Plan a regular place, time, and leader.
The leader should:
- start on time, not waiting for late arrivals.
- move the group along, being sensitive to God’s Spirit.
- encourage everyone to share without forcing it.
- be a great encourager.
- avoid dominating the conversation.
- keep the focus on the women, not herself and her own stories and insights.
- provide time for the group to think and share from their journals.
- contact absent group members to encourage them.
- text/email group weekly to remind them of their meeting and to share her excitement. As a group
- come prepared and on time with your study, journal, and Bible.
- share freely and honestly.
- encourage one another.
- don’t interrupt the speaker.
- love one another.
- don’t try to fix the other members of your group or their problems by giving advice, but do pray for one another and entrust each other and your problems to God.
- be honest and vulnerable, but wise in how much detail you share.
- stay in touch with each other between meetings for support and encouragement.
If Your Group Meets Within A Larger Group In A Church Setting
- Look for a woman gifted in teaching God’s Word to teach a short lesson after the small group discussion. Connect to BOW’s resource "Why Use Live Teachers, not Video"1 (For help, see our collection of videos2 or contact us.)
- Because educators say that we learn best when we discuss the members’ personal study in groups, the discussion should precede the teaching time to keep it focused on the group members’ insights, not on the teacher’s comments.
- The teacher may spend 15-25 minutes adding to the background of the lesson, beginning and ending within the allotted time frame. The majority of the time together should be invested in small groups.
- The teacher’s role is to clarify and extend what the group has studied, not to retell what they have discussed.
Schedule Suggestions
As you work to both connect those in your group and study the Scriptures well, it’s great to begin with an introductory meeting. For example, this study would meet for six weeks. Try to fit your schedule into a block of weeks with no more than one break for the sake of consistency. Each week set aside 45-60 minutes for small group, or even more if there’s no teacher.
1 Why Use Live Teachers, not Video? is found on video at https://vimeo.com/209323216 and the podcast version is at https://beyondordinarywomen.org/use-live-teachers-not-video/
2 These videos are found at beyondordinarywomen.org/bible-teaching, and the podcast link for each is given on the video description.
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