A Called to Office small group is a handful of people — neighbors, a few families, a Sunday school class, friends from church — who meet for a season to learn how local government works, to understand their own community, and to discern where each person is called to serve. It is study that ends in action.
You do not need to be an expert. You need a room, a few committed people, and a willingness to learn together. This guide gets you started.
1. Gather a few people
Start small and start with the willing. Four to ten people is ideal — large enough for real discussion, small enough that everyone speaks. Invite directly and personally rather than broadcasting; a personal ask from someone you trust is what actually fills a room.
Who to invite
- People who already feel a burden for their community but don't know where to start.
- Families thinking about their children's schools and their neighborhood's future.
- Church members looking for a concrete way to live out faith in public life.
2. Pick a rhythm and a place
Most groups meet every week or every other week for the length of the Faith & the City series — six sessions. A living room, a church classroom, or a quiet corner of a coffee shop all work. Consistency matters more than the venue: pick a regular day and protect it.
A simple session shape
Open in prayer and a few minutes of catching up. Work through one session of the study together. Close by naming one concrete local step each person will take before the next meeting — attending a meeting, reading a budget, checking their registration. Accountability is where study becomes service.
3. Use the Faith & the City series
The six-session Faith & the City series is built for exactly this. It moves a group from the biblical foundations of civic engagement, through a plain-English understanding of local government, to a clear-eyed look at where each member might serve. You don't have to design a curriculum — it’s ready to use. See the series or download the leader’s guide (PDF).
4. Move from study to participation
The point of the group is not to become better-informed spectators. It is to participate. By the final session, aim for every member to have taken at least one real step into local civic life: attending a school board or council meeting, confirming their voter registration, contacting a local office, or beginning to discern a call to run. Some groups continue together as an ongoing civic fellowship; others send each member out into a different corner of the community.
5. Keep it nonpartisan and gracious
Called to Office groups are for civic education and Christian formation, not for advancing a party or candidate. Keep discussion focused on understanding, conviction, and service. Welcome honest disagreement, model gracious dialogue, and leave voting decisions to each person's conscience. That posture is both faithful and what keeps the wider project credible.
Called to Office is a nonpartisan civic education project. Small group materials are for education and Christian formation; they are not campaign activity and do not direct how anyone should vote.