Leadership Cells

Leadership Cells equip individual believers in a short time to learn reproductive patterns that last a lifetime.

Nomads, students, military personnel, seasonal workers who already follow Jesus work great in a Leadership Cell. Because of their culture, their profession or their season of life - they may have a hard time establishing an ongoing group, but they can absolutely be trained how to start groups in each place they travel.

These special purpose groups help learners become leaders who will then start new groups, train new churches, and begin more leadership cells to grow God’s family.

Leadership Cells also work well when a group of people come to faith at the same time. A family, a network of friends, or even a small village can be trained in a short time to become producers for a lifetime - even without individual follow-ups or spiritual coaching.

Leadership Cell Meeting Format (3/3 pattern)

LOOK BACK (1/3 of your time)

Care:  Take time to have each person share something they are thankful for.  Then each person should share something they are struggling with. Have the person to their right pray for them about the items they share.  If anyone is struggling with something that requires more attention, stay after to care for that person.

Vision (Never skip):  Spend time singing together and tie the lyrics to the themes of  loving God, loving others, sharing Jesus with others, starting new groups, and helping others do the same.  Alternatively, people could share Bible passages that communicate these themes.

Check-up (Never skip):  Have each person share how they did regarding the commitments they wrote down from the previous week:

1. 1. How have you obeyed what you have learned?
   2. Who have you trained in what you have learned?
   3. With whom have you shared your story or God’s story?

If they forgot to follow through on a commitment or did not have the opportunity to do so, then those commitments from the prior week should be added to this week’s commitments.  If someone simply refuses to obey something they clearly heard from God, then it should be treated as a church discipline issue.

LOOK UP (1/3 of your time)

Pray:  Talk with God simply and briefly.  Ask God to teach you this passage.

Read and Discuss: Read this week’s passage.  Discuss the following questions:

1. 1. What did you like about this passage?
   2. What did you find challenging or not understand about this passage?

Read this week’s passage again.

1. 3. What can we learn about people from this passage?
   4. What can we learn about God from this passage?

LOOK FORWARD (1/3 of your time)

Obey. Train. Share. (Never skip):  Take at least five minutes in silent prayer.  Have everyone in the group pray for the Holy Spirit to show them how to answer these questions, then make commitments.  Everyone should write the commitments down so they can pray for people knowledgeably and hold them accountable. They may not hear something related to every question every week.  They should note if they share a response which they are not sure they heard from God but they think may be a good idea since the accountability will be handled at a different level in that case.

1. 1. How will you obey or apply this passage?
   2. Who will you train or share with about this passage?
   3. With whom or where will you share your story (testimony) and/or God’s story (gospel) with?

Practice (Never skip):  In groups of two or three, practice what you have committed to do in question 5, 6, or 7.  For example, role-play a difficult conversation or facing a temptation, practice teaching today’s passage, or practice sharing the Gospel.

Talk With God:  In the same groups of two or three, pray for every member individually.  Ask God to prepare the hearts of the people who will be hearing about Jesus this week. Ask Him to give you the strength and wisdom to be obedient to your commitments.  This is the conclusion of the meeting.

Rotate leadership in the group throughout the session so that everyone has a chance to lead, pray, or ask questions. Encourage and coach one another in what’s going right, what could be better with a little practice, and what a good next step would be for each member of the group to grow even more