Baptist Team Leader: Sunday School Best Small-Group Strategy
by Allie Martin
October 22, 2004
(AgapePress) - The nation's largest evangelical denomination is putting a renewed emphasis on Sunday school as an overall strategy rather than just as a weekly event for churches.LifeWay Christian Resources of the Southern Baptist Convention recently formed a new team that will place a stronger emphasis on helping churches get what they need to grow their Sunday school programs. The head of that team, David Francis, says Sunday school is still important to churches.
"What's unique about Sunday school as it's practiced and operated in most churches is that, in most cases, it meets concurrently with the major worship experience of the weekend," he says, "and therefore folks can have the worship experience together with the large group, then go to a smaller group of people, where the children, the students, the adults all have an age group they can relate to."
When executed well, says Francis, Sunday school is a 24/7 network of outreach, assimilation, ministry, and communication. He maintains that Sunday school is the most effective small-group strategy.
"It means that a large number -- 80, 90, sometimes 100 percent -- of those who attend worship are also involved in a small group experience," he explains. "There are no other small-group strategies that can approach those kinds of percentages."
Francis has been with LifeWay since 1997. Prior to that, he served as a pastor for 13 years in Texas.
