31293 Via Colinas, Westlake Village, CA 91362, (805) 496-2101

Senior Pastor: Larry DeWitt; Pastor of Group Life: Charles Hall

Charles Hall

The Value of Small Groups In Our Church: According to Pastor Hall, "We are living in a day where there is a growing need for ‘connectedness.' I think this is particularly true in our Southern California culture. People feel alienated and isolated from one another because of the pace at which they live. Many of them commute an hour or more every day to work, alone in their cars. Because the people they work with often do not live in the same community, their relationships at work are not usually very developed. There is very little sense of community. Consequently, it is vital in this culture to provide ways to help people connect, to develop deeper relationships.

"The same is true with many growing churches. For example, we're in a suburban community that serves four or five surrounding cities. People come to our church from a broad geographical area. Bigness requires that we ‘think little.' By that I mean, in order to care for the people who attend, we have to get them into small groups. It is important that people feel connected. And they usually don't connect in the large celebration service. Consequently, one of our goals is to have a pastor for each of our geographical areas who will begin small group ministries in his area. In fact, to help facilitate this, we recently restructured and reorganized our staff and overall ministry around small groups. Now the central organizing principle around which all programs and ministries must be formed in our church is the cell group."

A Snapshot View:

• Sunday worship service: 2,400

• Church growth: "We have found over the ten years of this church's existence that new people will come for two or three Sunday services. But if we don't get them plugged into a small group within four weeks or so, we are quite likely to lose them. This has a pretty significant impact on church growth and is one of the primary reasons we have placed so much importance on our small groups."

• Frequency of group meetings: Weekly

• Study materials used: "Many of the groups study whatever the pastor is preaching about on Sunday mornings. Sometimes the pastor will develop study and discussion questions for the leaders."

• Small group structure: "We train our leaders to design their groups around what we call the five S's: sharing, studying, supporting, serving, and singing. I've found that one of the most important of these is service. When a growth group takes on a service project in the community—reaching beyond themselves—it does more for cohesiveness and relationship building than almost anything else they do. Our groups provide shelter and meals for the homeless, help with housework and maintenance in the homes of some of the elderly in the community, ‘adopt' single parents, and serve as volunteers in various other community programs."

Mistakes We've Made: "We used to recruit our leaders only in July and August, and then we would train them in a one-weekend seminar. (They would lead their small groups from September through the summer.) But we learned the hard way that this resulted in leaders who lacked ongoing support, encouragement, and training. Many leaders simply burned out.

"Now we have ongoing leadership training, which we call the Leadership Ministry Community twice a month. The senior pastor is always at these meetings to teach, challenge, and provide the overall vision. We've determined that if he isn't there, it won't work. And he has determined that these training sessions—not his Sunday preaching—are his number one priority. After the senior pastor's training session, the group leaders break up by geographical area for more specific training and equipping."