Authentic faith lived in a vibrant missional community can be a hard thing to find, create and maintain. There comes a time for all of us when we may need to look at jumpstarting or re-starting some of the basics.
Whether it’s the busyness of holidays, the start of a new year, or things have just sort of fizzled out, there a few simple yet intentional rhythms you can dive into that can make all the difference and will get you and your missional community back on track.
Begin to Begin…Again
First of all, don’t beat yourself up. These things happen to all of us. Our best intentions don’t always stay that intentional, and the stuff of life can often derail even our most sincere efforts. Pick yourself up, remember that you are deeply loved by God and begin again. It’s okay. Every journey is a series of a thousand small, but intentional steps.
The thing you want to get to, or get back to, are predictable patterns: Those few key rhythms in your community life that everyone knows you’ll for sure be doing together at the same time and in the same manner each week. You need to get into a rhythm of predictable patterns. By the way…this is the same strategy if you wanted to know how to start a missional community too.
Go back to basics here. Think UP, IN and OUT. Jesus maintained balance and priority in his life by perfectly integrating these three relational dynamics:
➤ Time with his Father – his UPward relationship
➤ Time with those He was discipling in close community – his INward relationships
➤ Time with those out side of his close circle – his OUTward relationships
I want to suggest to jumpstart or restart your small group or missional community, you pick one new predictable pattern, or rhythm, you can begin to do together in community in each of these categories… UP, IN, OUT.
Here are a few suggestions to get you started in each category. And you can Download my free UP/IN/OUT matrix that will give you a ton of other ideas.
➤ UP – A rhythm of connecting deeper to God and the gospel
- Grow in your “gospel-fluency” by going through the Gospel Primer together for 8 weeks. This will help you connect deeply with the Father’s heart in every area of life.
- Spend time listening to God; not asking him to do a bunch of stuff for you, but listening for His voice.
- Read and discuss one narrative from scripture together and ask: What did we learn about God? What might he be saying to us in this story? What will we do about that this week?
➤ IN – Living more like an incarnational family together
- Reset some of the basic patterns to live increasingly as a “family on mission”. Begin to look more outward toward others–moving beyond just a weekly meeting. Try going through the Tangible Kingdom Primer together. This is the best “first steps” tool I know of and use.
- Family dinner night as a community. No big agenda other than to BE together.
- Sharing the Lord’s Supper / Communion as a community.
➤ OUT – Building relationships and serving those outside your missional community
- Regularly frequent the same few restaurants, pubs, cafes or parks so as to build familiarity and new relationships. Pick a day/night of the week and go for it!
- Pick a people group or need to serve consistently in your neighborhood or city. The Justice Primer will walk you step-by-step as a group into understanding what it means to love mercy and do justice among the least of these in your area.
- Host an Open Table night each week where anyone and everyone is invited to a meal. No big agenda. Build relationships and trust.
[clickToTweet tweet=”The life of a healthy missional community cannot happen in just one evening per week!” quote=”The life of a healthy missional community cannot happen in just one evening per week!”]Predictable Patterns
Remember, you’re looking to start doing these things in predictable patterns. And you may notice something here, you cannot do even these three simple rhythms all on one night of the week. Nope. A missional community is a family and you could never do healthy, meaningful family life together for a couple hours one night per week.
Don’t forget to Download my free UP/IN/OUT matrix that will give you a ton of other ideas.
None of these suggestions are amazing…holy cow… rocket science… crazy things. These are simple ideas to get you started. Again, these same things apply if you are starting from scratch and want to form a new missional community.
The next best time to add three simple rhythms to your community life is now. If you will get started, and stick with them, over time new rhythms and relationships with begin to form and you’ll find yourself in a whole new season.
Would you let me know other UP, IN, OUT rhythms you have found fun and effective in your community? Leave them in the comments below. And please subscribe to my Youtube channel before you go…ok?
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