A guide to help you understand your community
As you gather a diverse group of people together for three one-hour guided discussions you will create a safe environment for meaningful and spiritual conversatons.
Listen to two people who have led Focus Groups in very diverse communities and see how God might use you to build an environment which connects people to Jesus and one another.
My neighbours started asking me about Jesus when...
Many Christians find it difficult to talk with their neighbours and friends about Jesus. But what if they started asking you questions about your faith in a relaxed setting?
Listen to this 50 minute webinar to find out how we are setting up an environment where this is happening regularly.
Quotes from the book
Your role is to invite a few unchurched friends and make them feel welcome as you ask them the focus group questions. Then, it's your job to just sit back and listen - you'll be surprised at how much you learn about people by listening to them process through some of life's deeper questions.
The questions are geared for those with no church background and progressively get more meaningful as you start to wrestle with some of the deeper issues of life. At the end of the three weeks, you will have a created a safe environment for your friends to start talking about some of the more important issues they face and the role that Jesus wants to play in their lives.
Included in this downloadable resource is everything you'll need to run a focus group including detailed instructions, some creative ideas, sample scripts, follow up and the actual focus group questions that you should ask.
A RECENT FOCUS GROUP
by Bob Prouty
My wife and I invited some friends over to talk about "Teaching Children Values". In our text message we asked them to think about two questions:
- What values do you want children to learn?
- What are some ways you go about teaching values to children?
I also put these questions on sheets of paper which I posted on our porch (where we mingle at the start of each event). As people came I encouraged them to write down their answers. We mingled for awhile -- catching up with each other and also asking each other these two questions.
We were also celebrating a child's birthday, so we sang Happy Birthday and cut a cake. The children stayed outside to play games while the adults went inside to enjoy their cake and coffee. There I summarized what they had written.
Listen to my summary. (15 minutes)