Week 6 of our unit for Uniting College for Leadership and Theology was about Forming Disciples in Mission. This was the focus of my doctoral research, so I warned them up front that the class might take a couple of days.
During the afternoon I screened two video segments from one of my doctoral interviews featuring Rev Charles Gallacher and Rev Kerrie Lingham who until recently were the ministers at Queencliff and Point Lonsdale UC in Victoria. People were in groups of four and I assigned ‘lenses’ for them each to view the videos – Community, Leadership, Practices, and Mission. After each clip they discussed what they heard and saw, and also what they heard about “learning”.
I gave an overview of my research and the national UCA study that provided for the field interviews – 22 churches across Australia, 13 analysed in depth for my PhD.
The research had three areas of inquiry:
- Congregations as lifelong learning communities of discipleship for the sake of the mission of God;
- Church leaders as effective educational leaders, capable of guiding a community in forming disciples;
- Congregations developing a culture of learning for and from engagement in mission: mission-shaped discipleship.
This resulted in four ‘lenses’ for considering congregations as learning communities of lfielong discipelship:
We explored characteristics of learning communities based on the work of some authors, and talked about different kinds of learning communities.
“Learning communities are made
up of people who share a common purpose. They collaborate to draw on individual strengths, respect a variety of perspectives, and actively promote learning opportunities. The outcomes are the creation of
a vibrant, synergistic environment, enhanced potential for all members, and the possibility that new knowledge will be created.”
Kilpatrick, Jones and Barrett, Defining Learning Communities
I briefly presented some research findings about each of the four circles. I have a bunch of stories/examples but didn’t get to share too many.The emphasis of this session was that a church won’t grow in mission if its members aren’t growing as disciples, and that requires some intentionality on the part of church leaders. In each of the above four areas, I suggested some characteristics and processes that are important and deserve attention. I’m not outlining them here as they’ve been developed further since my thesis was submitted and aren’t yet published.
However let say the following:
- the above is not a model or an approach – it represents what I see as some inter-related dynamics of a learning community
- the four circles are not equal in anyway, in fact three of them could have been contained within the larger circle “Learning Community”
- according to my research, each circle has some characteristics, but of course my findings are indicative, not definitive (you can read about these in my thesis…)
- each circle/lens/dynamic has a kind of reflexive learning going on that is activated by human intentionality and Spirit generativity (you’ll have to wait for more details)
We spent a lot of time on the video interviews and that was enough as they are fantastic.
Here are some previous blog posts about my research.
20 Statements about Communities of Disciples
Intentionality in Christian Education
Qualitative Research in Christian Education
Congregations as Learning Communities