“Sunday School is dead” or misunderstood?

Ron Harvey — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 20:55:39 +0000

THERE ARE THOSE today who will tell you either by words or action, “Sunday School is dead”. Sunday School is not dead. The way your church “is doing Sunday School may be dead or causing yours to die but the assimilation process for developing believers and reaching pre-Christians through Bible study is not dead.” Churches today are redefining Sunday School. Some are doing a great job and others and just shifting the furniture on the Titanic. There is lots of moving around but we are still sinking. There must be a way to keep people once they have been reached. A Sunday School that is well-organized and building believers who are reaching others is still the best way to grow a church.

SUNDAY SCHOOL IS being redefined in terminology today. I have heard Sunday School referred to as: Bible study, small groups, life classes, life groups, growth groups, study groups, fellowship groups, ministry groups, Bible groups, Bible cell groups, accountability groups, prayer groups, teaching classes, cell groups, foundation groups, family groups, faith groups and those are just some of the suggestions. Does it really matter what you call it (does it?) We should be more interested in what it does.

GROWING SUNDAY SCHOOLS are being redefined in function. Terminology alone will not change Sunday School. Function redefinition will.

We must continually be asking, “Why are we doing this thing called Bible study?” For some the only answer is, “Because we always have done Bible study.” Today that is an unacceptable answer. Whatever it takes to build great commission Christians and reach people for Jesus is the reason churches should do Sunday School. That means a new day for most of the Sunday Schools.

In the following posts to come you will be asked to rethink Sunday School. No more enrollments as we know it. Accountability as we have not ever seen. Teachers who see their role as moving members out instead of building their class (kingdom). These are some ideas you will see. Hopefully you will understand and use some of these ideas.

Sunday School is not dead, just misunderstood.
(adapted from Ken Marler’s “Growth Points”)

Writing Things for the New Year . . .

Ron Harvey — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 19:05:15 +0000

This blog didn’t do what it was intended for in 2009, but I have resolved to post more for what it was designed to accomplish. This is about simple . . . so simply stated will be the thrust of the content. It will sometimes be mine or someone elses. Today I want to begin sharing a blog of a friend of mine on some very important observations about Sunday School. He is the State Sunday School Director for Oklahoma, Bob Mayfield. Hope you enjoy . . .

Enhancing Sunday School through Facebook

Years ago, Bible study leaders discovered a new way to connect with the people in their class… the telephone! Yes, Bible study leaders discovered that they could call every single person in their class in about one evening if they wanted to. They might receive a prayer request from a group member, and then call the rest of their group to share the request. A teacher could contact absentees to see how they were doing. The telephone became a vital part of Sunday School ministry.

Today, another powerful method of communication exists. The tool is the internet and one of the fastest growing ways to contact others and stay in contact is through a social network, specifically Facebook. I am going to take few moments and encourage you to seriously consider using this tool to connect the people in your class. We will also look at some practical ways to use Facebook in your group’s ministry.

How can Facebook help your class or small group? First, it provides a central point where people can go for information. Have a fellowship this Friday and a class member has forgotten what time it starts? Go to your group’s Facebook page and look it up. A Facebook page can be a great place just to put information about your group.

Use Facebook to help you teach the Bible. Do you want your group to do some study or some work before this week’s lesson? Put your questions or requests on your group’s Facebook profile. Perhaps you want the group to follow-up on this week’s study. You can post follow-up assignments on Facebook. You can post some preview information about the week’s study so that your group will be better prepared. Bible memory verses can be shared with your group too.

Post discussion questions on Facebook. You might want to generate some discussion about a particular topic. Post the question and then let your class members interact with it during the week. The people in your group will not only interact with your question, they will also interact with each other’s responses.

Post prayer requests. Using some reasonable restraints, you can post some prayer requests and also answered requests on Facebook. A class member who has been unemployed has found a job. He can put that answered prayer on the group’s profile himself! A parent of another member that the class has been praying for made a profession of faith in Christ! That member can share this great news and answered prayer with the entire group with just one post.

Email everyone in the class at once. A feature of Facebook is the ability to email all of your members with one simple email. Reminders about the upcoming class breakfast before Sunday School can be sent, as well as other needs or reminders. The emails you send are not part of your group’s public profile, so non-group members cannot see them.

Write on your wall or in your group’s discussion box some encouraging notes, meaningful Bible verses, etc.

You can choose if you want your group to be open, public, or closed. Which you choose is determined by how you want to use Facebook. An open group let’s anyone post on the discussion board. A public group lets others view the group’s posts, but only members can write a post. A closed or private group means that only group members can view or write on the group’s profile. If you want to use Facebook as an evangelism tool, obviously the private option is not the best.

Facebook is not perfect, but neither is the telephone. Facebook can be a powerful tool to help you quickly communicate with your group and also provide a way for them to network with each other. By the way, although Facebook is heavily used by young adults, research is showing that the largest growing segment of users on Facebook is women, ages 55-65!

An essential thing for you to remember: if you really want to use Facebook to help network your group, then you must make posts on it frequently and often. The more you use it and refer your group members to Facebook, the more valuable it will become.

A great e-book that you can download for free is: Facebook for Pastors. Yes, it is written to pastors but you can peruse this e-book and learn how Facebook works and also some practical ideas about how to use it.

While you’re at it, add me as a Facebook friend at www.facebook.com/caddiechaplain.

Sunday School in a Simple Church – By Eric Geiger and David Francis

Ron Harvey — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 17:50:28 +0000

The Simple Church revolution is here. Thom Rainer and Eric Geiger discovered the revolution through an extensive research project that is challenging church leaders to simplify. Their findings are reported in the book Simple Church: Returning to God’s Process for Making Disciples. In general, the vibrant churches in the study are much more simple than the churches that are struggling and anemic. Based on the research, church leaders are encouraged to design a clear process, move people through it, align all ministries around it, and eliminate everything that gets in the way.
So what does Sunday School look like in a Simple Church? Where does it fit?
First, let’s look at the research. Rainer and Geiger conducted the Simple Church project in two stages. In the first stage, only Southern Baptist Churches were studied, 400 churches were identified as “vibrant” based on growth of 5% or more for three consecutive years, along with a similar number of churches that did not meet this criterion. In phase one, 319 SBC churches completed the survey; 166 growing churches and 153 non-growing churches. The majority of these churches offer Sunday School or a similar small group structure by another name. The research instrument and subsequent data reporting used the word “small groups” so that churches that use a different name for Sunday School would respond accurately.

David Francis conducted a secondary project around the 400 Southern Baptist churches identified as “vibrant” to determine what kind of small group structure the churches operated. Gathering information from church websites and phone calls, he was able to gather information on 376 (94%) of the “vibrant” churches. Eighty-seven and a half percent (87.5%) of those churches operated Sunday School—or a functionally comparable on-campus program scheduled adjacent to the primary worship service. Twelve and a half percent (12.5%) operated small groups, with the groups meeting primarily off-campus at times other than Sunday morning. Fifty-three percent (53%) of the vibrant churches used only the words “Sunday School” to describe the program, while 26% used terms like Bible Study, Bible Fellowships, LIFE Groups or other terms, and 8% used Sunday School together with another term. So almost 9 in 10 of the simple churches in phase one of the research have a Sunday School. But so do the complex and struggling churches! While both groups tend to offer Sunday School with similar content, their similarities end there. The program is essentially the same, but simple and complex churches differ greatly in how they utilize Sunday School. These differences are significant and set apart simple churches from complex churches.

1) Clarity: The simple churches know exactly where Sunday School fits in their process.
Simple churches have a clearly defined process for making disciples, and simple
churches that offer Sunday School have placed it at a strategic place in that process. This is the essence of clarity. The complex churches do not know where Sunday School fits. They offer the program but do not see it as part of the overall process.
2) Movement: The simple churches intentionally move people to Sunday
School.
Simple church leaders recognize the reality that people must be moved to points of relational attachment for true life-change to occur. In fact if people are not moved into relational networks, they will not stay in the church. They will leave and leaders may not even know. The complex and struggling churches scored much lower on their intention and passion to move people to Sunday School. They merely run programs.

3) Alignment and Focus: The simple churches that offer Sunday School focus more on Sunday School than the complex churches who offer Sunday School.
Sunday School plays a more vital role in the simple churches than it does in the complex and struggling churches. This is a big statement, but it makes perfect sense. In the simple churches, Sunday School is aligned as an essential program in their process. These churches have made the difficult decision to cut other programs that fall outside of their process. Sunday School has more prominence as one of few key programs. In the complex and struggling churches, Sunday School is just one of many programs. It does not get adequate focus because attention and energy are divided among so many things. Here is the bottom line, the elevator conversation: According to the research, you should know where Sunday School fits in your process, move people to Sunday School, and give it focused attention as an essential program in your process.
Second, let’s get practical. The research demands a response. Truth always does. What exactly should church leaders do with Sunday School in light of the Simple Church revolution?

1) Clearly define the simple process God has for your church.
You must begin here. You have to wrestle with this. Church leaders admit this is the most difficult part of their job, but it is so essential. The key word in Simple Church is process, not program. The process is the how. Most church leaders know the why and the what, but few have the how nailed down. How is your church designed to make disciples?

2) Place Sunday School as the essential program for one aspect of your process.
The simple churches that have Sunday School use it very strategically. Sunday School is placed along their process. Most simple churches that have Sunday School are using it as the second step in their process. In these churches, Sunday School is the group that people are moved to after visiting a worship service. Sunday School is the group that attaches people to others relationally. And attachment leads to retention. No one can argue the assimilation effectiveness of Sunday School. Churches that use it effectively are able to move a high percentage of worship service attendees to Sunday School groups. Since Sunday School is so effective at assimilation, it is wise to place it as the second step in your simple ministry process.
And what could be more simple than being able to accomplish step one (worship) and step two (assimilation and interactive Bible study) with every member of the family on one trip to the church? Because of facility or parking constraints, not all churches can do this. Those that can, however, can see a very high percentage of worship Attenders moving to the next step of discipleship.

3) Move people from your worship services to Sunday School groups.
We admit this is much easier said than done. Designing a process is one thing; moving people through it is another. While announcing Sunday School is important, and listing the Sunday School groups is helpful, these actions alone will not move people to Sunday School groups. To move people to Sunday School, you must have leaders and classes that take responsibility for helping people move into their groups. Churches with vibrant Sunday School ministries communicate this to newcomers: “Sunday School is important. It is your next step after worship attendance. We would like you to find a group. We will provide information and assistance to help you. But it’s so important; we’re going to take responsibility for it. So if you don’t find a group on your own, get ready, because we’re coming after you!”

4) Funnel special emphases through your Sunday School.
Becoming a simple church is not easy. And the most difficult simple church element to implement is focus. Focus is saying no to everything that falls outside of your ministry process. The research indicates that one practical way to increase focus is to funnel other ministry opportunities through your existing essential programs.

For example, many churches funnel their missions emphasis through the Sunday School, encouraging each group to participate in a missions project. Stewardship campaigns are promoted through Sunday School. By assigning men and women to separate care groups, all communication about men’s and women’s programs can be funneled through the existing system. A growing number of churches encourage Sunday School classes to subdivide into small discipleship groups that meet during the week. These groups also include associate members of the class who serve in preschool, children, and student classes on Sunday. These are just some of the ways a Sunday School class can serve as a connecting point for moving people to the next steps of discipleship, while avoiding the creation of additional complex and redundant organizational structures. It’s just more simple to align as many essential programs as possible with the Sunday School structure. But remember that not all programs are essential to align!

5) Prayerfully and carefully begin to eliminate non-essential programs.
After you have designed a simple process with essential programs placed along the process, you will want to eliminate non-essential programs and special events. It is a stewardship issue. Non-essential programs and special events distract time, resources, publicity, and energy away from your essential programs. People will not hear about the new Sunday School opportunities if you are promoting everything else. People will not realize how vital your Sunday School groups are to your process if it is covered up by non-essential programs and events. Do this prayerfully and carefully. As mentioned in the book, “Become simple as fast as you can, but not faster.” This is the body of Christ, not just an organization. These are real people in your church, not just pawns in a strategy. Simple churches that have Sunday School use it strategically. Complex churches that have Sunday School are just putting on a program. How are you using your Sunday School? How’s your how?

Sunday School vs. Small Groups

Ron Harvey — Tue, 05 May 2009 22:08:05 +0000

It’s the classic match-up between the tried and true, traditional, all age group friendly assimilation model – Sunday School – pitted against the intimate, flexible, let’s-do-life together, connect your church members to each other retention model – home-based small groups. Church leaders have debated the advantages and disadvantages of each for decades with no clear resolution.

To bring clarity to this clouded issue, LifeWay Training is bringing in the big guns for a title bout throw down. In one corner sits David Francis, LifeWay’s Sunday School Guy, the reigning champion and consummate leader of Sunday morning on-campus education model for traditional churches. In the opposite corner sits Rick Howerton, LifeWay’s Small Groupologist, foremost expert on the principles and practices of small group life, former church planter, and kingpin of creating redemptive community.

These two thought leaders on the subjects of Sunday School and Small Groups come together to discuss/debate the various issues swirling around each educational model. If you a have ever considered adding Small Groups or Sunday School into your existing ministry, this dynamic, live eLearning training session is for you!

WATCH THEM Duke it out! May 19, 2009!

You will walk away with a new understanding of Sunday School vs. Small Groups as well as answers to the following issues:

* Which is the “best” method
* Is there really any difference, it’s just two different names for bible-study groups
* Why would I want off-campus groups
* Can Sunday School and Small Groups really work together
* Won’t I lose Sunday School members if I start Small Groups
* Can’t you have intimacy in Sunday School
* Are Small Groups ever welcoming to new members
* Small Groups don’t seem to help with biblical literacy
* How can I keep Small Groups on target theologically when every group member has an opinion, whereas Sunday School classes have a knowledgeable teacher.

Simply Stated For October 5, 2008

Ron Harvey — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 18:23:56 +0000

Simply Stated for the Week of Oct. 5, 2008

“Ten Disciplines” For Transformation Teaching!

Ron Harvey — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 16:47:41 +0000

Lifeway Christian Resoures provides wonderful resources for churches to use to further equip its workers. One such tool is what is called “eSource.” The most recent article deals with the The Ten Disciplines For Transformational Teaching. Please read the link provided and comment on the article.

Welcome to Simple Sunday School!

Ron Harvey — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 21:05:59 +0000

I am excited about the opportunity to participate in one of the most effective dicipleship processes I know, simply put. . . . . Sunday School! Did you say,“Sunday School?”“ “Didn’t that die out twenty years ago?” No, it is very much alive and well after all these years. I remember going to Sunday School very early on (my earliest recollection was at the age of 4 years old). I came to know Christ personally at the age of seven. My mom took us younger 3 (there were six of us altogether) to Church and Sunday School every week. I even remember receiving these pins for perfect attendance (I still have the pins). But what I remember most was that I was discipled and shepherded by some very caring and loving adults who taught me how to love God, His Word, myself, and others. I am forever grateful for those who have influenced me all these years while attending . . . yes, Sunday School.

So why “Simple Sunday School?” Well, simply stated, it ought not to be complex recognizing what a disciple of Jesus Christ looks like, acts like, talks like, in the Church and the world. There is no better place to develop followers of Jesus Christ than in Sunday School. It is my passion to know how to do just that with the Church of Jesus Christ

If you are reading this post you are either a member of Magnolia Ave Baptist Church in Riverside, CA, and you teach Adult Sunday School, or, you happened on to this blogspot; either way, welcome. Join me on this wonderful and incredible journey with other body of believers.

Just a special note to those who are Adult teachers @Mag (Magnolia Ave Baptist Church); this blogspot is dedicated to you and for you. Please join me each and every week as we, in the power of the Holy Spirit, lead people to become authentic followers of Jesus Christ!

What This Blog Will Offer . .

Ron Harvey — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 21:05:11 +0000

Ever seen those commercial ads where what was pictured was something entirely different (like a hamburger) from what you actually got? Well, I certainly do not want to deliver that kind of false advertizing in this blogspot. I have a “holy discontent” that we should be able to do a better job when it comes to Sunday School than what we are currently doing. It is not about numbers because quality Bible Study, caring, nurturing, and outreach will produce the numbers. Those “numbers” represent individuals who have entered the Kingdom of God and are attempting to carry out the Great Commission. That’s where my passion lies. Having said that, what will be offered here when I open this Blog? The answer is quite simple: quality material that will help me grow in my walk with God and ministry in His Kingdom.

Besides writing articles every week, I want to provide some of the finest resources I know of on the internet to help you grow your Sunday School class and organization. You will be able to benefit from others as we post comments on various subjects. I guarentee that you will take from this blog something new or refreshing everytime.

So, please stay tuned and hang on for a new ride . . . .

This is Pastor Ron. . . good day!