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Bible Study Leaders Should Not Have All the Answers

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Arek Socha (2016), public domain

Picture it. There’s a pause at your small group Bible study, and one of your friends asks a question. In that moment, all the heads in your group will likely turn in one of two directions.

Do the group members look up, at the leader? Or do they look down, at the Bible?

No Bible study leader can have the answer to every question. After all, leaders are finite and there are a myriad of potential questions, both relevant and—ahem—less relevant.

But even though leaders can’t logistically have all the answers, I don’t think that should even be a goal. As an ambition, that’s harmful for at least two reasons.

Bad for the Leader

When a leader plants the seed that they will have all the answers for their group, it bears bad fruit.

It can make the leader fearful of questions that emerge in their group or resentful of those who ask. After all, the leader might think, questioners are causing more work and giving another opportunity for the leader to fail.

This mentality can also lead to a misplaced trust. If a leader is good at anticipating questions and answering them in the moment, they might start to depend on their preparation, intellect, or persuasiveness instead of on the Lord.

Finally, when a group expects their leader to have all the answers, it can lead to pride. A capable leader who rises to this challenge may enjoy the attention they receive as their reputation grows.

Bad for the Group

There is clear spiritual danger for a small group leader when they are expected to answer every question. But this setup is unhealthy for the group as well.

A group structured in this way may start to trust in their leader instead of their Lord. Their confidence and assurance in the faith may rise and fall with the ability and mood of their small group leader. We must avoid this error and anchor our assurance to the rock-solid work of Jesus.

Members of this sort of group may also flounder when faced with studying the Bible on their own. Because they are not challenged to answer questions from Scripture, they may become content with the cotton candy of light, spiritual aphorisms instead of rich, filling meals from God’s Word.

This type of group may also experience stunted growth. Vibrant, healthy small groups often grow and split, as an apprentice from within the group (ideally) emerges. But if a leader is expected to have all the answers, this puts unreasonable weight on potential apprentices. That expectation also eliminates opportunities for group members to learn and grow into that role.

Guard Against Gurus

To train, lead, and empower small group members, leaders should guard against the urge to be a know-it-all or Bible guru.

There is one easy step to ensure a small group is focused on the Bible and not on its leader. This short response to any question will point people in the right direction.

“Good question. What does the text say?”

This is the simplest way I’ve found to point my friends back to the Bible. When I hear a question, I turn either to the questioner or to the whole group and invite them to look back at the text.

Sometimes the text at hand doesn’t answer the question, but other passages do. (A leader needs to decide whether or not that answer is worth chasing down.) Sometimes the question isn’t addressed in Scripture at all. But as much as possible, I want to point my group members away from my answers and into God’s Word.

The Danger of Being a Pastor

Within small groups, there’s a particular danger in being a pastor or anyone else with a seminary degree. I’ve seen how people defer to these leaders. They are often expected to give answers even when they’re not the leader of the group.

To them I offer the same advice I’m giving to small group leaders (as well as my sympathies). You shouldn’t have all the answers. As much as possible, resist being the crutch for your friends. They won’t learn to ride their bike until you let go and urge them to pedal.

Citing Other Resources

Finally, we should note that in the face of legitimate, difficult questions, it’s okay for small group leaders to admit they don’t know the answer. It’s also okay for leaders to a refer to resources that have helped them understand the Bible.

But even the best commentaries should not be appealed to as authorities themselves; commentaries should make the case for their interpretation from the text. And if a leader is not persuaded from the text by a commentary, “I don’t know” may be the best and most honest answer to give.

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5 Characteristics of a Great Small Group Leader

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Tegan Mierle (2016), public domain

What do the best small group Bible study leaders have in common?

Yes, there are certain things they do. We have provided a guide for those steps, from planning the group, running the study itself, and training a new leader. These actions are vital.

But no one wants to be in a group where the leader takes the right actions but has poor character. In this post, we won’t look at what a leader should do as much as who they should be.

Five Qualities

This list isn’t exclusive; there are many other qualities we could add. But when I think about a leader whose study I’d like to attend, these characteristics come to mind.

A great leader is diligent

Putting together a solid small group Bible study takes a lot of work, and this requires diligence. A good leader will study the passage thoroughly using a trusted Bible study method. (We have written about the OIA method here.)

Turning that personal Bible study into good questions for the group can also be a challenge. First-rate leaders set aside enough preparation time to write questions that will help their group find and wrestle with the main point of the passage.

A great leader is vulnerable

The best small group studies are lead by a person who has already been changed by their study of the Bible. When preparing, an exceptional leader will be vulnerable with God when thinking through the application of a passage. They will prayerfully consider areas where they need to change.

This vulnerability will also carry over into the meeting time. They will talk with the group about their own sin, their efforts to repent, and the grace God extends to them. A great leader will provide a potential map for their group members by sharing their own applications of a text.

A great leader is curious

A terrific leader is hungry to know God through his word, so they ask difficult questions as they read the Bible. They love God and understand that he makes himself known through this book.

While a good small group leader will put in a lot of preparation time before the study, they know they do not have a monopoly on God’s wisdom. They understand that different perspectives, approaches, and life experiences can help them both understand the text and grow in love for others. They want to know how their small group friends see the Bible text, so they ask honest questions during the meeting.

A great leader is humble

All the preparation in the world does not make a leader self-sufficient. A great leader is aware of their dependence on God, and they seek God’s help in prayer as they work to prepare for the group.

A humble leader is open to correction. They study the Bible aware that they need the discipline that God gives as a loving father. They also know that God may correct them during the group meeting itself, so they listen to their friends’ interpretations and look back to the text. An outstanding leader is not afraid to be wrong, because they know that the real authority is the Word of God.

A great leader is loving

This may be the most important characteristic of all. A great leader loves their small group members and wants the best for them. They want them to grow in the ways they know and trust God.

Love motivates a good leader in their preparation, in their activities with their group members outside the group, and in their prayers. During the meeting, a loving leader will not be concerned with their image or reputation, but with God’s glory and their friends’ growth.

God Makes a Leader

Does your small group leader have these characteristics? If so, thank God! And encourage your leader that you see this fruit in their leadership. Pray that God would help them abound all the more in these qualities.

If your leader lacks some (or all) of these characteristics, pray for them!

Finally, if you are a small group leader, pray for yourself, that God by his Spirit would grow these characteristics in you.

God is the only one who can change hearts. Let’s look to him for the character of our small group leaders.

What a Conversation Between Authors Taught Me About Leading a Bible Study

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writer
Brad Neathery (2017), public domain

I listen to a lot of podcasts, and a newer one I’ve been enjoying is called Table of (mal)Contents. The show is mostly about reading, and I’ve gotten some great book recommendations by listening.

On a recent episode, two of the hosts were talking about writing. Both of these men have written multiple books, and they were discussing their writing habits, how they come up with book ideas, editing, and other writing topics.

As they were talking about editing, one of the hosts (Barnabas Piper) said something that got me thinking—not so much about writing, but about preparing Bible studies for my small group. (A link to the episode is here; this quote begins at the 30-minute mark.)

People want to have 100% satisfaction with their written work, and you just won’t. You just come to the place where you’re like, “this was my best effort, my best contribution to ….” So I did a book on pastor’s kid, I did a book on faith and doubt, a book on curiosity. Are any of those the definitive word on those things? No. My hope is that they are the right kind contribution to connect with the right kind of reader and that I didn’t say anything terrible or stylistically just crappy. […] I think perfectionism is a terrible bane for writers.

I was struck by his comment about his books not being the “definitive word” on any of those subjects. I’ve grappled a lot with perfectionism when preparing to lead my small group.

Not a Seminary Class

In a Bible study meeting, my time is limited. We might have 45 or 60 minutes to look at the passage together. And I have a specific goal during that time: I want to help my friends see the main point of the passage and think about the implications for their lives.

We cannot do in a small group study what can be accomplished in a seminary class. Some passages are so rich that to dive into all of the connections and theological implications would take hours. And some small group members do not have the background or interest to cover all of those (sometimes complicated) topics.

A small group study will rarely cover everything associated with a Bible passage. But the study will be a success if we can read, understand, and apply the Scriptures in a faithful way.

A Check on My Ego

It is tempting for me to design a small group study as the definitive word on a Bible passage. Not only do I like the idea of being complete, but I like the recognition that comes from leading a profound discussion.

Perhaps other leaders face this same temptation. I want others to praise me as their small group leader. I like sounding smart and impressing people with my learning. The more theological richness I can wring out of a passage, my thinking sometimes goes, the better my reputation.

Of course, this posture is self-focused and wicked. Leading a Bible study is an opportunity to serve others and help them encounter the God of the universe. It is not a venue for shining a spotlight on myself. And exploring doctrine just for the sake of a sophisticated conversation is rarely the best way to serve the people in my group. When I am more concerned about my own praise than the way my friends worship and follow God, I am a glory thief. And I should shudder.

But the gospel says there is good news for glory thieves. For Christians, God is a loving, faithful Father. Because of the work of Jesus, he offers forgiveness and the power and motivation to change.

Keep it Simple

Bible study leaders, let’s remember that we don’t need to prepare the definitive study on our passage. We should study the passage ourselves, let the message change us, and then work hard to lead our group to the main point of the passage. Let’s aim for the “right kind of contribution that connects” with our friends.

God’s word is powerful and his Spirit is at work. He will bring about the fruit he wants from our efforts. We don’t need to craft the perfect study to make this happen.

Help Your Small Group See the Big Picture

By

Jiuguang Wang (2010), Creative Commons License

When I find myself in a new city, it takes me a while to get my bearings. I need an idea of a city’s structure before I can move around with confidence.

In Pittsburgh—the biggest city near me—everything is organized by bridges and neighborhoods. If I feel lost, I look for signs for the closest bridge, stadium, or college campus. Knowing the big picture keeps me moving.

When studying the Bible, a book overview serves this same function. Knowing the themes, structure, and main point of a book is a great help when you wade into the chapters and verses. We’ve written before about how to do a book overview in your personal Bible study; today we’ll address leading a small group through the process.

Homework is Required

A fair warning: This particular small group meeting requires homework. Your group members may balk, but without homework, a book overview discussion will become a lecture. Nobody wants that.

My small group recently started Luke, and we kicked things off with a book overview meeting. Here’s what I expected my group to do before the meeting.

  • Read the whole book. I asked them to read it at least once, and two or three times if possible. I encouraged them to jot down thoughts on the book’s structure and major themes as they read.
  • Watch two videos. We’ve written before about The Bible Project’s book overview videos. They’re excellent. Here are the two videos that were produced for Luke. (This was the easy part of the homework!)
  • Read an overview article. Either in a study Bible or an online source, I asked my group to find an article about the big purpose and themes of the book. (Here is one article I recommended for Luke. And here is another great resource on Bible book overviews.)

My group had five weeks between meetings to accomplish these tasks. Stating my expectations up front made leading the book overview meeting a snap.

The Meeting Itself

I told my group we’d discuss five simple questions at the meeting.

  1. Who wrote this book?
  2. To whom was this book written?
  3. Why did this person write this book to these people at this time?
  4. What are some key themes of the book?
  5. How is the book structured?

We hit all five questions, and because my friends had prepared, we had a lively discussion.

The goal of a book overview meeting should be to come up with a main point for the book you’re studying. Once you agree on this as a group, you can return to it to make sense of smaller passages. Even if you don’t hit on application during this meeting, you’re laying the foundation for future discussions.

Like a Compass in a Storm

The book overview won’t solve all of your Bible study problems. But it is a wonderful exercise for both personal and small group Bible study. When you know what an author is trying to do with the book as a whole, sometimes smaller sections of the book click into place.

Next time you start a new book in your small group Bible study, take a week to talk about the big picture. You won’t regret it!

Thanks to Peter for his help in preparing this article.

Image source

How to Train Someone in a Task

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Training is the process by which someone matures from learning to leading, from participating to performing. It is a process we regularly underestimate but can’t go without.

Some self-disciplined, intuitive types can train themselves in a skill by merely observing and imitating successful people. But there are masses of people who, to make progress, need rigorous coaching and instruction. This is why athletes, entrepreneurs, and executive teams hire personal trainers or outside consultants. Classes and books may help with communicating information, but effective skills-training rarely takes place without close contact, personal investment, and frequent feedback.

Living Fitness (2013), Creative Commons

Living Fitness (2013), Creative Commons

The world gives many names to such training: mentoring, coaching, supervising, parenting, tutoring, consulting, counseling. The Bible calls it “making disciples.” And when we use this fitting label, we’ll quickly realize the Bible has much to say about how to go about doing it.

While I write this post as part of a series about how to train someone to lead a Bible study, the process I outline1 can be applied to almost any skill. Since it describes how God works in the world, we should expect it to work as we follow his example.

  1. I do, you watch; aka “Come and see” (John 1:39). Invite this person to become your official assistant leader. Meet with your assistant before the group meeting to go over the passage. Teach that person how to do OIA Bible study. Practice it with that person over the course of a few months.
  2. I do, you help; aka “Come and follow me” (Mark 1:17). Ask your assistant to evaluate your leadership and make suggestions for improvement. Give assignments for your assistant to carry out during the meeting. “Please help me to draw out the silent person.” “Please feel free to ask a key question if you think the discussion is lagging.” “Please come early and be ready to help welcome people.” “Please let me know what you hear that will enable me to make the next study more relevant to them.”
  3. You do, I help; aka “Go out and come back” (Luke 10:1-24). Let your assistant lead one of the meetings, and then meet to give that person feedback on how it went. You now play the support role during the meeting, helping with difficult situations or participants. Encourage your assistant with what went well and offer suggestions for improvement. Avoid correcting every minor mistake; focus on broad patterns that might hold back this person’s leadership ability.
  4. You do, I watch; aka “Go and make disciples” (Matthew 28:18-20). Right when your assistant starts being truly effective, you’ll need to send that person out to start a new group without you. This is painful, because it will feel like your own group is moving backwards. You’ll lose the momentum and excitement of visible progress. But where there had been one group, now there are two. This is worth it.

The beauty of this process is that it’s neither time-sensitive nor dependent on factors like capacity, competence, education, or learning style. Because it’s merely a framework to guide the discipleship of an individual, we can tailor the process to all the different kinds of people we train.

If, after delegating the task fully (step 4), you suspect the person is struggling to succeed, that’s okay. Most trainees need to make their own mistakes and find their own style before they find competency. But perpetual floundering may also reveal that you moved too quickly through the steps and should return to one of them.

For the rest of this series, I’ll walk through these four steps in detail, explaining how we can use them to train people to lead their own Bible studies.

————

1I’m grateful to Dave Kieffer for introducing this model to our Team Leaders in DiscipleMakers.

The First Step for Training a Bible Study Apprentice

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The best way to grow a Bible study is to multiply it, which involves training a new leader for the newly birthed group. To train a new leader, you must first choose an apprentice who is faithful and will be able to teach others. But once you’ve chosen your apprentice, what do you do with that person? How do you get started?

Justin Kern (2011), Creative Commons

Justin Kern (2011), Creative Commons

The following posts in this series will focus on training an apprentice in the skills of leading a Bible study group. Before we get to those skills, however, I must clarify the first step: Teach your apprentice how to study the Bible. When I move on to leadership skills and training, I will assume your apprentice understands the basics of OIA Bible study (observe, interpret, apply) and can do them well in his or her own study of the Scripture.

So how do you teach someone to study the Bible? I’ve written on this at greater length in another post, but I’ll recap my points for you here.

1. Teach OIA

You’ve got to be explicit about what you’re doing and why you’re doing it. Explain why OIA is the best Bible study method. Give an overview of the process (this can be done in 5 minutes) and walk through the steps over time. Explain how to observe repetition, comparisons, contrasts, names and titles, and connectors. Walk through the process of asking questions, answering them from the text, and synthesizing the answers into a coherent main point. Fight for the main points. Explain the two directions and three spheres for application. Call your apprentice to get specific and focus on Jesus throughout.

The categories and concepts will give apprentices a vocabulary to see what they’ve never seen, understand what they read, and see everything in their lives change. When done well, this won’t feel academic but thrilling.

2. Demonstrate OIA

Talking about the methods and skills isn’t enough. People need to see them in action. That’s why you can’t really teach someone to study the Bible unless you actually study the Bible. Pick a book and go through it together. If your apprentices have been part of your Bible study for a while, they’ll have had time to see you do OIA study. And when you teach the skills (step one above), it will feel like opening a machine to see the inner workings.

3. Practice/Coach OIA

People won’t get it until they have to do it on their own. They might learn all the lingo and be able to tell you the difference between a summary and a main point. But unless they practice the skills regularly, in their own Bibles, and without relying on study guides or commentaries—they’ll end up with a few short circuits in their bionic implants.

Because of this need for practice, I find it crucial to meet with an apprentice outside of the group meeting. I’ll tailor my coaching to the needs and passions of the person. Sometimes we’ll collaborate to prepare the study for the next meeting. Sometimes we’ll review the previous meeting’s study and review how the OIA model guided the discussion. Sometimes we’ll do our own 1-on-1 study of a book other than the one the group is studying. The point is simply to give the apprentice an opportunity to practice OIA independently and come back for frequent feedback and coaching.

Again, for more details on these three steps for teaching OIA, please see the model I proposed here. If we don’t teach the steps for OIA, our Bible teaching will feel like secret dark arts that the uninitiated can’t ever replicate. If we don’t demonstrate OIA through books of the Bible, our teaching will feel academic and won’t take root in people’s regular practice. And if we don’t coach them through their own practice of the skills, they’ll never gain full confidence that they can do it.

And you’ll want your apprentice to be confident in his or her ability to study the Bible. That’s why you’re training, right?

Choosing Your Apprentice

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Darth VaderThough it’s an important choice, it doesn’t need to be a complicated one. It’s not like you’re looking for someone to help you overthrow the emperor and take over the galaxy. You just need someone who is willing to learn how to lead a Bible study.

This choice matters, though, because you see the need to train a new Bible study leader. You want the word of God to go forth. You want your ministry to multiply and not center on you. You want to train others to reach more people than you could reach on your own.

How do you get started? How do you find the right person to train?

Companies hire new professionals who have experience in a relevant field. Major League baseball teams call up players who develop through the system of minor leagues. And public schools recruit certified people who pass through a season of student teaching. In each case, the supervisory committee looks for evidence of commitment and success before they take further risk or assign greater responsibility to the potential apprentice.

Similarly, Paul instructs Timothy to look for evidence of both commitment and success in potential ministry apprentices.

What you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also. (2 Tim 2:2)

1. Find someone who is faithful

What this doesn’t mean: The person you train should be without flaws or struggles. The apprentice must never let you down. The apprentice must be the oldest or most mature Christian you can find.

What this means: Apprentices should demonstrate a pattern of resisting sin and addressing areas of weakness. They should be regular attenders and cheerful members of the groups they are learning to lead. They should be growing as Christians and committed to knowing God through the Scripture.

2. Find someone who will be able to teach others

What this doesn’t mean: The apprentice must already have experience in a teaching role. The apprentice must have a charismatic, extroverted personality. The apprentice must have a degree or comparable education in the Bible or divinity.

What this means: Apprentices should envision reaching others. They should care about how they come across and how they can improve their communication. They should be eager to learn, able to think clearly, and quicker to listen than to speak.

Perhaps you’ve got someone in your Bible study who already meets these qualifications, and your decision is easy. Or maybe you’ll want to invite someone to join your group to step into an apprentice role. Either way, if you stay focused on the right set of qualities, I bet the Lord would be delighted to entrust you with someone to train.

Then you can work with that person to spread the knowledge of God until his glory covers the earth like the waters cover the sea. I guess it’s like finding someone to help you overthrow the emperor and take over the galaxy.

 

Help! I Have a Bad Bible Study Leader!

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A great Bible study can be transformative. You see God, your sin, and your Savior clearly. You grieve over your offenses but marvel at God’s love for you in Jesus. You leave refreshed and hopeful about the future. A meeting like this can turn your week around.

Adriaen Brouwer's The Bitter Tonic (1636-38), public domain

Adriaen Brouwer’s The Bitter Tonic (1636-38), public domain

Because a Bible study has such potential, we can feel cheated when it falls flat. It’s like that slice of pizza you thought was stuffed with sausage but was swimming with anchovies instead. The unpleasant taste lingers.

A Bible study can turn sour because of disruptions, the group’s size, a chaotic setting, or recent events in the life of a group member. Sometimes we must play the unfavorable hand that God’s providence deals. But what if your Bible study leader is to blame for the spoiled meeting?

A Bad Leader

A Bible study leader could fall short in many ways. Maybe he favors lecture over discussion and misses out on the benefits of small group interaction. Or he asks questions but doesn’t care about the answers. Perhaps he shuts down conversations or silences people, leaving no room for differing views or sharing. Worst of all, he might misuse or misunderstand the Bible.

How do you react to a leader like this? Should you pack your bags and look for greener pastures?

Have A Conversation

Instead of jumping ship, ponder this: Might God have a job here for you? If the leader is young, inexperienced, or without a mentor, he might be aching for a friend to pass wisdom along. If you see the problems, by sticking around you may help your group study the Bible.

If you’re up for the challenge, there’s one obvious, uncomfortable task ahead of you: Have a conversation with your leader.

It’s possible that your friend has chosen a leadership style or strategy that makes your small group study unpleasant. But it’s much more likely that he doesn’t understand his effect. Your discussion may be a catalyst for his repentance (in case of moral failure) or training (in case of ignorance).

Of course, it’s also possible that the conversation will not go well, that he will explain away your observations and discount your concerns. Pray that God would use your words in the future if he doesn’t seem to be using them in the present.

Six Pointers

I’m avoiding specific guidelines on the content of this conversation because it may go in any of a hundred directions. Collect your thoughts and your recommendations before you meet, and if you need pointers for studying the Bible or leading a small group, this blog has some resources to consider.

As for your posture in this conversation and afterward, I have six brief suggestions.

  • Ask others first — Check with other members of your small group—are they seeing the same problems? If not, perhaps you need recalibration.
  • Pray — Bring this matter to God ahead of time, and if your friend is receptive, pray during your meeting. (And afterward too!)
  • Be humble — You are no better than your friend, and any insights you have are God-given.
  • Be a friend — This news may be difficult to hear, so be sympathetic and offer support for the future. Avoid all scolding.
  • Offer hope — Remind your friend of God’s long-term, enduring love and his committment to change us by the Spirit.
  • Look ahead — It’s unrealistic to expect overnight change, so ask your friend for permission to give small-group feedback down the road.

The Best Way to Grow Your Bible Study Group

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I don’t lead Bible studies just to make myself feel better; if that were the case, I could find many other ways to spend my time. No, I do it to help grow the kingdom of God. I want God to use me to influence others and draw them closer to him. If you’re leading a Bible study, I imagine you have similar motives.

So if we want to influence others to know God through Christ, we’ll want to have this influence on as many people as possible, right? That means we’ll want the group to grow. If we’re content with the group and never want it to change, perhaps we should reconsider our motives for having the group in the first place.

Grisel D'An (2015), Creative Commons

Grisel D’An (2015), Creative Commons

But this leads us to ask a valuable question: How do we grow the Bible study?

I could answer this question in many ways, depending on your cultural background, environment, unique strengths and weaknesses, and the makeup of your current group. But this post will highlight what is certainly the most important technique you must master if you want to expand your reach for the Lord’s sake.

You then, my child, be strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus, and what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also. (2 Tim 2:1-2)

Before you can master this technique, you must be strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus (2 Tim 2:1). You will always feel unworthy for what you’re about to do. Except for those times when you feel eminently worthy for this task, at which times it’s even more urgent that you be strengthened by the grace of Jesus. Draw your sustenance and power from the lavish mercy and free forgiveness of your Master and King. You are approved to study the Bible. And you are approved to lead others to study the Bible.

And what is this most important technique for growing your Bible study? “What you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also” (2 Tim 2:2). Take what you’ve learned and teach it to someone else.

Pick someone with godly character in your group to be your assistant leader. Give that person some responsibility in the group. Follow a plan for progressively entrusting both the good deposit of the gospel and the skills of leadership to your assistant. Your plan could look like this:

  1. Come and see (John 1:39), aka “I do, you watch.” Invite this person to become your official assistant leader. Meet with your assistant before the group meeting to go over the passage. Teach that person how to do OIA Bible study. Practice it with that person over the course of a few months.
  2. Come and follow me (Mark 1:17), aka “I do, you help.” Ask your assistant to evaluate your leadership and make suggestions for improvement. Give your assistant particular assignments to carry out during the meeting. “Please help me to draw out the silent person.” “Please feel free to ask a key question if you think the discussion is lagging.” “Please come early and be ready to help welcome people.” “Please let me know what you hear that will enable me to make the next study more relevant to them.”
  3. Go out and come back (Luke 10:1-24), aka “You do, I help.” Let your assistant lead one of the meetings, and then meet to give that person feedback on how it went. You now play the support role during the meeting, helping with difficult situations or participants. Encourage your assistant with what went well and offer suggestions for improvement. Avoid correcting every minor mistake; focus on broad patterns that might hold back this person’s leadership ability.
  4. Go and make disciples (Matthew 28:18-20), aka “You do, I watch.” Right when your assistant starts being truly effective, you’ll need to send that person out to start a new group without you. This is painful, because it will feel like your own group is moving backwards. You’ll lose the momentum and excitement of forward movement. But where there had been one group, now there are two. This is worth it.

After your assistant starts a new group, you’ll probably want to continue meeting for a time. You’ll want to discuss how the meeting goes as it gets off the ground. You’ll discuss the new challenges and opportunities faced by this fledgling leader. But most of all, you’ll want to make sure the new leader wastes no time in looking for a new assistant to train. And you’ll be looking for another assistant yourself. And before you know it, you’ll have four groups going.

I didn’t invent this model for growth. Jesus instituted it from the start of his ministry, and it has been changing the world ever since. It’s not flashy,  and you’ll rarely be able to wow people with your dramatic growth figures. (“I trained one new person this year!”) But the power of multiplication is like a silent infection, wreaking havoc on the forces of darkness. Don’t neglect this best way to grow your Bible study group.

How to Know Whether Your Bible Study was a Success

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I want to believe that what I do matters, especially when I’ve put in much time and effort. Don’t you?

And when we lead Bible studies, our common temptation is to measure success in all the wrong ways:

  • Did a lot of people come? Is the group growing? (Acts 19:29-41)
  • Was the meeting exciting? (1 Kings 18:28-29)
  • Did I faithfully speak the truth? (Job 5:8-16, quoted approvingly by Paul in 1 Cor 3:19)
  • Did I follow all the steps and have the right interpretation? (Luke 10:25-29)
  • Do people feel close to each other? (Gen 11:1-9)
  • Are defenses being lowered? (Gen 3:1-7)
  • Are people learning? (2 Tim 3:6-7)

Bernard Goldbach (2011), Creative Commons

Bernard Goldbach (2011), Creative Commons

When I call these the “wrong ways” to measure success, I’m not suggesting any of them are bad things. Merely that they are not the main things. If these things happen, then praise God! But unless the main thing happens, the study was not yet a success.

The main measure of success

What is the main thing? I addressed it early in this series when I explained the main reason to attend a Bible study. I now return to the same goal for evaluating success:

As a result of the study, do people know God better through his Son Jesus Christ?

If you remained faithful to the truth, there’s a good chance you led them to the one who is the Truth. But if you didn’t incarnate love in the process, you made much noise without making an impact. That’s not success.

If a lot of people came and felt comfortable with each other, but their affections and lives weren’t conformed further to Christ’s image, you may have merely accelerated their slide into hell.

If very few people came and you’re patting yourself on the back for standing fast as one of the only truly faithful ones in the land, it might be time to work on sweetening your speech and adding persuasiveness to your lips.

If people learned a lot, terrific. Did the increased knowledge increase their love for God and bolster their commitment to submit to Christ the Lord?

Yeah, but how do you measure it?

You may commit yourself to helping people know God through his Son Jesus Christ. It feels great to make such a commitment, but it still feels vague and idealistic. How do you know whether it’s happening? What is the visible evidence of such success?

In his book Growth Groups, Colin Marshall gives the following diagnostic indicators of a healthy small group. These indicators are most helpful when we remember they are secondary. That is, they don’t define success; they show that success is possible. If these indicators are present, the group might be healthy, and we can get close enough to people to evaluate their progress in knowing God. If these indicators aren’t present, the group is probably not healthy, and we probably can’t get close enough to people to know.

  1. Ownership: each member belongs to the group. People have commitment to the group and concern for the group’s welfare.
  2. Participation: high levels of involvement in discussion. People prepare for the meeting, engage with the discussion, and/or interact deeply with the text.
  3. Openness: honesty in self-disclosure. People feel safe to celebrate success, confess failure, and commit to personal change.
  4. Service: each member using their gifts. People trust each other and all pitch in. They don’t rely on the leader to do all the work.
  5. Achievement: the group goals are being achieved. People pray and work to the end that they would know Christ more and that others would come to know Christ.

I appreciate Marshall’s diagnostic, because it gives me a way to measure the overall health of the group. But, as with a healthy human body, it’s possible to look healthy on the outside without truly being healthy. But with ownership, participation, openness, service, and achievement, our chances are good of peeling back the layers and captivating people’s hearts.