Since we are in the business of crafting a start-up rather than providing a cookie cutter approach, feel free to innovate on our suggestions below. However, we thought it best to give you some tracks to run on. We’ve found some leaders appreciate getting some good ideas that have worked in the past, as they put together the project.
Step by Step, Part 1
1. Decide who owns the group. Is it yours (or your team’s) or is it God’s possession? If you are called to be a steward to lead this, that doesn’t mean you own the group or it somehow belongs to you or your team, but it does mean you will be giving an account for it as a steward.
2. Organize Christian friends to pray about this project and its success before and during the execution of your plan. You yourself pray and stay in touch with God, listening to his inaudible voice in your head as He leads. Make sure you have Christ in the “control” center of your life as you do this, He uses flawed people like you and me to carry out these tasks.
Commit your work from the start into the Lord’s Hands and His superintending and leave the results to Him.
3. Pray that as you network with your colleagues and friends you find those who might partcipate in the community building; pray that they be of like-mind with you and with the scriptures, that God would grant you favor in their eyes as you (and your team) put this fledgling fellowship together. And, that the end result would bring glory to God.
4. Network with other Christians who are in academe, that you find: in your church, in your department or school, in your discipline (on your local campus) to see if you have like-minded people that you know and trust that might have an interest to build a Christian faculty community locally--at your university or college. Get other Christian colleagues to network their friends and report their findings to you or your leadership team.
Create a database to keep track of those you are referred to.
5. Network from those new contacts (super important) you received by getting new names of others from these new contacts; that is, people they think might have an interest in forming this kind of community/fellowship.
6. Seek our ministry’s help by contacting us and letting us know of your interest in doing this and asking what resources we can help you with. Contact us at:
or 303.808.6245
We will often travel to your locale to help you work this project.
7. As a result of your connecting with these people, begin to pray for those you network with and who are interested; pray for and ask them to pray for God to do something in your midst and to build the community on your campus.
Step by Step, Part 2
1. At the same time, develop your vision of what God can do on campus through the Christian Faculty community. Ask God to show you:
- Consider the impacts you might have on your non-Christian colleagues
- Consider the impacts you might have on your students
- Consider the impacts you might have on your Christian colleagues as you grow together
- Consider the impacts you and your fellowship might have on a future legacy through the colleagues and students you are surrounded by.
- Ask God to give you special insight into areas on influence He might give to you and your group
- Seek to make your group ethnically and academically diverse and gender inclusive.
2. Here are some, "Suggested Readings" as you are networking and are forming the group (forthcoming)
3. Watch these videos of other Christian faculty who have been the starter-uppers for a fellowship/community on their campus, during their tenure on campus.
4. Read this short essay on “Working with the Right People.”
5. Continue to keep track of the people you are networking with in writing (somewhere) and their responses for referrals. Ask them if you could use their name in contacting them. Keep this information confidentially in your (suggested above) local database.
6. During this phase or part of the start up, think of yourself of building your network of interested folk for about a semester or two at the most. You are aiming to find enough—a critical mass of colleagues—who can join you in launching the fellowship. Cap that process at least once where you bring as many of those people into a group meeting where you can present the vision of the community/fellowship in a captivating way. (Ask for help from us in putting this together.)
7. In the “cap meeting(s)" or in follow-up from that initial meeting you need to know who are willing to join the team you’re forming and work with you to build the network of folk. Find some way to capture and record that response in writing (for yourself).
Think of that (those) “cap meeting(s)” in terms of how you will present the vision for the community in a group setting. That can include a short video, and/or an appropriate slide show to help people “see” what has happened at other places like theirs and what can happen if they trust God and get organized. It’s always good to have planned a meeting to invite them to, at that cap meeting…that is, have a speaker lined up to give a short talk or devotional to the group and invite them to bring their Christian friends to that. Getting people to speak to your group whose names would be recognized can build momentum.
8. Look at our resource on “Meetings, Momentum & Relational Thinking”
Step by Step, Part 3
1. Keep on networking and expanding your list of folks who are interested.
2. Begin to think how to properly use the people who show interest in the project and where they might best “fit” on the team.
For hints, check out this resource on “Various Involvement Issues” It might be a great idea to call us about this because we help explain some of the details. (303.808.6245)
3. Become familiar with the resources we provide regarding:
- Focus on the Telos
- Focus on People and Relationships
4. Make sure you contact us to maximize your understanding of the context of these materials.
<aconnectionsi@gmail.com> or 303.808.6245.
Step by Step, Part 4
1. Have in your “back pocket” a good speaker for your first meeting near the beginnng of a semester that can galvanize interest in what you’re doing. They say an expert is a guy who brings an attaché case and lives greater than 50 miles from you. We don’t literally mean that, but it does help to an “outsider expert" speak that can gather people and create momentum for the group. It’s important that you also plan other meetings that you can announce at that first meeting…that creates a continuity to the movement and that it isn’t just a one time thing.
2. Assess how things are going on the fly at the meeting(s) and improve the local meeting ambiance. Having a good MC with skills really helps. Sometimes, for groups under 30, it’s a good idea to go around the room and have everyone introduce themselves to the group. In larger groups you can have people introduce themselves to those close by or at their table.
3. Make sure your meeting room fits the size of your group—avoid the BB in a boxcar syndrome.