Willow Creek recently released Follow Me, the expansion of their Reveal study on discipleship growth and spiritual formation. They divided people into four distinct stages of spiritual development, and looked at the things that served as catalysts to move people from one stage to the next. Readers of smallgroupministry.com probably won’t be surprised to hear that their study of 80,000 people in 200 churches revealed that participation in small groups was a key aspect of growing as disciples.

But before we assume that we have this covered, congratulate ourselves, and move on, the book… well, reveals… a problem. The study included a “gap analysis” to measure the difference between how important people believed things were, and how satisfied they were with how well their churches were providing them. The two biggest shortfalls between perceived needs and what the church is offering them were:

• Helping me in my time of emotional need

• Helping me to develop relationships that encourage accountability

In other words: Of all the things people think they need from our churches, the two things people are least getting at the level they want are the things our small groups should be best at providing! So why isn’t it happening?

No doubt some of the 200 churches in the study don’t have small groups. But 84% of them averaged more than 250 in attendance per weekend, so chances are good that very few that don’t have small groups at all.

The problem, then, would appear to be that all too often churches have the wrong kind of small group. Small groups that aren’t helping people in their time of emotional need. Small groups that aren’t building enough community to allow people to be transparent with each other. Small groups that aren’t really providing what people need to develop as disciples.

How many of the things we call small groups are really Bible studies? Of course Bible study is important, and having additional Bible learning outside the weekend services is another catalyst for spiritual growth that they identified. But taking Bible teaching out of the church classroom and putting it into a living room with cake and coffee doesn’t make it a small group.

We contribute to this problem by putting out calls for small group leaders. We’re immediately setting up a hierarchical structure that will attract those who tend to dominate a group. But if we’re going to fix the shortfall identified in the study, we need people who are less leaders and more facilitators — people whose focus isn’t on how much time they spent during the week preparing a lesson, but how much time they spent praying for and pouring into the lives of those in the group. People who aren’t so eager to begin imparting their wisdom on people, but can’t wait to hear what’s going on their lives.

Having that sense of community is a key to spiritual growth. People are telling us they want it. They’re also telling us they aren’t getting it. How will we respond?

Brian Proffit brings experience as senior pastor, discipleship pastor, and small group director to his role as senior editor of Group’s Church Volunteer Central.