Why is your influence on your small group enormous?
Jesus taught in front of thousands of people throughout his lifetime. Wherever he went, huge crowds followed him ( Mark 5:24 , Mark 10:1 , Matthew 4:25 , Matthew 8:1 , Matthew 14:13 ). But not everyone that Jesus taught continued to follow him. Not everyone that followed him became his disciple. And even within his disciples, Jesus had an inner circle—the ones he invested in the most ( Mark 9:2–3 ). In The Master Plan of Evangelism , Robert E. Coleman examines Jesus’ strategy: Jesus was not trying to impress the crowd, but to usher in a kingdom. This meant that he needed people who could lead the multitudes. What good would it have been for his ultimate objective to arouse the masses to follow him if these people had no subsequent supervision or instruction in the Way? It had been demonstrated on numerous occasions that the crowd was an easy prey to false gods when left without proper care. . . .Thus, before the world could ever be permanently helped, people would have to be rais...