Every morning it's the same thing. The alarm goes off I crawl out of bed; hit the shower: get dressed; go downstairs; brush my teeth; watch the morning news while i put on my shoes and head out the door to take my son to school at 7:15 am. This has been my morning routine since school started last fall. The other day I turned to my son on the way to school and asked "do you ever feel like we've been here and done this before?" Routines can be good. Most of us function best when we have some kind of routine. We create routines to help live our lives efficiently. But routines can be bad when they become ruts. Ruts happen when you do the same thing over and over again and it begins to feel like the wheels are spinning but you aren't really going anywhere.
I've found in leading my cell group that it's easy fall into a rut. You know the same thing week after week. When cell group goes from being a routine to feeling like its in a rut the group loses it's sense of excitement. Instead of looking forward to cell group people start dropping out.
I launched a group last September and it's pretty much been the same thing week after week. I found myself in that rut until last week. Last week 9 guys, most of them from my cell group headed to the U.P. for several days of snowmobiling. We had a blast together. We made the 8 hour trip in a 40ft. motor home. We spent several hours over a couple days out on the snowmobile trails going real fast. We played euchre, ate at the local greasy spoon, watched movies and just hanging out. It wasn't anything overtly spiritual like a typical men's retreat but some how I think God was pleased. It got our group out of the rut we've been in and allowed the guys to develop a deeper level of friendship. We simply did life together and that's what being in a cell group is really all about.
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