Article
The Missing Ingredient in Most Church Plants
Luke Simmons
Leadership development is salt in a church plant.
Lately, my house smells incredible.
My 17-year-old daughter is in her “sourdough era,” and we are loving it. (When parents warn you about your kids’ “phases,” nobody says this is even possible!)
Warm, tangy sourdough makes for a comforting snack, a delightful gift to unsuspecting friends, or a hospitable welcome for dinner guests.
Unless you forget the salt.
One evening, she made a loaf for the group of lay leaders I was developing who were coming over for dinner. The pleasing aroma filled our home as she sliced the bread, and the guys clapped as she brought it to the table. As I tasted it, I could tell something was off.
Afterwards, I thanked her for the bread and asked, “Were you happy with how it turned out?”
“I think I forgot the salt,” she admitted.
“Yes,” I said. “I think you did.”
Salt isn’t just a key ingredient for an outstanding loaf of sourdough. It’s a crucial piece of almost every recipe that improves the flavor by highlighting the other flavors. Without it, everything else is a bit more bland.
Salt is like the leadership development in a church plant.
When a church planter invests intentional time in building leaders, it makes every other area of the church stronger.
Unfortunately, too many planters seem to forget the salt. They are so busy preparing sermons, securing facilities, ensuring volunteer holes are plugged, managing social media, and more. But without investing in leaders, none of the church’s ministries will thrive.
In the church I planted, we moved as fast as we had leaders. And we were as strong as the leaders we had. So now, as I coach planters, my advice is consistent: make “developing leaders” an essential part of your job description.
Below are seven convictions for leadership development, followed by four practical ways to intentionally invest in potential leaders.
7 Leadership Development Convictions
1. Every believer is a disciple who should play a role in disciple-making, but not every believer should try to be a leader.
Leaders are not ‘advanced’ disciples, but rather those who have been gifted by God to serve by leading and influencing others (Rom 12:8). We must resist the temptations to insist (explicitly or implicitly) that everyone becomes a leader or to see those without leadership potential as a waste of time.
2. The health and effectiveness of the ministry will largely rise or fall depending on the leadership that is developed.
Leadership development is not a nice ‘bonus’ for established, well-resourced churches. It is an essential ingredient for the health and sustainability of any ministry. God always uses imperfect, flawed leaders. God occasionally does something remarkable through bad leaders. Most often, however, good leaders are essential for effective, lasting ministry impact.
3. Character development is the most important part of leadership development.
One of the most dangerous things to a person’s soul is to have gifting and opportunity that is far beyond character. It also creates an unhealthy direction for the church as a whole.
4. We must joyfully embrace the reality that we will sometimes give away our best leaders.
We call this ‘growing fruit on other people’s trees.’ Our ultimate goal is gospel and kingdom growth, not our own ministry’s growth.
5. At its best, leadership development involves relational environments that combine knowledge, experiences, and coaching.
In their must-read book, Designed to Lead: The Church and Leadership Development, Eric Geiger and Kevin Peck point out that in Luke 7-10, we see Jesus’ approach to leadership development, where he (a) teaches and models ministry, (b) sends his disciples out to experience doing ministry, and (c) provides coaching and feedback. All three elements are essential. And all of them happen best in relational environments (not just classrooms), and they often happen better in small groups of people than one-on-one, because group dynamics always introduce teachable moments.
6. Leaders develop leaders—systems and curriculum are not enough by themselves.
Well-developed systems and curriculum are important, but personal investment from leaders is essential to develop the kind of leaders we want. People are shaped by people, and future leaders are shaped more by the people leading than by the content involved.
7. Because every area of life is starved for healthy leadership, our efforts will not just shape church leaders — but leaders for all of life.
If done well, our investment in leaders will help them lead well in the marketplace, community, youth sports, at home, and beyond—in addition to leading well in the church.
With those commitments in mind, how can a church planter take steps to intentionally develop more leaders?
4 Actionable Leadership Development Ideas
1. Remember the Leadership Development 101 Pathway (it’s basic because it works).
What’s this pathway? Surely you’ve heard of it:
- I do. You watch. We talk.
- I do. You help. We talk.
- You do. I help. We talk.
- You do. I watch. We talk.
- You do. Someone else watches.
In this approach, a leader is modeling, giving increasing opportunities and responsibility, and then providing coaching and feedback. This is best done by simply bringing others along and involving them in the leadership you’re already doing.
2. Leverage delegation.
If you want to get things done, delegate tasks. But if you want to develop leaders, delegate responsibility … and then anxiety. As a developing leader is given opportunities to carry heavier loads, they learn a ton.
But be careful. Delegation is not an all-or-nothing endeavor, so be sure to delegate to the appropriate level (consider Michael Hyatt’s five levels of delegation).
3. Create an invite-only experience that is short-term, high bar, & exclusive.
This is the best thing I’ve done to develop leaders in our church.
I brainstorm a list of people in our church who have ministry game or potential. Then I send them each a personal email inviting them into an exclusive, short-term experience. I pick some kind of curriculum that I think would create interesting discussion (my favorite is case studies), and make some part of it semi-inconvenient.
The specific, personal invite makes it feel special, and they are honored to be invited by the lead pastor. The higher bar makes it feel valuable and worth investing in. Requiring serving or giving or community demonstrates that nobody gets to lead until they are faithful in small things. And the semi-inconvenience (or financial cost) weeds out those who aren’t going to put in the work.
To see an example of an invite letter, click here (this was for the group that got the saltless sourdough).
4. Just do something.
Don’t overthink it. Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good enough. If you have an idea, go for it. Too many leaders get paralyzed by idealism. Don’t. Just go for it.
Conclusion
Your church will only be as healthy as the discipleship environments you create. And those environments will only be as healthy as the leaders who are guiding them. So few things are as important as investing in leadership development. It’s the salt that makes everything better.
