Your First Gathering as a Group / Small Group Discussion Guide
Week 1

Leader Checklist

  1. Before your first group, make sure to send out a reminder with the group location, time, childcare arrangements and any materials your group members need to bring. Create a calendar of meeting dates, special events (ie: Serve Day) and dates you will not be available.
  2. Review the discussion guide ahead of time so that you are familiar with the content and questions. Be prepared to provide your own answers as well as Bible-based responses to your group members’ feedback.
  3. Remember that you are a facilitator, not a lecturer. Provide ample time for your members to speak and make sure you use story-prompting questions (not yes or no questions) to have your group fully engaged in the conversation.
  4. Don’t directly call on someone to answer a question or pray. Look at your group members’ faces and posture and ask the questions to the group as a whole instead of directly at an individual.
  5. Log your attendance after the group meeting and follow up with anyone that was absent.

Starting Scriptures

1 Corinthians 12:14-21Even so the body is not made up of one part but of many. Now if the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason stop being part of the body. And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason stop being part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? But in fact God has placed the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be. If they were all one part, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, but one body. The eye cannot say to the hand, “I don’t need you!” And the head cannot say to the feet, “I don’t need you!”

Reflection At the root of the human spirit, we all have a deep desire to belong. God has given us a place to belong when He included us in His family, and He has positioned us to be connected to other believers in relationship through the church.When we unite with others in relationship, we gain access to spiritual gifts, to a place to belong and be loved, and to a place where we can be accepted despite our problems and the issues we face. Our failures and shortcomings cause us to need additional love and acceptance. Acceptance in spite of our sin is at the core of the Gospel, so we need others to show us love and acceptance when we’re at our worst. It’s this validation from one another that reinforces the love that the Father has for us. Romans 15:7 says the result of acceptance brings praise to God. The payoff for our mission of making disciples rests on our individual obedience to be a fruitful member of the Body of Christ. By building up others, we choose to go against the “me-first” mentality that society promotes and live out a God-first life by also being others-first.

Discussion Questions

  1. Relationships are costly, but anything in life that is valuable is only valuable because you put something into it. When it comes to relationships, what makes them valuable to you?
  2. Who is someone thatmakes you feel valuable? What have you learned about relationships from this person by how he/she has treated you?
  3. How do you prefer to be shown love by others (ex: gift giving, quality time, words of affirmation, acts of service, or physical touch)? What’s a thoughtful thing someone has done for you that you’ll always remember?
  4. What is a way for someone to make you feel un-valuable? How can you still feel valuable even when you’re treated that way?
  5. What especially appeals to you about living life together with this small group? What do you hope to experience this session?

Going Deeper

As a group, write down what each person has said regarding what they hope to experience this small group session. Condense the answers into about four goals for the session. Review your goals and ask these questions of each goal:

1.Is your goal specific?

2.How will you be able to tell that you achieved it?

3.What is the action planset out to achieve this goal?

4.Is it realistic or too far-fetched?

5.What is the deadline for the goal to happen?

Additional Scriptures
Hebrews 3:13 But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called today, so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness.
James 5:19 My dear friends, if you know people who have wandered off from God’s truth, don’t write them off. Go after them.
Romans 15:7 Accept one another, then, just as Christ accepted you, in order to bring praise to God.

Notes:

Your First Gathering as a Group / 1