Life Shapes
Help your disciples live balanced lives that honor God, emphasize community, and prioritizes seeking the lost
In the buttons below you will find videos, articles, podcasts and helpful questions that will help your disciples become mature in each topic. Take your time to read through the materials yourself so that you can be as helpful as you can.
Today’s Session
DISCLAIMER: This may look like a lot to go through, but if this is your first time engaging in a D-Group here at Fielder, it is highly encouraged that you take the time to process all of this before starting!
In this first session, you’ll spend time getting to know each other. Here’s an outline of what to expect:
- Review the Discipleship Group purpose and guidelines below.
- Read, discuss, and agree to the Discipleship Group Commitment Form.
- Share your faith story.
- Pray for one another.
- Plan your next meeting.
Purpose
The purpose of the Discipleship Group is simple: to learn what it means to grow in deeper obedience to Jesus so that we can more effectively inhale the Gospel, exhale the Gospel, and make disciples who do the same.
With that being said, let me tell you what it isn’t. This is not simply another Bible study or prayer group. In this group, you will study the Bible, you will pray, and you will have accountability, but God’s vision for this experience is much greater than any individual component. His goal is nothing other than the production of missionary leaders who have a radical love of God and an incomprehensible love for those He has placed around them. But how do Discipleship Groups accomplish this? Discipleship Groups do two things that help produce missionary leaders:
1. Train you to be a disciple
If you are in a New Disciple curriculum, the goal is for you to be established in your understanding of who Jesus is, what it means to follow Him, and how to walk in obedience to His commands. This establishing is crucial to the rest of your life as a disciple of Jesus. Everything that God wants to do in you and through you will be based on this foundation that He is establishing in you through Bible reading, prayer, accountability, serving, and learning to share your faith.
If you are in a Growing Disciple curriculum, the goal is for you to be equipped to do the work of the ministry that God has called you to do. Our faith was never meant to be kept to ourselves, but to be used to be a blessing in the world around us. God has called you out of darkness into light so that you might be sent back into a dark world with the power of the Holy Spirit to redeem and save. This curriculum will give you the tools that you need to live your faith out loud, to find freedom from sin, and to make an impact in the world around you with the gifts that God has given you. This is an ongoing process that lasts for the rest of your life!
2. Train you to make disciples
Jesus’ final command to His disciples was not simply to be disciples but “to make disciples of all nations…” That means our journey does not end once we become growing disciples who are equipped to do the work of the ministry, we are commanded by our Savior King to be disciple-makers! Multiplying Disciple curriculum will help export you; to take what you know about what it means to follow Jesus and pour into the next generation of disciple-makers, whether that’s here at Fielder, across the globe, or somewhere in between! If you want to be obedient to Jesus then that means you need to step into the journey of making disciples who make disciples.
Now that you know why we’re here (to either establish, equip, or export you), let’s dive into what this group is practically going to look like!
General Guidelines
The four major values in the DGs are authenticity, teachability, confidentiality, and dedication. Each person is asked to commit to live by these values during the DG experience.
- Every person must choose authenticity over comfort. The more real you are, the more you give God space to deal with areas of growth in your life.
- Every person must choose teachability above self-confidence. The more you approach this thinking, the more you have the answers, and the less you will see your need to change (and consequently, the less you will!). Our goal is to be teachable during this process, giving God space to let us shape each other.
- Confidentiality – what is said during the meeting stays in the meeting. If you are married, this includes speaking with your spouse about things that are discussed by other members. If this guideline is breached, authenticity suffers.
- Dedication – due to the intensity of the experience, each person must dedicate themselves to do 4 things: pray for each other, do all the assigned curriculum, prepare for each meeting by answering all questions in advance, and make attendance at the meetings a priority.
D-Group Extras
This curriculum is not meant to be all-encompassing for everything that you need to be a healthy Christian but a tool that you can use in tandem with other tools so that you can grow as a disciple who makes disciples. On top of this curriculum, you should also be using the below resources to make sure that you are as healthy as possible:
- Bible Memorization tools
- Writing scripture on our hearts helps us combat temptation, minister to people better, and grow more in love with Jesus. Find a scripture memorization tool that your group likes and commit to memorizing scripture throughout your time together. You can use the apps/books listed below to start!
- Join a Community Group and start serving!
- Community Groups give you an opportunity to form a family of believers that you can serve with, pray with, pursue non-believers with, and connect with in a different way than Discipleship Groups. Discipleship is done best in the context of community! Sign up for a Community Group here!
- As you grow in being a disciple, finding opportunities to live out what you are learning is extremely beneficial to your growth. There are plenty of areas to serve within Fielder and countless ways to serve in our local community that will help you walk in obedience to Christ. You can click this link to learn about the serve opportunities available to you in Fielder Church and our Community.
- Bible Reading Plan
- Since the purpose of being in a D-Group is to grow in more obedience and likeness to Christ, then spending time with Him through the Word is essential to your growth. We encourage you to start a Bible reading plan with your group to hold each other accountable to spending time with Jesus through scripture and help one another understand the commands and promises that God is speaking over you. You can find Bible reading plans on the Fielder Website by clicking here!
Discipleship Group Meeting Flow
Almost every discipleship group curriculum that Fielder offers follows the same formula and contains the same components. This ensures that no matter what you are learning, it is being taught in a familiar and uniform way. The time spent on each section is dependent on the shepherd’s leadership and the needs of the group, but the average D-Group meeting should generally follow the flow below. The components of a Discipleship Group will often include:
Prayer(10 minutes) – A time to spend time with the Father together, offer up prayer requests, and pray for the non-believers in your lives.
Accountability(25 minutes) – Hold each other accountable to your Bible reading goals, regular prayer times, confession and repentance of sin, and action steps based on the last D-Group session.
Intentional Learning (55 minutes) – This will include:
- Overview (5 minutes) – Recap of the curriculum that was assigned to the group
- Discussion (20 minutes) – Questions that are geared towards diving deeper into what God is revealing to you through the curriculum. Use this time to answer how you understand what God is trying to say to you through the curriculum. Don’t try to give the “right” answer, give your answer to the questions.
- Model/Practice (15 minutes) – An opportunity to put what you have learned into action in a safe environment. Whether it’s role-playing a scenario that you might encounter in the world around you, participating in an activity together, or praying that God would move, this is vitally important for getting what you learned from your head down to your heart.
- Action Steps (15 minutes) – Every D-Group member will share what they will do before the next D-Group meeting to build on what they learned in the curriculum and what they confessed and repented of during accountability.
Prayer and Accountability
Prayer and accountability are essential components of Discipleship groups. The prayer and accountability time allotted in your meeting is not just there so you can share. It’s not just there as a checklist to make sure you are doing the right things. It’s there to help you sharpen each other and grow in every area of life as you Inhale and Exhale the gospel!
For each session, you will select two questions within the D-Group Accountability Questions document that reflect areas of victory in your life and two questions that reflect areas of struggle and discuss them with the group. Please spend time before the meeting determining these areas so that you will be prepared to share.
Shepherds have the option to help push the rest of the group deeper in accountability. If more areas need to be discussed, feel free to move beyond the questions selected by the group member.
Intentional Learning Guidelines
Intentional learning is an essential part of D-Groups at Fielder. Much of this learning takes the form of reading the Bible, helpful books, articles, and blogs, and watching helpful videos, sermons, and podcasts. Here are a few tips that we have found to be helpful:
- Take notes while you read/watch. Underline important thoughts, put a star or some indication next to new, important ideas, and write frequently in the margins as your thoughts come.
- Pick out the 5 most influential thoughts or concepts (Top 5) from your assigned curriculum and record them in your journal.
- Carve out 10 minutes every day in your schedule that will allow you to spend time reading/listening and journaling your takeaways.
- To assist you in reading the assigned scripture passages, we provide a guide called The Gospel Method to help you grow in your love and understanding of God through reading and studying the Bible. Take time during your first session to go over the method as a group and pray that it gives you guidance on how to hear God’s voice more clearly as you read scripture.
Facilitate Leadership
After the first few sessions, you should begin to rotate the facilitator of each session to give each person in the group a chance to lead. Each of you will be asked to eventually lead a Discipleship Group once you have gone through the Discipleship Cycle.
Once you go through the Discipleship Cycle, or when the shepherd of the group recommends, you should begin to lead 3 new people through a D-Group of your own.
Commitment Form
Click here to download and print the Discipleship Group Commitment Form. By signing this, you are ensuring that everybody in the group is bought into the vision and purpose of this Discipleship Group. This helps you trust one another as you confess and repent of sin, share prayer requests, and challenge each other to walk in Christlikeness.
Faith Stories
Share Your Faith Story
Take turns sharing your faith story using the outline below.
- Tell about what life was like before Jesus was Lord of your life. (even if you grew up in a Christian home, there should be a moment where Jesus became the one sitting on the throne of your life instead of you. Describe what that “before time” was like!)
- Tell how you were introduced to Jesus Christ and the events surrounding your acceptance of Him as your personal Savior and Lord.
- Tell how you have grown spiritually since your conversion and what God is doing in you at the moment.
Prayer
Everyone shares one area that you are asking for God to move in your life.
After each person shares, the group should pray for them.
Prayer Requests/Time in Prayer
- How can we pray for you?
- During this time, don’t focus on the prayer needs of others in your life, we want to pray for you.
Accountability
- What is one thing that you read from scripture that you believe the Lord is trying to teach you? What are you going to do about it?
- What is God asking you to confess and repent of? How can the others in the group hold you accountable to this?
- Who are you praying for and are planning to show hospitality towards in your life who has not yet put their faith in Jesus?
Content Overview
Send these resources to your disciples:
Memorize: Mark 1:15
Model and Practice
Model:
- Process through a recent Learning Moment that you have recently had with your disciples. Go through each step of the Learning Circle up to “accountability.” If you can, try to use a Learning moment that came from your time reading scripture to show how you are responding to God’s word.
- Have your disciples actually hold you accountable to what you are choosing to repent and believe. Commit to do whatever it is that you have felt called to and keep your disciples up to date on how it’s going.
- On a scale of 1-10, give yourself a score on how your up, in, and out relationships have been recently. Be honest with yourself and with your disciples.
- Share action steps with your disciples on how you are going to improve in each area of the Triangle in the coming weeks. Ask them to hold you accountable to these action steps.
Practice:
- Ask your disciples to all go through the Learning Circle based off of a recent Learning moment they have had in the past week. Have them write out in their journals each step and share with the group once they have processed through their Learning Circle.
- Instruct your disciples to give themselves a score on each part of the Triangle. Ask them to be honest with themselves and to give reasons for why that has been the case. Then, instruct them to write action steps for how they are going to grow in the Triangle over the next few weeks.
Action Steps and Prayer
- Have your D-Group identify 2-3 Learning moments that they have within the next 2 weeks. Have them journal their Kairos Circle and bring that to the next DG meeting.
- For each person in the DG, whichever part of the Triangle they felt they were weakest in, do something this week that helps grow that portion of their lives. Talk about what that could be before the end of the session so that everyone can be held accountable.
Prayer Requests/Time in Prayer
- How can we pray for you?
- During this time, don’t focus on the prayer needs of others in your life, we want to pray for you.
Accountability
- What is one thing that you read from scripture that you believe the Lord is trying to teach you? What are you going to do about it?
- What is God asking you to confess and repent of? How can the others in the group hold you accountable to this?
- What are some takeaways from implementing the new practices from last week’s DG session?
- Who are you praying for and are planning to show hospitality towards in your life who has not yet put their faith in Jesus?
Content Overview
Send these resources to your disciples:
Memorize: Matthew 6:9-13
Model and Practice
Model:
- Pray through the Lord’s Prayer over your disciples. Use the Hexagon tool to not pray the Lord’s prayer word-for-word, but to pray the principles that God is asking you to pray. Pray in your own words so that your disciples can see how you pray like Jesus taught His disciples to pray.
- Read John 15 in your group with your disciples. Lead your group to analyze the text using the Key. Genuinely process through what the stand out and what the Lord is teaching you in this passage of scripture.
Practice:
- Take time as a group to pray using the Hexagon. Focus on one section at a time and move one to the next once everybody has prayed. Make sure everyone prays during each section.
- After showing your disciples how you personally use the Key to process through scripture, give them time to study John 15 and use the key themselves. Take time to share the different kairos moments that all of you had during that time reading and processing through scripture.
Action Steps and Prayer
- Challenge your disciples to read the bible every week day until your next D-Group meeting and use the Key to process through what the Lord could be saying to each of you. At the next D-Group, go over what the Lord has been teaching in those times during the “accountability” section.
- Get into pairs before you leave your time with the group. Each pair should find times to gather together at least once a week to pray through the Hexagon together. Contact your disciples after the first week to make sure everybody met.
Make sure to fill out the Community Impact Form after your session!
Prayer Requests/Time in Prayer
- How can we pray for you?
- During this time, don’t focus on the prayer needs of others in your life, we want to pray for you.
Accountability
- What is one thing that you read from scripture that you believe the Lord is trying to teach you? What are you going to do about it?
- What is God asking you to confess and repent of? How can the others in the group hold you accountable to this?
- What are some takeaways from implementing the new practices from last week’s DG session?
- Who are you praying for and are planning to show hospitality towards in your life who has not yet put their faith in Jesus?
Content Overview
Send these resources to your disciples:
Memorize: John 15:4-5
Model and Practice
Model:
- Share with your disciples what side of the semi-circle you usually lean towards. Be honest with them of how that affects your personal life, your family, and you relationship with God.
- Show your disciples how you work from your rest instead of resting from work. Invite them into restful habits in your life throughout the week and share with them the moments where you bear fruit.
- Share with your disciples whether you relate to God more as Father or as King. Explain what in your life has contributed to this and dive into the healthy and unhealthy aspects of it.
- Show your disciples rhythms in your life where you get to relate to God as Father in the way that you abide in Him and sit in His presence, whether that is during your session time or outside of it. Do the same with the rhythms in your life where you get to relate to God as King, showing your disciples how you love your Father and obey your King.
Practice:
- Ask your disciples to plot on the semi circle which way they usually lean. Have them analyze how an imbalanced semi circle has led to unhealthiness in their relationship with the Lord.
- Depending on which way each person leans on the semi circle, have everybody identify one action that they can take to have a more balanced semi-circle. This means doing something that either challenges you to rest in a biblical way or to bear fruit while doing kingdom work.
- Ask your disciples whether they tend to relate to God more as Father or as King. Encourage each disciple to dive into why they relate to God the way that they do and dive into the healthy and unhealthy aspects of that.
- Step into a time of prayer as a group. For those who primarily see God as Father, challenge them to pray to Him as their King. For those who primarily see God as King, challenge them to pray to Him as their Father.
Action Steps and Prayer
- Depending on where everybody landed on the semi-circle, make a plan to do something this week that allows each individual to swing towards the other side of the semi-circle.
- For those who leaned more towards rest, take action in areas in your life that God is calling you to be obedient in. This could look like sharing the gospel, volunteering at church, investing more in your community group, etc.
- For those who leaned more towards work, take time to simply sit with God this next week. Take extra time to turn off your phone, leave your home, and find a peaceful place where you can be in the Word and journal.
- In your time of prayer this week, task each person to pray to God as both Father and King. Have a prayer time all together outside of your D-Group session time to practice praying to God as both Father and King.
Prayer Requests/Time in Prayer
- How can we pray for you?
- During this time, don’t focus on the prayer needs of others in your life, we want to pray for you.
Accountability
- What is one thing that you read from scripture that you believe the Lord is trying to teach you? What are you going to do about it?
- What is God asking you to confess and repent of? How can the others in the group hold you accountable to this?
- What are some takeaways from implementing the new practices from last week’s DG session?
- Who are you praying for and are planning to show hospitality towards in your life who has not yet put their faith in Jesus?
Content Overview
Send these resources to your disciples:
Memorize: 1 Corinthians 11:1
Model and Practice
Model:
- Pick a skill that you would like to teach your disciples. It could be reading the bible, praying, sharing the Gospel, or something else that you feel proficient in. Create a game plan of how you would take your disciples through each portion of the square, how long it would take, and what your hopes would be for them.
- Go through a quick version of the square with your disciples in the session time. Pick a skill to teach your disciples and start modeling to them the skill. Work your way around the square until you get to the final step. Debrief afterwards.
Practice:
- Ask each of your disciples to pick a different ministry skill. Have them write out what the leader and the disciple would do in each step of the square and share their findings with the groups.
- Have your disciples choose one person that they feel called to disciple. Have them create a game plan on what they want to teach their disciple and how they are going to use the square to do that.
- Have one person teach a skill using the discipleship square. It doesn’t have to be a ministry skill, it should be something very simple that they can use to practice using the square to pass on new skills to people. They could teach something as simple as how to throw a football, how to draw something, how to cook scrambled eggs, etc.
Action Steps and Prayer
- Take some time outside of the session to take your disciples through the square to the point where they become competent enough to then teach others the skill that you taught them.
- Ask your disciples to pray about who they are eventually going to model ministry skill to when they are done with this D-Group. Ask them to write down 2-3 names of people that they are praying for by the time you have your next session.
Prayer Requests/Time in Prayer
- How can we pray for you?
- During this time, don’t focus on the prayer needs of others in your life, we want to pray for you.
Accountability
- What is one thing that you read from scripture that you believe the Lord is trying to teach you? What are you going to do about it?
- What is God asking you to confess and repent of? How can the others in the group hold you accountable to this?
- What are some takeaways from implementing the new practices from last week’s DG session?
- Who are you praying for and are planning to show hospitality towards in your life who has not yet put their faith in Jesus?
Content Overview
Send these resources to your disciples:
Memorize: Ephesians 4:11-12
Model and Practice
Model:
- Draw out your own brick wall for you disciples. Be honest about the gaps in your wall and how you plan to fill those in. Share what your relationship looks like with each of the people in your brick wall and how much time you spend with each of them.
- Share with your disciples a time in your life when your brick wall felt full. How did that affect you and your relationship with the Lord? Same question, but think of a time when your brick wall felt very empty.
- Take the free APEST survey found in the Pentagon PDF linked above and share your results with your disciples. Share with them why you think you got the results that you did based on self-observation.
- Based on the results of the APEST survey, determine how you can continue to serve the Lord using your gifts. Show your disciples how you use the way that God created you to serve your community group, your church, and your family.
Practice:
- Have your disciples draw out their brick wall. Ask them to identify the weak spots in their walls. Encourage them to come up with a game plan on how they are going to fill those weak spots.
- Give each disciple an opportunity to share how they are going to strengthen each section on their brick wall. How are they going to improve their relationship with their leaders, their peers, and their disciples?
- Have each disciple share the results of their APEST survey. Ask them to share whether they think their results makes sense and how they have seen themselves live into the behaviors of their APEST.
- Ask your disciples to write down different ways that they can use their gifts to serve their community group, their church, and their family. How has God created them to bless His people?
Action Steps and Prayer
- Have your disciples meet with somebody that is in the weakest part of their brick wall before the next session. Ask them to set up regular times to meet with them in order to build up a stronger wall.
- Each disciple should make a game plan to use their gifts to bless the church in some way within the next week. This could look like signing up for a volunteer opportunity that highlights their strengths, meeting with somebody who would be blessed by their ministry, or taking a new role in their community group that takes the weight of responsibility off of the CG shepherd’s shoulders.
Shepherding
Prayer Requests/Time in Prayer
- How can we pray for you?
- During this time, don’t focus on the prayer needs of others in your life, we want to pray for you.
Accountability
- What is one thing that you read from scripture that you believe the Lord is trying to teach you? What are you going to do about it?
- What is God asking you to confess and repent of? How can the others in the group hold you accountable to this?
- What are some takeaways from implementing the new practices from last week’s DG session?
- Who are you praying for and are planning to show hospitality towards in your life who has not yet put their faith in Jesus?
Content Overview
Send these resources to your disciples:
Memorize: Romans 3:23-24
Model and Practice
Model
- Take some time to model how you would share the Gospel using these helpful tools. Role play a situation where one of your disciples is pretending to be someone who is not yet a follower of Jesus and use these tools, one at a time, to share the Gospel with them.
- Give time for your disciples to debrief the role play situation as a group. What did they observe that stuck out to them? What did they not know about sharing the Gospel before seeing you do it? Take time to point out what you intentionally did during your Gospel sharing that you wanted them to learn from and moments that you made mistakes so that they can learn from them.
Practice
- Now it is your disciple’s turn. Break them up into pairs and have them role play the different Gospel sharing tools. To save time, one person can choose to use the 3 Circles and the other person can use the Thrones. Challenge them to use those tools like they are talking to people who aren’t believers yet.
- Take time as a group to debrief how the Gospel sharing went. Have your disciples share how they felt like they did and how they want to improve in their Gospel-sharing skills.
Action Steps and Prayer
- Instruct your disciples to write out the names of non-believers in their life that they want to start praying for. Ask them to specifically pray that they would have the courage to take advantage of opportunities to share the Gospel with them.
- Challenge your disciples to share the Gospel with a non-believer in their lives before the next DG meeting.
Shepherding
Prayer Requests/Time in Prayer
- How can we pray for you?
- During this time, don’t focus on the prayer needs of others in your life, we want to pray for you.
Accountability
- What is one thing that you read from scripture that you believe the Lord is trying to teach you? What are you going to do about it?
- What is God asking you to confess and repent of? How can the others in the group hold you accountable to this?
- What are some takeaways from implementing the new practices from last week’s DG session?
- Who are you praying for and are planning to show hospitality towards in your life who has not yet put their faith in Jesus?
Content Overview
Send these resources to your disciples:
Memorize: Psalm 107:2
Model and Practice
Model
- Take some time to share your story with your disciples. They should already know it by this point, but the goal of this time is to share you story in a way that leads to the Gospel. Practice using the method of sharing your story in the pattern that was shown in the video above.
- Map out your story and share the different points that clearly point to the Gospel. Share with your disciples how you would use those highlights to point people to Jesus when you are sharing your story.
- Share with your disciple the different questions that you would ask somebody to transition from one portion of the Missional Living Wheel to the next portion.
- Give examples of different kinds of conversations that you would have with somebody on an average day. How would you bring up that conversation? How would you use the conversation to lead to a Gospel conversation?
Practice
- Instruct your disciples to write out their stories in their journal. Give them 5-10 minutes to write it out. Have them separate it with the “before Jesus,” “why Jesus,” and “since Jesus” model.
- Discuss with your disciples where other people may be able to relate to their story and how they can use that to share the Gospel. Challenge them to think about how God has pursued them, saved them, and shaped them to look more like Christ, and how that could help others follow Him.
- Have them draw the Missional Living Wheel with enough room to write words around it. Instruct them to write out the names of non-believers in their lives in each portion of the MLW. Have them try to come up with at least 2-3 names for each portion.
- Ask your disciples to write out how they plan on moving each of those names to the next portion of the MLW. Ask them about the specific questions and topics that they would use to help the non-believers in their life get closer to a Gospel conversation.
Action Steps and Prayer
- Have everybody in the group commit to sharing their story with somebody in their life who doesn’t know their story within the next two weeks. Instruct them to use that moment to share the Gospel with them.
- Have your disciples take one of their non-believing friends from one portion of the Missional Living Wheel to the next. Even if it’s just from “intro conversation” to “general conversation,” encourage them to take that step of boldness over the next week.
NOTE: If you are the leader of this group and this is the last session that your D-Group will be meeting for, please fill out the Close Out your D-Group form! Thank you for your help in shepherding the flock at Fielder Church!