World Mission for Small Groups

mission & me? aims to excite, inspire, and challenge children and young people to be involved in world mission.

Since mission & me? was first produced it has had a makeover! It is still aimed at 7-13-year-olds but now has an additional section to help teenagers dig deeper into the Bible with further questions to discuss and help develop their mission thinking.

Several churches who had used mission & me? felt the topics covered would be useful for small groups, so we adapted and augmented the material to produce mission & me too? for adult small group Bible study.

The topics covered are not exhaustive, but give a broad introduction to 6 aspects of mission:

• What is mission?
• Teamwork: doing mission together.
• Partnership: doing mission alongside.
• Persecution: doing mission when it's dangerous.
• Salt & Light: doing mission closer to home.
• What are you waiting for: doing mission now.

There are leaders notes for those leading the studies and each study ends with an ‘Assignment for the Week’ giving the opportunity to do something practical in response to what has been learnt.

mission & me too? comes in loose-leaf format so it can be easily photocopied for each member of the Bible study group, meaning you only need one copy per group.

mission & me too? On Zoom

Just as we launched mission & me too? in March 2020, the UK went into lockdown with churches having to learn new ways of operating remotely. So, towards the end of 2020 we trialled mission & me too? with a Zoom-weary small group and found that it stimulated interest and discussion among those who had previously struggled to engage.

We had very positive feedback from the participants, who welcomed the change from the more usual Bible study, and the challenges that the series brought:

“mission & me too? is a really helpful source for challenging, encouraging and reflecting on how we view mission as individuals, as a family, as a part of the local church and the global church.”

“I loved how it was grounded in Scripture throughout, and although there were times of uncomfortableness (in being challenged) it was a good challenge and a challenge to change and be conscious of needing to be more pro-active, with local and global missionaries, as well as being made to be more aware and prayerful in these things.”

“I was challenged again to take the opportunities God gives me to tell others about him.”

Even the Assignment for the Week was found useful!

“The assignments made me so much more aware about local work, global work and also the individual challenge of being in contact and knowing our missionaries”

“The homework helped to tie the weeks together and gave one the required nudge to continue to think on the previous week's topic.”

Despite the difficulties of online communications the course had the desired effect:

“I felt it was a very inclusive and interactive course - encouraging and reminding us all that we all have a role in mission.”

There is a Powerpoint presentation for use with the studies, as well as the studies being available as PDFs, that can be emailed to group members prior to each study.

As was our aim with mission and me? for children and young people, we hope and pray that mission and me too? Will also help to excite, inspire, and challenge those in our churches to be involved in world mission.