Today and tomorrow, I’m at the Re:Group conference in Atlanta, GA. Re:Group is a 2-day conference on small groups that NorthPoint church puts on each year. You can find out more about the conference here.
The opening session speaker was Andy Stanley, pastor of NorthPoint church. NorthPoint is a church that was planted by Andy over 20 years ago and has, at it’s core, a small group philosophy of growing the church and reaching more people. Here are some quotes from his opening session talk:
- Whatever you set as a goal, you’re going to get creative around that goal.
- We’ve never had attendance goals, only group goals.
- Setting a group goal has shaped our entire organization – how and where we plant churches, how we train leaders, etc.
- When setting goals, groups are the best bet.
- Long after I’m (Andy Stanley) gone, thousands of people will still be meeting in homes – rockin’ on!
- We wanted to build a community of Jesus followers who were in community.
- The reason the church thrived in the first 200 years was because of the “one another” philosophy
- Circles are better than rows.
- I’m (Andy Stanley) a thoroughly satisfied customer.
- It’s easy to love Jesus, but my (Andy Stanley) kids love the local church. My 3 kids think you’re supposed to be in small groups (be in one and lead one).
- Who feels free to ask “Are you okay?” and won’t accept “I’m fine” as an answer?
- When someone stumbles and falls and there’s no one there to help them, there’s nothing the church can do.
- Groups are preventative. (somebody can see what I can’t see, somebody can see it coming)
- There’s no such thing as a marriage problem, only problems that people bring into marriage.
- Every marriage needs some support now to avoid the need for life support later.
- There’s way more going on behind the scenes than you know or you can measure in circles.
- If people wait until they need it, they won’t have it.
- Small groups are like a retirement account – if you don’t invest now, it won’t be there when you need it.
- They were already there, so they were already there for us.
- You don’t start deep relationships with a crisis.
- You can’t do in rows, what you can do in circles.
- Your life would be better if the generation before you had been connected.
- It’s not about the results we get, it’s about the problems we’re preventing.
Stay tuned for more quotes from the conference!