Douglas Allison | Knowable Word

Don’t Fear Silence in Small Groups

September 30, 2026 By Peter Krol

Douglas Allison helpfully wonders about the causes and cures of silence in small group discussions. Especially, he warns leaders against speaking themselves just to fill an awkward silence:

Small group leaders can tend to believe that something is going wrong if the conversation is not flowing. Silences can be awkward. Wrong answers can seem to beg for correction. But small group leaders do well not to correct every error or to fill every silence.

He goes on to address some of the potential causes for silence, reflecting on what a leader can do about it.

Even if it is unintentional on the leader’s part, the silence could be due to him. In any case, the leader does not help the group by filling the silence with words. In that case, the leader is not building relationships in the small group but compensating for the lack of it.

The best kind of silence in a small group is one in which all or the majority of the students are thinking hard about what to say. It is the kind of silence that is filled with thinking rather than attempting to read one another. It is a kind of silence in which students are actively processing what was said and eagerly developing ideas in response. It is the kind of silence that is called pregnant.

If you are part of a small group Bible study, these keen musings are worthy of your curious reflection.

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Clear Answers are Not Always the Best Goal

September 16, 2026 By Peter Krol

Douglas Allison has a thought-provoking post on leading small groups, where he argues that there is a time not to give clear answers to people’s questions.

In particular, it is better to promote exploration than to explore answers. We do better to teach people how to think over teaching them what to think. And we can capitalize on their own questions to help them learn to ask even more and better questions.

Arriving at a conclusion but not necessarily resolution means that small group leaders can be ok leaving the students wondering at or puzzling over something. There does not always have to be a clean and clear answer to every question a student asks. In fact, it is often better for leaders to encourage further thinking and more discussion than to try to answer the question and move on.

Allison provides much helpful insight into our leadership of others in small group settings.

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Leading Small Groups with Teenagers

November 12, 2025 By Peter Krol

If you work with a youth group or have opportunity to lead small groups of young people, how can you pique their interest and make best use of the time? Douglas Allison has some helpful suggestions. Here is a taste:

Most often, we tend to think of small group time as a chance to fill in gaps in the students’ knowledge or understanding. But a large part of the benefit of small group does not come from filling in the gaps but exposing them. Students who do not know that they have gaps in their understanding that materially affect how they live are not likely to be motivated to fill them in. For students, small group is not helpful so much for filling in gaps but helping the students to see the ones that are there.

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How God Directs His People in the Book of Numbers

November 1, 2023 By Peter Krol

A few weeks ago, I finished reading the book of Number 20 times in a row. From that reading, my draft of the main point is “Yahweh sees his people through the wilderness, though not in a manner any of them hoped or expected.”

Douglas Allison recently posted an overview of Numbers, where he proposes a similar main point: “I have taught that the big idea of Numbers is that Yahweh is his people’s guide to the promised land.”

Allison defends his main point through an outline of the book and an explanation of benefits for reading the book.

As we read today, we can be confident that the same God who led the Israelites through the wilderness in Numbers is the same God who will see us home. Yahweh was Israel’s guide to the Promised Land. And he has not left us without a guide.

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