First Steps Configuration

Configure your church's First Steps pathway — the practical path you walk disciples down as they get grounded in their walk with God and find their place serving in the body. Every church has the flexibility to shape this pathway to match how your house disciples people.

Accessing First Steps Settings

1. Navigate to Settings in the sidebar
2. Click First Steps

Configuring Your Steps

Number of Steps

Choose between 2 and 12 steps for your First Steps pathway. Think about how your house actually disciples people when deciding:

• 2–3 steps — A simple "get planted, get serving" path
• 4–6 steps — A common choice for churches with a structured pathway from daily walk to ministry involvement
• 7–12 steps — For churches with a detailed pathway all the way to leadership development

Naming Your Steps

Each step should be named for what your disciples are actually doing at that stage — getting grounded in prayer and the Word, getting connected to the body, discovering gifts, serving, and finding their calling. Examples:

Step #	Example A	Example B	Example C
1	Build a Daily Prayer & Bible Reading Life	Get Planted in a Home Fellowship	Connect with a Saint
2	Get Planted in a Small Group	Discover Your Gifts	Identify Your Calling
3	Discover Your Gifts	Shadow a Ministry Leader	Serve on a Ministry Team
4	Shadow a Ministry Leader	Serve on a Ministry Team	Share Your Testimony
5	Serve on a Ministry Team	Share Your Testimony	Lead Someone to Christ

First Steps is about getting disciples plugged in and walking in their calling — it is not a doctrine lesson program. Teach doctrine through your Bible studies.

Sensitive Steps

Some steps may cover sensitive or personal topics. You can mark individual steps as sensitive:

• Sensitive steps are only visible to pastors and leaders
• Regular teachers will not see these steps on student profiles
• This is useful for steps involving personal counseling, lifestyle changes, or confidential topics

To mark a step as sensitive:

1. Click on the step in the configuration
2. Toggle the Sensitive option on
3. Save your changes

Saving Changes

After configuring your steps:

1. Review the step names and order
2. Click Save
3. The changes will be reflected immediately across all student profiles

предупреждение

Changing the number of steps will affect how student progress is displayed. Existing completion data is preserved, but adding or removing steps may require updating records for current students.

Best Practices

• Choose step names that are clear and meaningful to both leaders and students
• Keep the number of steps manageable — enough to provide structure, but not so many that students feel overwhelmed
• Use sensitive marking sparingly for steps that genuinely require confidentiality
• Consider your church's actual onboarding process when designing steps