If you’ve been following this series of articles, you should by now have established the purpose for small groups in your church, and identified a visionary and your vision for small groups. And now you’re ready for the next step. See how easy that was?

Hopefully you’ve detected the note of sarcasm there.

If not, you may have fallen into the trap that so many other churches have. To pull back the curtain a bit: Authors of articles like this one, or books like the ones on your shelves, or speakers at events like you’ve attended this year, are charged with taking a fairly complex process and making it understandable for their defined audience. This causes us to put into a neat little package things that aren’t neat and really can’t be packaged. Nonetheless, I hope what I’m sharing is helpful—and that you realize that realize nothing’s as easy it appears in print.

You may still be wrestling with defining the purpose for your small-group ministry and not even thinking about vision yet. That’s okay. We’re there with you. My wife and I finally got a chance to sit down with a couple of the pastors to discuss what our church was looking for in its small-group ministry. Being new to the church, we had to back up and ask simple questions like: How many small groups currently exist? What’s the leadership structure of the church? What’s the history of small groups at this church? Where do leaders see small groups interacting with other ministries of the church?

Having done that, we’re now feeling quite a bit better about building a small team and crafting a purpose statement. Seeking after and developing the vision for our small-group ministry will come after that. And I’m not sure how long this will take.

But enough reality! Let’s take some time to examine what happens after the vision has been revealed and you are ready to get moving. In short: Goals. And if you’ve done a good job developing purpose and vision, goals should be very easy to establish. If you find yourself struggling to come up with goals, that’s probably an indication that you need to revisit your purpose and vision.

When setting goals, I recommend the S.M.A.R.T. approach. I’m not sure where the concept first developed, but it’s been used for many years in business. S.M.A.R.T. goals are Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and Timely. So let’s break that down a little further.

Specific goals include start and end dates, size and location of meetings, frequency, and types of groups (study, recreational, interest-based).

Measurable goals include targets for numbers of groups, numbers of leaders, numbers of people trained and equipped, and increases in worship attendance directly attributable to small-group participation. There’s nothing wrong with setting goals like “increased spiritual maturity” of participants. But can you create a reliable way to measure spiritual growth or discipleship or other faith-impact goals? For a goal to be measurable you have to be able—and willing—to measure it.

Next you want to make sure that your goals are attainable. Is it within your church’s capacity to tackle the goals you’re setting? On the other hand, churches sometimes make the mistake of not setting any aggressive goals because they’re convinced the goals aren’t attainable. Stretch, but understand your reach.

Close cousins to attainable goals are realistic goals. If a goal set for your small-group ministry is attainable for your church, but your leadership or congregation aren’t willing or able to attempt it, then it’s not realistic. This is where a clear, compelling vision comes back into play. An inspirational vision properly communicated and consistently held up can motivate others to achieve incredible things. In a church of 100 people, with the right vision and motivated people, even a goal of 200 people in small groups might be very realistic. (Yes, you read that correctly.) That same goal for a church of 500 that doesn’t have the willingness or ability to tackle it, on the other hand, would be unrealistic.

Finally, you want your goals to be timely. This means there’s a defined beginning and end. Let’s face it, churches are notorious for getting people involved in things with the impression that they really are eternal. I served in a church in the ‘80s where the Sunday School superintendent was 75 years old and had been serving since she was 20 years old! Irene was one of the sweetest ladies I’ve ever met and I loved her dearly. But you can imagine the challenges I faced when it came time to recruit her replacement.

One way to set timely goals that I highly recommend is to start with an end in mind. If I know that our small groups are going to launch the first week of February, I can now back schedule my calendar to determine what needs to be done one week before launch, one month before launch, two months before launch, three months before launch and right now. As I back fill my calendar from my target date I might realize that there isn’t enough time to fully prepare for a February launch. That allows me the chance to adjust my launch date, rearrange my other priorities, and decide what can be safely eliminated from my list of tasks.

S.M.A.R.T. goals work together to accomplish your vision for small-group ministry. Next time we’ll take some time to dig further into our S.M.A.R.T. goals, provide specific examples of each and how they can play off the others, and look at how to make goals that are flexible without diminishing their effectiveness.

Tim Kurth served as a Director of Christian Education in the Midwest for more than 20 years. During that time he assisted churches in starting a variety of volunteer ministries. He’s a husband, father, author and speaker. He and his wife Elizabeth live in Loveland, Colorado, where he currently serves as Camp Project Leader with Group Workcamps Foundation.