Introducing RON YOUTSEY!

I'd like to welcome on board, Ron Youtsey - a new 2orMore Trainer. I'm excited Ron will be partnering with me in 2orMore to serve church leaders around the nation. He brings a wealth of experience and a huge heart for empowering other leaders to cultivate the growth of life-changing community in groups. If you are interested in having Ron work with you, please go to the 'Contact Us' page of www.2orMore.org and indicate his name in the 'Other Information..." field.

Ron’s passion is developing leaders and equipping new followers of Christ. He brings 25 years of experience serving as an adult ministry pastor with a strong focus on small groups, from new church plants to mega churches. Ron’s heart is to make disciples and he is dedicated to helping build a community of missional Christians in the local church. Living out his call to shepherd and develop leaders he provides practical training along with personalized coaching to encourage both new and veteran leaders. Ron’s experience as director of Small Group development in multi-site churches in Southern Nevada and Washington/Oregon makes him effective in providing a broad range of leader support and training for pastors. Serving on church staff teams he has developed successful Small Group start-up strategies and expansion campaigns to multiply groups while stimulating outreach.

Ron has published a Small Group monthly e-newsletter for 250 leaders providing resources and training tools. He serves as the Northwest area point person for the Saddleback Small Group network coordinating 180 participating pastors/leaders in five states.

A former Navy pilot Ron followed Christ during a six year tour and left active duty for a pastoral ministry. He earned his Masters of Divinity from Bethel seminary and completed D-Min studies in church ministry assessment and strategic planning.

Married to his college sweetheart Donna, they have twin sons and five grandchildren. He and his wife reside in Port Orchard, WA where he enjoys kayaking and other outdoor activities.

Free Web-Based Tools to Enhance Your Group-Life

circleup.com - With CircleUp you can e-mail or IM a question to a group of any size and get back a single result with everyone's answer. This tool can help if you need to change your next meeting time and want to see if the new time works for everyone. It can also help if you want to plan a get-together spontaneously between your regular meeting times or see what people are thinking about the Bible study you’re in the middle of. It’s a simple, free and easy way to ask questions of the community you belong to and get back a consolidated and summarized result regardless of which method you use to send your question!

pbwiki.com - A PBwiki is an easy-to-use web page that multiple people can edit. This is way people in your group can gather in cyberspace, generate ideas together, and develop a portal for learning and inviting others to join in your group’s spiritual conversations. This tool can be used to include people who weren’t able to be physically present at the last gathering or invite new people to your upcoming gathering. Think of it as an extension of your community-life. Like CircleUp, you can use this online collaboration tool to plan for meeting logistics as well.

https://beta.yodio.com - Yodio lets you record audio anywhere from your phone, combine photos with your sound files, and create an audio postcard that you can use to invite people to your small group. This is a creative way of strengthening your group’s approach to invitational evangelism that will pique the interest of YodioCard recipients.

mypunchbowl.com - MyPunchbowl allows you to create a cool looking invitation in minutes. The application of this concept is similar to Yodio, but you can make your invitation more interactive by including features like Google maps and message boards. It also allows you to share after-gathering reflections (text, photos, and video) with people who were invited. This tool might be useful when you are planning special events for your group like a summer BBQ, giving people you’re reaching out to a ‘feel’ of your group, and building on the experience of previous gatherings for the benefit of those who were a part of it or who couldn’t be a part of it.

Seeker-Friendly Small Group Life – Part 3 of 3

Receiving & Reaching Truth-Searchers for Christ

This is the final installment of a three-part series designed to help you welcome truth-seeking guests, build relationships between them and your group members, and inspire everyone to take their next steps together in their relationship with Jesus Christ.

1. Most guests like to be acknowledged – they just don’t like to stand out or be spotlighted in front of a group…so don’t focus on them. If you keep things normal the group will feel more natural and comfortable to newcomers.
2. The more people your guests sense a possible connection with, the more likely it is they will want to return. Help seekers get to know a few others in your group. Research has shown the possibility of a visitor joining a church is reduced by at least 50% with each passing week. This trend also holds true for small groups and can be inverted by the same proportion if guests experience the hope of developing healthy friendships. In other words, the likelihood of seekers returning increases by at least 50% if they experience a sense of belonging through their connection with others. This can be cultivated by highlighting things your truth-searching guests hold in common with other group members and timely follow-up.
3. Talk about how you would like for your group to make a difference in your community. Have that conversation spontaneously or just say you would like to talk about it next time. This allows you to revisit your group’s commitment to outreach and shows seekers that your group is…
   Outward-thinking and it is not all about those in the group – this actually helps guests feel safer because it makes the communal nature of the group feel less cultic and more caring.
   Serious about making a commitment to share God’s love and grace to a waiting world. People want their lives to make a positive impact on others. This helps them to see that your small group can help toward this goal, making group-time a worthwhile investment of their time.
4. Do not offer advice for how your seeking guests can grow. That might sound funny for those who like to be helpful. The reason is because some people on the receiving end of such good advice might interpret it as homework and think you will be checking-up with them at the next meeting. You might be surprised how this inhibits people from returning, especially if they did not act on your advice or experience the results they assume you want them to have.
5. Follow-up with guests before your next meeting to let them know you hope to see them again. If a seeker came with somebody, encourage their friend to welcome them back. Sometimes group leaders hold off from following up in this way because they are afraid of being intrusive or coming across as pushy. Guests appreciate this act of kindness and it makes your group more inviting overall. If you do not risk the remote possibility of coming across as intrusive in your follow-up, seekers may feel like they are intruding.
6. After a gathering where you had seekers to your group, write down facts about them or prayer requests they shared. Find a way to revisit these things when you follow-up with them and naturally weave them into your conversation. This shows you were listening and that you care, which has a powerful effect in drawing guests into your group’s community life.
7. Last but not least, decide as a group to have an open group policy with personal outreach (and if possible in church communications also). Small groups provide so many opportunities and so much encouragement for outreach. You want group members to have more than permission to invite their friends…let them know you WANT them to invite their friends. This attitude is one of the greatest contributing factors to a group making an evangelistic impact. If your group is in a season or study that is less conducive to having newcomers join in, just ask your small group ministry contact person to remove your group listing from your church’s small group communications and promotional material for a time. However, it is always good for group members to know they are commissioned and encouraged to invite their seeking friends. Groups can and should always serve to encourage personal outreach.
   

Small groups enable people to apply biblical learning to life and believers are empowered to engage in mission through them. They are a vital extension of a church’s community-life to the life of its surrounding community and present wonderful opportunities for blending believers with those who have yet to believe.

Just know a group that has an open home, open hearts, and open hands is a group that is pregnant with life-giving possibilities. By following the recommendations above, you will create an environment where the hospitality of biblical community will receive and reach many truth-searchers for Christ.