My name is Ken Braddy, and I believe in God’s ability to transform people through His Word. I believe that discipleship happens best in community. Sunday School and small groups are the perfect places for believers to grow together. 

THIS BLOG

I began this free blog in 2011 to encourage and equip pastors, church staff, and group leaders. I do not earn income from it, and I use it as a means to help churches have stronger ministries through groups by communicating principles that work in all kinds of churches. There are over 1300 articles in the archive, and you can use the Search feature in the sidebar menu to quickly find topics that are of interest to you.

ABOUT ME

I currently serve as the Director of Sunday School & Network Partnerships for Lifeway Christian Resources.  From 2010 through 2021 I was the managing director of Lifeway’s adult ongoing Bible studies such as Bible Studies For Life, Explore The Bible, MasterWork, The Gospel Project, YOU, and more. Through my work at Lifeway, and the excellent work of the men and women on our team, we served the Bible study needs of approximately 3 million adults each week.

In my current role as Director of Sunday School, I write books, blog posts, and articles about group ministry. I launched a new podcast in March 2023 called Disciple-making In Community, plus I travel and train on the topics of Sunday school, small groups, and church leadership throughout the year.

AUTHOR

I have co-authored or authored 9 books on group ministry. You can view my books here.

I am a recurring author on Facts & Trends and Lifeway’s Group Answers Podcast. I have written numerous leadership articles for all of Lifeway’s major lines of Bible study curriculum. In addition, I have crafted customized articles for Sunday School Leader Magazine, Deacon Magazine, Open Windows devotional, and Stand Firm devotional for men. I also have also created Bible studies at smallgroup.com, and I authored a six-session Bible study series in Lifeway’s Bible Studies for Life ongoing curriculum series in the summer of 2017; the six-session study reached 1.2M adults. 

CHURCH LEADER

I provided leadership as the Groups Pastor at a new church startup in Texas in 1992. The mission church began with 44 people in Bible study on launch Sunday.  By 2002, just ten years later, it had grown to over 2,400+ members through God’s gracious work among us. We established weekly group leader training, purchased 7 portable buildings in which we housed our Sunday School groups, moved the Sunday School from its original one-hour time slot to three distinct Sunday School hours, rented a local school and shuttled people to and from the gym where we held adult groups, and ultimately moved some of our adult groups into people’s living rooms on Sunday mornings! We also designed and built a large multi-story education building and on-campus gym for our group ministry (and yes, we kept the 7 portable buildings, too!).

I served my second church for 8 years before moving to Nashville, Tennessee, and beginning my work at Lifeway Christian Resources. My second church was a 50 year-old Southern Baptist church whose Sunday School had experienced decline. While I was there, the Sunday School was reorganized, training was established, new groups were started, and the Sunday School began to grow again. 

Since moving to Nashville in 2010, I have served on several church staffs as a discipleship pastor or a discipleship ministry consultant. Working with one Nashville area church, the pastor and I led the church to start new groups, create a new member’s class, establish training for group leaders, and start a second hour of Sunday School. That church became the fastest-growing Sunday School in Tennessee by percentage growth prior to COVID-19.

My wife and I have started 2 Sunday School groups recently, and I have taught 4, 6, 8, and 12-week discipleship studies. Currently, I am a group leader at my church where I teach Lifeway’s Explore the Bible series to a group of empty nest adults.