Grouplink

Most every church tells you the best way to meet people, and grow in your walk with God, is to be apart of a small group.  Watermark is no exception.  It is a large church, and if you are not plugged into a small group of believers, you are just another face in a sea of people. My church doesn't offer traditional Sunday school, however.  It does have classes that people could attend that discuss various topics or characters in the Bible, but not regular classes that people go to every weekend.  That is why they offer Grouplink.

Unlike most churches, which throw you into a Sunday school class based on your age and cycle in life, Grouplink is a five week meet and greet, where you talk to and get to know people before forming a group.  At the end of the five weeks, you get to pick what days of the week are best for you to meet and who you would like to be in a group with.  Based on that information, the leaders put the groups together and assign a leader. I tend to think of it as speed dating for Lifegroups.

I personally like this approach.  Instead of being ushered into a class full of strangers hoping to connect with someone, you get to be apart of a group of people you've had a chance to get to know before hand.

Since I am single, me and a friend of mine, went with the single men's group in their 30's.  I got to meet a pretty cool group of guys.  It was interesting to get to know some of them, and learn where they came from and how God has worked in their lives.

I am excited to see who will be in my group.  One of the guys I met seemed to sum up my sentiments exactly.  He said he didn't want to be in a group of guys who got together every week for one hour and just have a bible study, though those are great.  He wanted to be in a group that could go out to lunch, go see a movie, or see a Rangers game.   In other words, really connect and become friends.  That is my hope as well.  I want whatever relationships I form to mean something apart from the hour we spend together in our community group or the hour we sit together in church.  Who knows?  We'll see.  My next step will be find a place to serve, but that's a different blog post.