Have you ever heard of home groups? Have you ever heard of semester-based home groups? If you haven’t, you SHOULD get familiar with them, because they are coming to Pequea this fall.

Home groups are simply that – a grow group of people that get together to build their relationships with each other and with God in homes. In recent years, Pequea has offered home groups to our community as a way for folks to grow deeper in their relationship with God, outside of the weekly Sunday sermon. Throughout Pequea’s history, many have joined home groups and grown in their relationship with God, staying connected to a small community of people for several years.

After a year of research, we have become convinced that a few adjustments to our home group ministry will serve our church and community more effectively. Here are the major improvements that we will be launching in September:

The “church calendar” year will now be divided into three trimesters.

• September – November (first trimester)
• January – March (second trimester)
• April – June (third trimester)

Starting this fall our home groups will meet in three-month segments, or “trimesters.” There are other advantages to utilizing a trimester system for our groups. For example, research shows that people grow in short seasons or “spiritual sprints.” Many people find their spiritual growth reaches a plateau when studying one topic for many months. Trimesters will offer various topics every three months: from parenting to women’s studies to hot topics to books of the Bible. The majority of home groups that meet year after year also sometimes find their relationships with each other growing stale. Exposing ourselves to new groups of people every three months will help us to interact with the entire community at Pequea.

Perhaps the greatest advantage to trimester groups is this: leaders who want to lead only have to commit to three months at a time. Also, those who want to grow in a group of other people, likewise only have to commit to three months at a time. With most (if not all) of us having calendars that are overflowing, this will help all of us commit more fully to a short-term group.