POD THINKING
We need fresh ways to gather the scattered people of God
For months pastors and church leaders have wrestled with how to:
Sustain online worship and discern when and how to return to in-person worship.
Offer pastoral care when physical presence is unhealthy.
Respond to the intense opinions of many people.
Encourage continued financial giving.
Retain active members, welcome new ones and nourish faith.
It’s exhilarating and exhausting! While many church people feel connected with their congregations, others are feeling less involved and more at loose ends when it comes to their church involvement.
We need to find fresh ways to keep our people connected with each other as well as engaged in worship whether that is online or in-person.
One effective way is to gather people in pods with a purpose, life-sustaining vessels supporting the people of God as they are sent to serve.
A pod is a group of three to fourteen people that meet weekly for Word-Share-Prayer and to send one another to serve.
Life today feels like being on choppy water in uncertain weather. Pods are like life boats!
They offer supportive Christian fellowship during the journey of those on board.
The Why “pods?”
The church in the States over the last decades has seen several forms of small group movements, each of which has contributed to church vitality. The term “pods” simply gives us a fresh perspective on face-to-face fellowship.
Pod shift us from the “spoke church: to the “network church”
Online worship is a spoke church experience. In the spoke church, people are connected to the pastor and the church like the spokes of a wagon wheel. They relate to the hub at the center but not as much to each other. When a people’s primary means of relating to the church is sitting in front of the online broadcast of a worship service, they do receive personal inspiration but little personal relationship, even if they contribute by posting a remark or a greeting.
Pod thinking is a way to add the “network church” experience - the network of relationships - to the “spoke church” experience.” Then people experience church as a spoke and a network. They connect with the center, the pastor and other leaders but they also connect with one another in a web of relationships.
The online experience suggests people of significant commitment to the pastor and church will remain involved but those less committed and without a network of relationships find themselves adrift.
Pods are life-sustaining vessels that are connected to the church and that are small enough to nurture an ongoing web of friendship among the pod’s members.
The How-to of “pods?” - checkout the HOME page and POD CHECKLIST
Pods of God’s People:
Deepen standing relationships.
Offer entry points for new people.
Sustain webs of friendships
Grow the connection with the wider congregation.
Enable pastoral care and growth in discipleship
A pod is a life-sustaining vessel supporting the people of God as they are sent to serve.
Pod-thinking offers a new way to spread the leadership load and enhance ministry!
Consider the concept of a pod for a moment. Pods come in many forms but generally they offer connection and protection. A seed pod holds seeds until they are released, sent if you will, to germinate and produce new life. So, pods are about support and service, in the case of seeds, sustaining them as seeds and sending them to germinate new life and in the case of people, supporting those in the pod and sending them to serve.
That gives us picture of a pod of people, pods with a purpose, pods that offer us a wonderful picture of the church for our day. Pods are a way by the grace of God this abnormal time can be an energetic time of Christian growth in faith, mutual support and in numbers of followers.
Pods with a Purpose
A pod with a purpose carries its members as they are sent to accomplish their work
Think of a pod of peas that carries and protects the peas until they are released, planted, sprout and grow – or of a spacecraft pod that protects its human inhabitants and from which they are sent to accomplish their mission.
A pod with a purpose is a micro-group of typically six to eight people, up to 14, that gather regularly for the common purpose of growing in personal relationship with God, with the people of God and with the work of God in the world.
A pod can be a small as two or three. If the pod is much larger than 12 to 14, then the pod will need to meet as a large group for a while and then as smaller pod-groups. Once a pod is too large, then quiet people remain quiet and it’s time for sub-pods!
Pods are a do-able, expandable way to help people grow in their relationship with God, the people of God and the work of God in the world. They are life-sustaining vessels that carry their members as they are sent to their work.
