Family Discipleship 101 Small Group Curriculum

You want the families in your church to thrive in their faith, but your efforts don’t seem to make much of a difference.

You pass out take-home sheets, only for them to be stepped on and dirtied on the minivan floor.

You plan out and send home fantastic Christmas and Easter kits, only to discover that all your hard work was used for two days and then forgotten in the busyness of the season.

The only parents who seem to respond well to your family-equipping efforts are those who are already discipling their kids at home. But you want to reach those who feel like they’re too busy to pray with their kids, too ill-equipped to read the Bible at home, or too new in their faith to know what family discipleship looks like.

The answer isn’t to send home more resources to gather crumbs in the minivan, but to take one step backward and show families how little faith habits in our days make a big difference…and how to sustainably implement little faith habits, even during the busiest of times.

Enter: Family Discipleship 101

This is the only class of its kind, because it’s not going to teach your families WHAT to share with their kids (because that changes based on age and need, as well as the specific doctrines of your church) but HOW to realistically start talking about faith at home in a way that builds their relationships with each other and with God.

Because of its immensely practical approach, parents with teenagers will find it just as helpful as parents with infants as will single, divorced, and married parents. Grandparents also will find ways to help their grandkids grow in faith in ways that don’t step on their adult kids’ toes.

This video-and-discussion-based curriculum was created by Christie Thomas, longtime Children’s Ministries Director, author, and mom. As a leader and a mom, Christie has been on both sides of the struggle to equip today’s parents, and, through her work at Little Shoots Deep Roots, has discovered a proven way to help even the busiest parents find time in their day to disciple their kids, without having to know it all or do it all. 

They just need to start little.

This 6-session curriculum will turn your expectations of family discipleship upside-down as you discover the power of little habits in the hands of a great God.

CURRICULUM INCLUDES:

• – 6 videos, 20-30 minutes each (available to download or stream)
• – A leader’s guide (including discussion questions for before and after the video)
• – Printables for parents to help them retain what they’ve learned
• – Tips for running a successful event
• – Promotional copy to make effective communication a breeze
• – A Canva template that can be modified for posters, flyers, and announcement slides. (Uses elements available with the free Canva account)

The curriculum can be used as a single-day seminar or for 6 weeks of class. (ACCESS A 1-WEEK SAMPLE HERE)

ENDORSEMENTS FOR FAMILY DISCIPLESHIP 101:

“In Family Discipleship 101, Christie Thomas provides families with a gentle, helpful, and relentlessly practical approach to family discipleship. If you’ll take this course, and yield to her advice to start little, you’ll thank yourself and so will your kids.”

Ryan Coatney, Lead Pastor of Grace Story Church, founder of Cross Formed Kids, and father of 5

“Our small group of moms with young children did a pilot of the material included in Family Discipleship 101.  It was just what the moms needed to feel equipped and confident to begin discipling their children, even from the youngest ages! From the start, recognizing the tendency to parent out of fear instead of vision, and Christie’s encouragement to keep vision as the focus was pivotal. Then, one of the moms, in response to the content on blessing children, remarked that it “hit the target” of a felt need of teaching and training her children. As the women worked through the content, it became clear that being given permission to start small made a huge difference in the ability of our moms to begin doing something and not be paralyzed by the overwhelm of this task of discipleship. I highly recommend this course for parents with children of any age!”

  Barb Peterson, Director of Children’s Ministries at New Covenant Church