Half Way Look Ahead

We are at the half way point of our six week Community Group study, “Growing to be like Christ”. With only three weeks left before the end of this series, it is time for us to do some forward looking and see what is next.

Our original plan was to grow PAC’s small group ministry as well as align the small groups with the new vision of the church presented by Boyd earlier this summer, www.princetonalliance.org.

The core of the PAC vision is to “Know God, Develop Community and Bring Hope to the World”. In straight forward words this translates, “believe, belong and serve”.

Our hope is to make it possible for many more people to connect to our PAC family by belonging to a small group. We planned the Community Group campaign in part for this very purpose.

In early September, 85 people responded to our call and said that they would host a new small group for six weeks. This was to be in addition to 30 existing small groups that have their roots in the care circle ministry. While we were unable to find groups for all of these who said they would host at this time, we did succeed in launching 80 Community Groups! These groups are now following the weekend sermons with the Growing to be Like Christ” DVD material.

Looking ahead, we hope the 80 will decide to continue on together as Community Groups. While the current sermon series will end in three weeks there are some options for groups that continue to consider using for content material.

First option would be to continue with the Doing Life Together DVD series which included the “Growing to be Like Christ” material. We have two recommendations for you. If your Community Group is new to PAC or if you just want to focus on the basics of Christianity, “Beginning Life Together” is just for you. It deals with finding God’s purpose for your life. Second option is if you want to continue with something more around fellowship, we would recommend another DVD in the series called, “Connecting with God’s Family” The DVD materials for either option cost $65 and will have to be paid for by your Community Group. PAC will help you in obtaining these materials.

If you don’t want to continue with the DVD series, you can do your own study. At PAC we have many recommendations for content material for you. Contact your Community Pastor for more information.

For your Community Group to continue to meet, you need to do the folowing:

1. Pick the leader for your group. In many cases you probably already know who this person is who is best suited to lead your Community Group. Our guidelines were that Community Hosts did not have be members of PAC. However, to be a leader of a Community Group after the campaign, you do need to be a member.

2. To become a member of PAC, you can attend our next membership class which will be held Saturday, November 17, at PAC. The class is called Discovery Community and is held from 8:30 am to 1:00 pm. More instruction will be given to you that morning regarding membership.

3. There will be leadership training available for Community Leaders. Details are forthcoming.

4. Even though many of the Community Groups don’t have a full membership of 10, by staying together even with as few as 4 people you provide the opportunity for others to connect with you in the future. We are always adding new people at PAC and they may be looking to join your group.

Your Community Pastor will be contacting you during the next three weeks to help you through this decision time. May God bless you as you build Community Groups in your neighborhoods, so we can bring hope to the world!