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You’ve promoted it and prepared for it…what do you actually do at the Connection?  In this article I’m going to fill in some blanks…but first, let’s clarify one very important detail.  What I’m going to lay out is how to do a Saddleback style Small Group Connection.  I’ll detail the North Point version (GroupLink) in a future post.  For now, just know that what I’m about to explain raises up leaders better than anything else I’ve ever tried.  Better, way better, than any other idea.

Ready?  Here goes.

Step One: Set up the Connection to be a great experience.

Get ready for the day by including your Children’s Ministry team in the strategy. The best connection events are held right after a weekend service and feature childcare at least through the 5th grade.  In Part One of this series I talked about the importance of following up on the sign-ups for the Connection by sending a letter AND calling to remind on Saturday just before the event.  You can see a sample of my letter RIGHT HERE.  The letter reminds parents that there will be childcare and instructs them that when they check their children in to “let the volunteer know that they’ll be staying for the connection.”  Why do that?  One of the gaps we discovered was that requiring parents to pick up their kids after the service and then check them back into another room for Connection childcare frequently resulted in either a delay getting to the Connection or the decision to attend another time.  We eliminated that issue by simply giving each child whose parents were staying for the Connection a different color tag and then transferring them to an extended childcare room at the end of their normal program.

Announce the Connection TWICE during the service. This may seem like overkill but if you talk about the Connection early in the service and then again at the end it will help your walk-in count.  Simply saying, “If you haven’t signed up for the Small Group Connection but you can make it today, we’d love to have you!  There’s childcare.  It’s a really good experience.  Give us an hour, we’ll help you get connected.  Join us right after the service in room ______.”  If you promote it right, send the letter, make the phone call, and invite walk-ins…your attendance will be about what your sign-up was.

Be ready when the crowd arrives. Simply being ready with the room arranged and the right people in place makes a big difference.  The ideal arrangement includes tables, chairs and open space.  You’ll need signage that clearly identifies the room.  I’ve found that the best table arrangement is two rectangular tables butted together.  Pay attention to the RSVP count.  Provide table space for that many.  Position your friendly, outgoing greeters at check-in tables with name tags and medium point sharpies.  Have greeter also work the room while the crowd arrives.  These greeters can do double duty and become monitors at the tables as the connection proceeds, or you can use existing small group coaches or leaders as monitors.  I’ll give you more on this later.

You’ll want to start as quickly as you can, but not too soon.  Allow time for most of your attendees to arrive.  When you’re ready to begin, here’s what to do:

Step Two: Sort by Affinity

I’ve often described this step as being somewhat like a quarterback at the line of scrimmage. The diversity and size of your crowd will determine how you’ll sort them out.  Whether you sort them out by geography (where they live), type of group (couples, singles, men’s or women’s) or life-stage (young marrieds, empty-nesters, parents with teens, etc.) you’ll want to end up with clumps of about 12 to 16 people.  If you have a smaller group, you may not need to sort!  If you have a larger group, you may end up with several clumps around the room.  It’s not an exact science.  Make it fun.  Keep it light-hearted.

The first thing I do in this stage is “test the room.”  I usually start by getting everyone’s attention and asking for a quick show of hands.  “Anyone looking for a men’s group?  How about a women’s group?”  These two questions will almost always surface a few.  Note how many and then move on.  “How many of you are looking for a couple’s group?  Anyone looking for a single’s group?”  The object of testing the room is really just to see what you have.  Once you’ve gotten a feel for the room you can quickly make some decisions.  Only have a few people looking for a men’s or women’s group?  Ask them if they’d be game to join a mixed group?  Only have a few singles?  Same thing.  Eyeball the room.  Make decisions about what you can do and move on.  It’s always ok to adjust by taking names and fitting people into other existing groups.  Just make this stage move along and get into the actual connection process.

The second thing to do is begin moving people to different parts of the room. At this point, you’re not seating them at different tables.  You’re simply moving them to the right area.  “If you’re looking for a couple’s group, would you move over to this area.”  The objective here is to end up with clumps of 12 to 16 around the room.  It’s ok to be smaller.  You’ll simply adjust the way you do step 3.  It’s also ok to be larger than 16.  You’ll just adjust the way you handle step 3.  Once you’re finished sorting, you’re ready to move to the next step.

Step Three: The Connection Process

The Connection Process is actually pretty simple. You’ll be helping your attendees have a conversation that leads them to know each other well enough to choose a leader at each table that they’d be willing to follow for a six-week test-drive group.   It’s important to note that every church will need to determine who can lead a connection group and then adjust the process accordingly.   What I’m about to show you assumes that the group can choose who they will be willing to follow for a six-week test-drive.  For the record, I’ve found that most groups are extremely capable of making great choices even with only an hour together.  They can easily pick out who the “relative shepherd” is at their table.  That being said, what happens next is the first of three rounds of instructions, each round accompanied by a question.  The question rounds will be followed by a carefully monitored action step.  Here’s the first instruction and question:

First Round:  Find another couple (or get in groups of four WITHIN your clump), introduce yourself, and tell how you came to our church the first time and what made you come back. This is a short introduction.  You may have to call an audible or two in order to get them moving.  You may have to adjust depending on the number of people in certain clumps.

Second Round:  Now, take your group of four and connect with another groups of four in your clump…and answer this question:  Have you ever been in a small group before of any kind (could be BSF or AA.  Could be a home Bible study or Crown Ministries).  Have you ever been in a small group before of any kind…and what was your experience like? Again, you may have to adjust to accommodate a clump that doesn’t start with enough people, but the idea is to get them talking within the clump that you’ve sorted them into.

Third Round: Now ask them to join the other group within their clump and have a seat at one of the tables.  Ideally that will give them 12 to 16 people at the table.  The next question is, “Briefly share where you are in your spiritual journey?”  I like to debug this question by saying, “One of the great things about our church is that we know there are people here who have been walking with Christ for a long time…and there are some here today who are trying to figure out if Jesus is the real deal.  We love that!  Today, no matter if you’re investigating Jesus for the first time or if you’ve known him since you were a little child, we want you to share where you are in your spiritual journey.  Now the key word is ‘briefly!’  If someone at your table begins by saying, ‘I remember when I woke up in the Christian preschool…,’ that’s too much information!  We’re looking for brief today!  I want you to take a few minutes and share where you are in your spiritual journey.

This is the point in the process where it makes sense to have a monitor for each table.  You’ve asked people for an hour of their time.  It is possible to do a connection in about an hour…but only if the participants follow instructions and if you are fairly directive.  A monitor at each table can help participants keep moving on this question.  One person giving the 10 minute version of where they are can really set the whole process back.  Additionally, if the monitor is also the person who will be serving as a kind of coach for the group that will begin, it gives them a chance to be known from the beginning.

It all comes down to this. You’ve promoted and prepared.  You’ve pulled together a good group of unconnected people who are looking for a small group.  You’ve sorted them out by affinity and they’ve spent about 45 to 50 minutes in a dialog that has brought them to the very edge of forming a group.  What happens next is huge!  And we’ll tackle that part of the strategy in the next article.