Tips to Help Nurture Your Group

Do you have any words of wisdom you’d like to share? Contact Us by email (friendship@friendship.org), phone (888.866.8966), or mail (Friendship Ministries, 2215 29th St SE #B6, Grand Rapids, MI 49508).

Camps and Retreats: Consider using a Friendship Life Study for your group’s summer camp or retreat. These thematic five-session courses work especially well in this setting. Check out Caring for God’s World, and Faith for Tough Times. If you would like to talk with someone who has organized such an event, let us know.

Ideas for Jesus, Our Savior/Unit1/Session 4: To make the lesson of Jesus calling his disciples come alive, consider take and “Apostle Hike.” Ask 12 people to act the parts of the apostles, and plant them in various places outside your church or meeting place. Then have the rest of the group go find them, singing songs to call them from their fishing and other activities to follow Jesus.

Another way to increase involvement: ask 12 friends to play the part of a disciple by holding a disciple puppet (provide in the group leader's packet) attached with glue to a chopstick. Place 12 cups of Kiddy Dough (available in boxes of 21 at craft stores) near the picture of Jesus from the previous lesson. Have a narrator call the name of each disciple, to which the actor will respond by coming forward and placing the puppet into one of the cups. Eventually, all twelve disciples will stand beside Jesus.

Thanks to St. Theresa’s in Federal Way, WA, for the first idea and to Calvin CRC in Muskegon, MI for the second.

Bulletin Publicity: Let your congregation know what’s going on in your group. One way to do this is to ask whether you can include a bulletin insert about your ministry. Include a summary of the history of your group, of activities you’ve been doing throughout the year, and of the people involved, from friends to mentors to snack providers to bus drivers.

Avoid Leader Burnout: Doing everything for your group yourself is a sure way to burn out before long. Not only that, but when leaders do everything themselves, others miss out on opportunities to share their gifts. Recruit people to take charge of things like:

Music
Storytelling
Arts and crafts
Snacks
Organizing materials
Preparing materials (copying, cutting, etc.)
Planning events and parties
Sending out event reminders
Transportation

Talent Not Required! When you are looking for people to lead songs or dramas, remember that it isn’t necessary to find people with great talent in these areas. In fact, sometimes it is the song leader who often forgets the words that creates an environment in which others feel able to risk singing a solo.

Financial Support: If your group is in need of financial resources, share your need with mission organizations in your church, individuals in the congregation, and organizations in your community (e.g., Knights of Columbus). Calculate the amount needed each week per friend, and suggest sponsoring a number of friends.

What’s in a Welcome? When your group gets together, try spending the first few minutes on…

Welcoming visitors
Acknowledging birthdays
Sharing events of the last week
Sharing any “show and tell” items

The above will nurture community—and compensate for various arrival times.

Celebrate and Remember: Establish traditions in your group to celebrate milestones and to remember sad events. For example, commemorate confirmations or professions of faith asking friends who have made this faith step to bring in mementos and talk about the experience. Remember a friend who has died on the anniversary of her death by bringing in photos, sharing stories, and singing her favorite song.

More Than a Program, a Movement: Stay inspired by reminding yourself that what you do in your group is more than just another church program to be measured by the numbers. You are part of a movement of people across the country—and around the world—who are responding to the vision that God’s church is complete only when all of his children are included.

Mobilize Your Mentors: If your mentors don’t know what to do during one-on-one (or small group) time, the friends in your group are being shortchanged. Encourage mentors to spend 10-15 minutes before each meeting reading steps 5 & 6 in the leader/mentor guides.

Worship Partners: A great way to help integrate your friends into your congregation is to find a partner to worship with each friend on Sunday mornings. That way, friends have someone to help them through parts of the service that may be unfamiliar, and more caring relationships are formed within your church.

Focus: As you work with the take-home papers during one-on-one time, you will often encounter pages with several pictures on them. To help your friend focus on one picture at a time, use blank pieces of paper to cover up the other pictures.

Hospitality: Remember to include caregivers. Reach out to them by:

Meeting the vans when they arrive and helping them get unloaded.
Learning the caregivers' names. Encourage them to wear nametags so everyone will know who they are.
Asking their advice on how to communicate with friends who have difficulty yet have so much to offer.
Inviting them to have a cup of coffee and snack with the group.

Recruiting Volunteers: Rather than putting out a general request to your congregation, ask specific people who you think would make good volunteers to give Friendship a try. They may not think themselves qualified, but you can convince them otherwise!

High Schoolers can make good volunteers, too: Responsible high schoolers can be wonderful mentors. Emphasize the importance of attending faithfully and arriving on time, and offer to write them a letter of recommendation for school or a job if they do.

Spiritual Gifts: Many friends have the spiritual gift of welcoming. Give them roles such as greeting and/or handing out bulletins at Sunday worship services.

Don’t Toss It—Reuse It: If you’re like so many other groups, you probably have limited funds. So why spend more than you need to? Save the visuals and guides from the Bible Studies for reuse. Here's an idea. Collect the Leader/Mentor guides from all your volunteers. Purchase a portable plastic file box - one that has a handle on top, or you could use a cardboard file box. Carefully file each Group Leader Packet along with the Leader/Mentor Guide from that unit. That way, when you go back to reuse them in a few years, they’ll be ready for the Group leader. Or if someone else takes over your class, they will thank you mightily that you filed carefully.

Decorate your space: The way your Friendship space looks is more than just a matter of beauty—the visual cues in our environment affect the way we feel. Set your space aside for worship by creating banners for the front of your room (watch the art ideas page for suggestions). Or do something as simple as framing art from the new Friendship Bible Studies—another great way to maximize your use of materials!

Names: Friends are often faceless and nameless to the world. Change this in your group:

Have friends and mentors express their individuality by decorating their nametags with stickers, markers, etc.
Wear nametags each week, and call each other by name.
Write prayer requests on a prayer board each week and include the name of the person making the request; pray each person’s name along with his or her request.
When a friend has a birthday, invite him or her to the front of the group to be sung to. One group includes the tradition of a birthday hat to add to the celebration.