Posts by Mark Howell
The Easter Experience
The Easter Experience, from City On A Hill Productions, is a new church-wide study from the folks that produced H2O. With host and teacher Kyle Idleman, The Easter Experience includes a six session DVD-driven small group study that coordinates with a six weekend message series–designed to conclude with Good Friday and Easter. The DVD-driven small…
Read MoreMaximize the Fall with a Church-Wide Campaign
Have you finalized plans for the fall ministry season yet? It’s definitely time to zero in on where things are going! Much like the way NASA has a scientifically defined window of opportunity for Space Shuttle launches (or landings), there are many factors that determine the success of a church-wide campaign and many of them…
Read MoreThe Exponential Power of a Church-Wide Campaign
What is the most powerful way to impact your entire congregation? Many believe that a church-wide campaign, what Rick Warren refers to as a spiritual growth emphasis, is the most important spiritual innovation in the last 50 years…maybe the last century. Why? Read on. Although there are very basic church-wide campaigns that simply offer a…
Read MoreThe Role of the Senior Pastor, P. 3
In addition to championing community regularly among the staff and congregation and casting the vision for community beyond the core of the church, the Senior Pastor is also the key to coordinating messages and themes for the year to emphasize community. This again is an area of ministry that requires the engagement of the Senior…
Read MoreWhat Do You Call Your Small Groups?
Important Note: Every day a few dedicated small group ministry champions (staff and volunteers) find this post. Can I be honest? I hope this blog post (written in 2009) gives you an idea or two. My real hope? I hope you’ll subscribe to MarkHowellLive.com so you can get the latest in small group ministry strategies,…
Read MoreThe Role of the Senior Pastor, P. 2
In the first post in this series we talked about how important it is that the Senior Pastor function as the small group champion. What’s next? Let’s talk about how to cast the vision of life in community beyond the core of the church, in fact reaching out into the crowd and community itself. This…
Read MoreThe Role of the Senior Pastor – P. 1
Some questions come up almost every time I’m at a conference. “Does the Senior Pastor need to lead a small group in order for a church to set group life as a high value?” “Is it enough for my pastor to be in a small group?” These are just two of the questions I get…
Read MoreLife-Change at the Member Level
We talk a lot about life-change in small group land. We often say that the optimal environment for life-change is a small group. I regularly tell people that the weekend service—even with inspiring worship and practical teaching—is closest in kind to a defibrillator. You know that thing they use on you when you’re on the…
Read More5 Areas You Must Tweak with Your Small Group System
I got a great question recently and knew you’d want to get in on the answer. You might even want to suggest something different or argue with me. Any way you slice it, this is a great topic. Here’s the question: What are five areas you believe every church body should be continually tweaking with…
Read MoreDesigning Your Small Group System
We had a great call today with my good friend Kent Odor, this week’s guest on the Small Group Fraternity. Definitely in the small group pioneer category, Kent has a long small group history and has had many great experiences along the way. In today’s call there were a number of important insights. Just wanted…
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