really enjoy our Monday evenings.
The group meets in our home, so that means Monday we have to set up the living room for the Bible study time and have enough chairs in place, as well as our back room set up with more chairs for refreshment time. Each of us takes turns bringing the refreshments, and we never eat supper Monday night as everyone brings adequate for a meal. The talk is fun and has a range of subjects as we are eating together and then by about nine o'clock everyone goes home..
We pray for each other and stay in touch. One member is in Emory Hospital right now with heart disease, and we get reports of his progress or lack of it each day. So it has drawn us together as a group and put us in contact with some people we have not known well before this. So I guess it is fulfilling its purpose. Next week we have the final dinner together of this semester, and so we will not meet together again until the Fall. We read that in today's society, small groups are the answer to getting to know people in your church, and it seems to be working for those of us who participate in it.
Pastoral visits are out - unless you are near death's door.....elder care is sketchy......but the church is trying small groups now. I guess they are here to stay in the evangelical church of today.
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