Elevate || Part 1

this is in no way an exhaustive post on Small Groups in our ministry. If you want more, let me know and I'll send you every document we have on training, implementing and strategy! 


Being a Multi-Site Church, I get the question from Student Pastors constantly on how we structure and implement our ministry on a weekly basis. So for the next couple of posts, I will be talking about the programs we have put in place for reaching students in Raleigh-Durham. 

I'm pretty sure this needs to be stated up front before I talk about our programming at Summit Student Ministry:  Programs are tools to reach people. Every aspect of our programming is accomplishing a mission. It's strategic. Programming for the sake of programming just makes everyone busy. Programs with a goal move people into your mission! Always keep that in mind. 

Small Groups || 

Every ministry builds itself on something. For some of you it's Sunday School, your Wednesday night program, or your corporate worship gathering for students. All of those can be great avenues for getting students plugged in. We build our ministry around small groups. 

Why? Because we believe that discipleship happens best in community. And in our structure, that happens best in Small Groups all over Raleigh-Durham.

A few thoughts: 

1. We make every effort to move students into small groups. At every place you turn, you will hear us talking about small groups. At our weekly Worship gathering for students, we will constantly plug small groups. There will always be an outlet to get into one.
2. We put a lot of time and energy into equipping our Small Group Leaders to shepherd well. We realize that there are a few staff for the couple hundred students we've been given the privilege of shepherding. That means we must train our people well and set them free to do it! 
3. We've actually seen many students trust and believe in Christ in our small groups. It has become one of our biggest evangelistic arms of our ministry. The beautiful part? It's the students sharing the gospel with their friends, and not them completely relying on us to do it for them. (Equipping SAINTS to do the work of the ministry.) 
4. Students are leading...and planting. At the Summit, we have a vision to plant 1,000 churches over the next 40 years. Those leaders/planters of those churches are in our student ministry right now. So, we are giving them the vision now. We want them to plant new small groups, literally take the reigns and run with it (under our leadership/direction and LOTS of training of course.) They are getting their feet wet right now in planting churches...and we love it. 
5. Students Are Growing. It's that simple. The word is being opened and God has been gracious to us in growing students into maturity in their faith...and that's the point. 

Whatever your outlet, use it well for the kingdom!