There is a movement growing at Saint Nicholas, and you may not even be aware of it. Groups of people are meeting in each others’ homes and telling stories, sharing food and experiences, and they seem to be enjoying it! Our leadership met on the first Saturday in September to talk about this and what it means. As it turns out, many of the leaders are, in fact, among the people already affected.

This may sound like the beginning of The Invasion of the Body Snatchers, but don’t be concerned. It’s a movement as old as the church itself, as the quote from the Acts of the Apostles (above) seems to suggest.

We’ve had three groups of three people in each group – they are called discipleship triads. They’ve been meeting for between 3 and 6 months, and a fourth group has just formed. The groups have been working through a book called Discipleship Essentials. The material includes bible studies (including some memory verses which have eluded some of our more “experienced” members), essays and questions to help us apply the material to our own lives.

And here’s the thing – in spite of having three (now, four) different groups of very different people, everyone seems to be enjoying themselves. There are young moms, parents of teenagers and some empty-nesters. But all of them are saying things like, “this is my time,” “this is time I save for myself.” Compared with other committees and classes, people simply refuse to miss the sessions of their discipleship triads. Of course, the group doesn’t meet unless all three members can be present, so there’s some direct accountability. But there’s more – these groups provide a safe space where we can admit there are things we aren’t sure of or don’t know, things we wonder about, things we wish we knew more about. And there are people who have become close friends, people who can rely on each other. We know that sometime down the road we should form new groups with each current member leading a new group, but so far, no one wants to leave our current groups to do that.

I asked the leadership group, how can we introduce this idea to the congregation without people feeling like it is just another obligation? The leaders who hadn’t been involved in the groups suggested that the best way would be to have a forum for the congregation just like the workshop they were attending, where parishioners could ask questions and hear about the groups. So that is what we’re going to do. In the next few weeks, we’ll have a temple-talk introducing the idea of these discipleship triads and a week later, we’ll have an adult forum where you can ask questions and talk with participants in the existing groups.

I don’t usually recommend selfishness as a Christian attitude, but there are times when we believers need to be fed, need to share the mutual conversation and consolation of the believing community. Think for a moment about a couple other people at Saint Nicholas whom you would like to get to know better, people you might want to share your faith journey with. They may or may not be people you know well already. The commitment is for a little bit of reading and bible study and meetings that you’ll actually want to go to.

This is not the only way to grow in discipleship. We’re going to be talking about other ideas in coming weeks. But it does seem to be an effective way, a person-to-person, relational way of growing in discipleship, very much like the way the original disciples were formed.

Pastor Greg