Saddleback Day One

Reflections from Wired Small Groups Conference Day One.

1. Russ Lee is leading in worship taking me back to the old NewSong days.
2. Steve Gladen led sessions today on the 5 purposes and their relationship to groups. It was fairly introductory and I was a little disappointed. I went to supper with a guy from Murfeesboro, TN and after talking with him about his situation, I realized why Steve was so basic in his material. Many folks are dealing with traditional mindsets and lay people who do not get it. Everyone deals with that stuff from time to time but I felt really bad for this guy’s situation.
3. Steve used a polling device that I thought was cool. Everyone was given a device that looked like a small calculator to respond to questions about small group experiences and general information. Instantly the results were posted on the screen so that Steve could see info like who had small groups versus Sunday school.
4. Stuff Steve said…
a. Spend 80% of your time talking with new group leaders and leaders who are quick to adopt change. Spend 20% of your time talking to veteran leaders and late adopters.
b. Everyone has a spiritual next step.
c. Specialty groups spend 80% of their time on one purpose. These include serving groups, missions groups etc. Small groups are balanced in the 5 purposes. We should strive to have folks participating in both kinds of groups.
d. “How dumb were the Israelites? I’m just like them.”
e. He said that a previous church a deacon came forward to take the offering and was asked to pray over the offering. The deacon said, “God, thank you for this food…”
f. This quote from a girl in a video clip… “ I wanted to be closer to God but I realized I couldn’t be closer to God unless I believed in his Son, Jesus Christ.” Powerful.
g. “EGR” refers to people who require extra grace. Saddleback calls these kinds of people “heavenly sandpaper.” Funny.
h. Nobody gets into a spiritual hole with a backhoe. It’s usually with a spoon.
i. Everybody knows the 80/20 rule. 20% of the people do 80% of the work. We must teach the 20% to say “no” so that responsibility if reflected onto the 80%.
j. We launch groups for life.
5. Rick Warren led session two.
a. Said he was watching foo fighters last night and realized that the 11am drummer is in the foo fighters. Cool.
b. In typical fashion, he threw out his message and decided not to talk about the conference subject.
c. Began by saying that he was burdened by Willow Creek “Revealed” study and the alarming number of pastors who have “flamed out” or “burned out.”
d. Spent a good bit of time talking about how Willow and Saddleback are different and that the results of the study made him sad because they showed that Willow lacked maturity and that could have been avoided.
e. He explained how easy it is to make a process of maturity and that’s what should have happened.
f. Direct quote, “Saddleback is the most spiritually mature church in America. There’s not a church in America with the spiritual depth that we have.”
g. Too much focus has been placed on the front end. It is not all about the weekend. It’s about the process.
h. Gave statistics on how many are in group, how many do quiet time, how many tithe, how many have gone on missions trip, etc. “What you measure is what you succeed in.”
i. “I can teach you how to have a spiritually mature church.”
j. 8 laws of spiritual growth…Spiritual growth is…
i. intentional (growth by making commitments)
ii. incremental (“not 3, not 4, not 6, there are 5 purposes)(the starting point for discipleship is “come and see” the ending point is “eat my flesh and drink my blood.”
iii. Personal
iv. Habitual
v. Relational
vi. Multi-dimensional
vii. Seasonal (growth in summer and spring, dormant in fall and winter) (too fast growth is swelling. Growth other than conversion growth is no good. Church goers are attracted by coolness. They’d rather be cool than effective.) “Have you noticed God likes to bless people you disagree with?” Yes, I have. ☺ Growth through campaigns was stressed. (people don’t come to groups for relationships, they come for content. They go for content and stay for relationships).
viii. Incarnational - We shouldn’t strive to be more like Jesus but for Jesus to live in us.