2016 amf read - leader loop - from followers to mentors

LeaderLoop/Huffard 2016

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LeaderLoop Theory: Following—Leading—Mentoring

Evertt W. Huffard, PhD

Harding School of Theology

Memphis, Tennessee, USA

The church provides us a rich and necessary environment for spiritual formation

and for living out our calling in service to God. A healthy church can give much more

to the world than the sum total of the ministry that individual Christians could possibly

offer. The health of that spiritual body depends upon the constant emergence of new

leaders to provide direction, spiritual influence, godly examples, encouragement,

guidance, and spiritual resources. Without these leaders there will be no mission;

without mission there will be no growth of the church. Without growth there will be no

honor for God. It is the sobering reality that churches seldom, if ever, rise above their

leaders that motivates me to seek ways to develop more effective leaders within the

church.

Where do we start?

For the past thirty years, I have asked students in my spiritual leadership class at

Harding School of Theology to participate in a very easy exercise. We generate a list of

problems they have experienced with church leaders. The critique flows fast and freely.

The most common responses include the lack of many things, such as: spirituality,

organization, commitment, direction, vision, mission, communication, trust,

consistency, discipline, stability, visibility, mentoring, new leaders, and preparation.

However, in the past couple of years, I have adjusted the assignment to also include

problems they have experienced with followers or as followers. To overlook the

challenges of following undermines the foundation for leading, so I have come to

believe we have started in the wrong place. The answer to the question of how to develop

more leaders really begins with how to develop stronger followers of Christ. Where do we

start—with leading or following? With both!

John Gardner observed two matters of failure of followers that can apply to

churches.

First, there are qualities such as apathy, passivity, cynicism, and habits of

spectator-like non-involvement that invite the abuse of power by leaders. . .


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Second, there is the inclination of followers in some circumstances to collaborate

in their own deception.1

The first point makes sense. When members fail to step up as active participants in a

church and follow their leaders, the leaders are forced into more autocratic styles and

peace keeping missions rather than evangelism and shepherding.

We may need a little help with his second point. To illustrate the second point, Gardner

notes that from our political process we can learn that when a population wants to be

lied to they will have liars as leaders. When members of a church refuse to accept

challenges to trust in God and their leaders, they will have leaderless leaders. In fact, I

have seen roles are actually reversed in churches where the members take on the

leadership role and the leaders become the followers. This is not a new phenomenon.

Remember Korah and the 250 leaders of Israel? They appointed themselves to lead

when they told Moses: “The whole community is holy, every one of them, and the

LORD is with them.”2 So they proceeded to let Moses know that they would follow

themselves and not him.

One wonders how a Bible-based church could have anything less than strong

followers and leaders with so much about both in the Bible. Almost every book of the

Bible yields insights about leaders, followers and situations in which both failed or

succeeded. With over thirty different types of leaders mentioned in the Bible, several

thousand leaders mentioned by name, and twenty books that speak directly to

leadership, Bible study should produce great leaders.3 But this has not always been the

case. Maybe one of the reasons for the disappointing success rate of leaders finishing

well in the Bible may be the same today—human will struggles to submit to God’s will.

Leaders missed a fundamental spiritual step in their development. Active followers,

true disciples, submit their lives to God. To become a leader and skip this step leads to

spiritual, moral and institutional failure. Good followers (disciples, servants) make

good leaders.

1 John W. Gardner, On Leadership (Free Press, 1990). 2 Numbers 16:3. 3 See J. Robert Clinton, The Bible and Leadership Values: A Book by Book Analysis (Altadena, CA: Barnabas,

1993) 46-48, for a list of the top 20 books.


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Part of our problem may be in the questions we ask—or don’t ask. If we

approached the Bible with more questions about developing leaders, what would we

find? Of the leaders we know enough about their life to determine the outcome, only

about thirty percent finished well. You will also find positive and negative examples of

transition. For example, the transitions from Moses to Joshua, Elijah to Elisha, Barnabas

to Paul, Jesus to the apostles, and Paul to the elders at Ephesus provide great examples

of passing the baton to emerging leaders.4 However, the transition from Eli to his sons,

Saul to David, and David to Solomon should alarm us to the consequences of dropping

the baton.5

This discussion could seem impractical for many small young churches in Asia

and Africa where the urgent need is to train leaders, not pass leadership to the next

generation. It could take decades to raise up new leaders. In so many cases the future

seems rather hopeless as churches struggle to survive. If so much training and maturing

is needed but the opportunities and resources are extremely limited, why think about

the development of leaders? What can a church with very limited resources do?

The Challenge

Ask a seasoned preacher or missionary to reflect on forty years of ministry to

name the one thing they would do differently if they could start over. Many will tell

you they would spend more time developing leaders. Any seasoned minister can name

churches that have died simply because no one developed leaders or the leaders failed

to bring the next generation or two into leadership.6

The long-term health of a church depends on developing leaders. I am not aware

of many churches that give priority to developing leaders and I wonder why. Beyond

4 Rickie D. Moore, “The Prophet as Mentor: A Crucial Facet of the Biblical Presentations of Moses, Elijah

and Isaiah,” Journal of Pentecostal Theology 15:155-172, provides a theological framework for mentoring

through “spiritual succession” and the expectation that discipleship is “more about being and being with

someone than knowing what to do” (p. 172). 5 See J. Robert Clinton, Leadership Perspective: How to Study the Bible for Leadership Insights (Barnabas, 1993),

100-103. 6 Kennon L. Callahan, Small, Strong Congregations (Jossey-Bass, 2000), believes some church leaders hold

on to power because they worked so hard to seize the power and do not think the younger generation is

“ready for it” (p. 228).


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the spiritual issue this raises, I believe the suburbanization of the church could partially

explain this phenomenon in the USA. In Africa and Asia it might be just the opposite

reason—inadequate resources and training opportunities.

As suburban churches went through a phase of rapid numerical growth in the

USA, they became lax in developing leaders because transfer growth brought mature

men and women into the church who provided instant leadership. Transfers from rural

to suburban churches have almost stopped. Now leaders are searching for emerging

leaders and discover they should have started developing leaders decades ago. When it

comes to leadership in the church, we suffer for the sins of the fathers—at least the ones

who were too short-sighted to invest time and resources into intentionally developing

leaders for the church today. Unfortunately we carry on the tradition and fail to

develop leaders for tomorrow. How do we learn to pass the leadership on to others

when it no longer seems to be a natural thing to do?

If a generation forgets how to develop strong leaders, they adapt by lowering

their expectations of leadership and failing to learn how to follow. The temptation for

churches under the influence of western values, consumerism takes on more power. As

volunteerism declines, the demand for more paid staff in churches increases in order to

maintain a minimal level of ministry; but never enough to meet the demands of the new

consumers. As members morph into consumers, they expect the church to serve them.

What follows is a very strange phenomenon where the followers become the leaders

and the leaders abdicate their spiritual authority and responsibility to plan ahead, to set

a direction and to hold the church accountable for doing God’s will. Why then would

anyone want to be leaders in a context where so few are willing or able to follow? This

begs the question for training in followership. Until we become good followers we

cannot be good leaders. How do we become better followers?

God placed every church in a community for a purpose. If that church turns

inward and fails to fulfill its mission, it dies. Followers need direction and organization.

Someone needs to interpret the context and discern what God is calling the church to

do. Without a clearly defined and intentional mission, we see no need for real leaders. I

only need to point out the stress many churches encounter when they try to develop a

mission statement. It takes months to do this when the mission has not been determined

and the leaders lack vision and purpose. In this instance, the mission statement gets no

further than a mantra in the weekly bulletin where no one really sees it or understands


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how it can guide the ministry of the church. How do we, as a church, discover and

identify our mission from generation to generation without effective leaders and

willing followers?

Reference to leaders will probably bring to your mind thoughts of preachers,

elders and deacons. These are not the only leaders in the church. In this paper, my

reference to spiritual leadership is really to spiritual influence more than to a role or

position in an organization. I know men and women with great spiritual influence in

their church who have no assigned role or appointed position. I also know the reverse

to be true. Spiritual influence incorporates a much larger percentage of Christians into

the equation. How do we develop more followers into leaders with spiritual influence?

When a congregation realizes the need to develop more leaders (often too late!)

the natural response is to start a class, a series of sermons or a program on leadership.

Such efforts have limited success. They might raise the awareness for the need. Ask an

elder in a mature congregation in the USA about the last time their church appointed

new elders and you will hear about the same thing: “It has been a long time.” He might

also say they identified a few good, qualified men to serve but they declined. So as the

church (especially the leaders) continues to grow old, it can actually skip a generation in

the eldership. The elders get stuck in the immediate challenges of managing a church,

keeping the peace, and the tyranny of the urgent without empowering new leaders or

passing the baton to anyone. When the elders finally resign or die, they leave a hole too

large to replace and a generational gap too great to span. A few of these good men take

a lot of wisdom and experience to the grave. Some withdraw to the degree that they

become followers, barely functional. What a loss! This is how and why churches grow

old and die. Yet the challenge of replacing leaders reaches much deeper into the church.

The larger the church becomes, the more challenging it is to staff various ministries, be

it outreach, Sunday school, nursery, or teens. How do we pass the desire to lead on to

others? How do we create an environment to develop more leaders in the local church?

These challenges motivated me to chart a path for the transition of followers to

active involvement and leadership in the church. My passion for church renewal keeps

taking me back to this basic reality: unless more followers become active followers and

leaders, there can be no lasting renewal.


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LeaderLoop Theory

The process of developing leaders can be confused with the process of

appointing leaders within the organization of the church. Churches are impatient and

demanding. They may know what they need but do not want to take the time to get

there—especially when it comes to leading. Like a married couple who fail to maintain

a budget because it takes too much time and keep on adding to their debt, so churches

continue to bankrupt their leader pool for lack of discipline and planning.

Plans to develop leaders in the church often start with attempts to move

followers into leadership positions in a short amount of time—like 6-9 months--and

assume elders can learn to lead on the job. These premature attempts to develop leaders

usually focus on public roles and positions of the church, such aslike worship leading or

a position in the organization of the church.

The anxiety brought on by the absence of effective, healthy leaders tempts the

church to seek quick solutions. I have seen this in churches that take a year or two to

find a preacher. They become so anxious that they take shortcuts, only to find

themselves in another preacher search in a few years. They operate with a false sense of

security by assuming their leadership

is adequate if all the traditional

organizational positions are filled.

They disregard the fact that some of

the members with the most spiritual

influence in the church are not in the

public eye or in an official role. Jesus

made a clear distinction between the

function of leaders in the world and

those in the church.7 So, how do we

change this? Where do we start? The

natural response might be to start

with followers. How can we have

good sheep without a shepherd?

7 Mt. 20:20-28.

Figure 1. LeaderLoop Model


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LeaderLoop Theory proposes a path or paradigm for the development of

spiritual leaders within the family of God that is neither gender specific nor limited to

public or official roles. Simply stated, LeaderLoop theory assumes that the

development of emerging leaders in a church begins with leaders mentoring

followers to become active followers and leaders.

This shift in function (from leader to mentor) requires an intentional strategy

along with the ability to cope with the stressful consequences of the transition. The goal

of spiritual influence in a church shifts from maintaining and “filling” positions (for a

long time) to mentoring as many as possible to become active disciples and leaders

who use their gifts to the honor of God.

When leaders overcome the temptation of being stuck at the top of an

organizational pyramid, making all the decisions, carrying all the responsibility, and

handling all the pressing urgent needs, they will value the opportunities to mentor

others to serve and lead.8 They will shift their priorities to passing the baton to

emerging leaders by mentoring those who pick up the new responsibility or use their

gifts to develop new ministries. Empowerment unleashes God’s people to use the

resources God has given them to transform lives, communities and the world. This is

missional more than institutional.

Figure 1 illustrates the LeaderLoop process. Each arrow represents a dynamic

function or process. The focus of LeaderLoop Theory concentrates on the process (the

arrows) not the positions. It gives priority to the process of developing leaders rather

than to positions that need to be filled. It is empowering and transforming.

While most attempts to develop leaders start with followers (A), LeaderLoop

Theory starts with leaders (C). When leaders mentor followers to become active

followers and leaders, a process begins that can replicate itself (a loop). To start with

followers is like starting with sheep without a shepherd to lead them and care for them.

In the real world of raising sheep, we start with the shepherd, then add the flock. Sure,

it takes much more time, but it addresses core competencies for becoming the kind of

8 Another reason leaders could be stuck can be attributed to the assumptions of an older generation.

Richards and Hoeldtke wrote a book on Church Leadership: Following the Example of Christ (Eerdmans) in

1980 with no reference to mentoring or coaching.


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person people will follow. Attempts to develop leaders without addressing the need for

inner life, life maturing, and ministry maturing, sets the church up for failure.9

If these phases were sequential and overlapping, a natural process for

developing leaders could emerge that gives more attention to becoming a leader

someone could follow rather than politicizing the body of Christ by placing the wrong

personj in a position without adequate spiritual authority. According to this theory,

anyone could be at any point (A-D) at any given time. LeaderLoop challenges the notion

that once someone is a leader in some role of the church, he or she should be a leader in

everything. Leaders in one area are not leaders in all areas. This is a reason for the

plurality of elders; they also follow each other. In reality, an elder is still a sheep! In

developing leaders in a small church, Callahan argues that leaders learn to love, listen

and learn before they lead.10

This reminds me of the story I read about a telecommunications company that

hired attorneys to work in teams on deregulation issues. They looked for people who

could lead and follow but very few applicants could do both.11 Leadership in the church

requires both.

LeaderLoop theory relies heavily on defining our ministry by our spiritual gifts

and spheres of influence. When a few leaders do all the work, something is seriously

wrong. To resolve this gridlock, leaders have the responsibility to transition to

mentoring while passing the baton to an emerging leader in their area of ministry. To

do so, leaders will have to overcome the tyranny of the urgent to focus on the

important—mentoring others to lead. The Pareto Principle (20% of the people do 80% of

the work) challenges every church to take on mediocrity and empower more members

to be active followers.12

9 See J. Robert Clinton, The Making of a Leader: Recognizing the Lessons and Stages of Leadership Development

(Colorado Springs, CO: NavPress, 2012) for a guide to inner life maturing (chapter 3), life maturing

(chapter 7) and ministry maturing (chapters 4, 5, 8, 9). 10 Kennon L. Callahan, Small, Strong Congregations: Creating Strengths and Health for Your Congregation

(Jossey-Bass, 2000), 214. 11 Stephen C. Lundin and Lynne C. Lancaster, “Beyond Leadership: The Importance of Followership.”

The Futurist 24 (May-June, 1990): 19. 12 Gary McIntosh, One Size Does Not Fit All: Bringing Out the Best in Any Size Church (Grand Rapids:

Fleming, 1999): 121.


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Strategy and Stress

As illustrated in Figure 1, attempts to develop leaders, especially transitioning

from A to B to C to D, will require a more intentional strategy and will create stress.

These two factors may offer primary reasons why C and D are exceptions; it takes

training and increases stress in a system already stretched to the max. Keeping it simple

and quick will keep you at “A” for a long time. Greater intentionality (strategy) and

higher energy (stress) will be required to move leaders into mentoring (D) than to move

followers to active followers (A). At “A” the tension will be personal; at “D” the head

winds will be institutional and organizational.

By the end of the 20th Century, large growing churches in the USA began to shift

their strategy in developing leaders from a program-based approach that sought people

to fill positions to a person-based approach or a “relational discipleship approach.”13

This shift involved a strategy that would incorporate members in small groups and new

ministries.

From Followers to Active Followers (A)

In 2004, Kent Bjugstad conducted a book search on the Amazon.com website for

books on leadership and followership. He discovered 95,220 titles on leading and 792

titles on following—a 120:1 ratio.14 One reason given for the imbalance can be attributed

to the misconception that leaders are more important than followers.15 In the following

section, I will introduce the dynamics of the transitions of the LeaderLoop.

When Jesus called men along the shores of the Sea of Galilee to “follow me,” he

spent three years developing good followers before he launched them into leaders. In

the modern church, it is so easy to skip this step (A) in developing leaders, probably

13 Gary McIntosh and Daniel Reeves, Thriving Churches in the Twenty-First Century: 10-Life-Giving Systems

for Vibrant Ministry (Grand Rapids: Kregal, 2006), 101. 14 Kent Bjugstad, Elizabeth C. Thach, Karen J. Thompson, and Alan Morris, “A Fresh Look at

Followership: A Model for Matching Followership and Leadership Styles” (Institute of Behavior and

Applied Management, 2006), p. 304;

http://ibam.com/pubs/jbam/articles/vol7/no3/JBAM_7_3_5_Followership.pdf. Accessed on the web March

15, 2012. 15 Ibid, p. 305.

http://ibam.com/pubs/jbam/articles/vol7/no3/JBAM_7_3_5_Followership.pdf


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because we assume too much and want too much too quick. The leaders who have

failed, who did not end well, likely skipped the process of becoming an active follower

before they assumed leadership roles. Their church may have pushed them into these

roles too quickly, or their ego may have driven them into premature leadership.

Whatever the case, effective leaders in the church come from the pool of good disciples.

The believer’s next step will always be active discipleship, not leadership.

Called to Serve

In Be My Witnesses, Darrell Guder convincingly argued the case that every

Christian needed to answer two questions: “Am I saved?” and “Am I useful?”16 These

two questions set the boundary between a follower and an active follower. The active

follower, the disciple of Christ, can answer both questions with clarity and confidence

but the passive follower will not grow past the first question.

Active followers of Jesus respond to the call to serve. It is possible to believe in

Christ and be redeemed by the blood of Christ without becoming an active disciple—a

hearer of the Word but not a doer of the Word.17 This transition demands spiritual

formation and inner life maturing: a maturing process that takes time, commitment,

experience, accountability, a desire to serve, and mentoring.

Willing to Serve

Possibly the most un-American text in the Bible is Ephesians 5:21—“Submit to

one another out of reverence for Christ.” Here lies the base line for a disciple, an active

follower of Christ. A follower, a believer, will submit to Christ, but not necessarily to a

church. An active follower submits to Christ and his church. This also identifies the

threshold for spiritual influence. How can one possibly lead and mentor others when he

or she cannot submit to anyone else? Leadership in the kingdom of God depends on

influence, not commands. The foundation for effective spiritual leadership is the ability

to be an active follower. Spiritual leaders can take responsibility in one area of his or her

giftedness (thus exercising spiritual authority) but in all humility follow someone else in

their area of giftedness. As Standish concludes in response to the question of whether

leaders can be humble: “Humble leaders motivate people to follow God’s vision. In

16 Darrell Guder, Be My Witnesses (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1985): 59. 17 James 1:19-25.


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contrast, conventional leaders motivate the people to follow the leader’s vision.”18 This

is why an elder would submit to the leadership of his fellow elders. This is the Sunday

school teacher that submits to the leadership of the church in developing a curriculum

that fits the direction of the church. This defines a ministry leader who is willing to

collaborate with other ministries, because an active follower knows the value and

power of team work.

Understanding this difference, even distance, between a follower and an active

follower helped me realize how easy it has been for me to skip this step in developing

leaders. I assumed a follower was a follower. However, a follower was really a seeker

who became a believer in God, reconciled to God through the redeeming blood of

Christ. As a new believer, he or she needs to feed on the milk of the Word to grow into

mature service. I also know many followers who, for decades, never took the next step,

even though they attended worship services every Sunday. They camped on the fringes

of the congregation and for a host of reasons lived in the shadows of the fellowship that

could have richly blessed their lives. For many years I have been lacked a clear strategy

to move more of these followers into the light of active involvement in the body of

Christ.

Involved in a Ministry

So how do we define an active follower? I will venture to define active followers as

disciples of Christ who use their spiritual gift(s) in at least one area of ministry. Call it a

“spiritual job description.” Two examples that provide a base line for an active follower

would be the willingness to assume responsibility for the spiritual welfare of others in

some way and the willingness to follow spiritual leaders.

Paul called the brethren in Thessalonica to the core competencies of discipleship

in caring for others. Passive followers look around and see others like themselves who

are just consumers, shy about their faith, and weak. In 1 Thessalonians 5:13-18, active

followers (healthy disciples) step up to participate in the spiritual maturation process by

warning the idle (= followers), encouraging the timid (= followers) and helping the

weak (= followers). They assume spiritual responsibility for others by taking the

18 N. Graham Standish, “Whatever Happened to Humility? Rediscovering the Misunderstood Leadership

Strength.” Congregations 33 (Sp 2007): 25.


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initiative to use their spiritual gifts to influence an idle, timid, weak or high

maintenance brother or sister.

And we urge you, brothers, warn those who are idle, encourage the timid, help

the weak, be patient with everyone. Make sure that nobody pays back wrong for

wrong, but always try to be kind to each other and to everyone else. Be joyful

always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will

for you in Christ Jesus.19

Active followers also imitate the faith of their leaders and obey their leaders. In a

poignant contrast between the temple as the center of faith (temple consumers) and

Christ who never changes, believers were urged to “go to him outside the camp” and to

“continually offer a sacrifice of praise—the fruit of lips that confess his name.” Active

followers (true disciples) “do not forget to do good and to share with others, for with

such sacrifices God is pleased.” 20 Passive followers wrap their faith around a temple;

active followers of Christ express their faith in service and ministry outside the temple.

This contrast between the temple and Christ (13:9-16) is bookended by base line

behavior of active followers:

Remember your leaders who spoke the word of God to you. Consider the

outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith. Jesus Christ is the same

yesterday, today and forever. . .

Obey your leaders and submit to their authority. They keep watch over you as

men who must give an account. Obey them so that their work will be a joy, not a

burden, for that would be of no advantage to you.21

In the individualistic, consumer driven, western culture a Christian can be

tempted to reject any spiritual authority and detest the word “submission.” These

words challenge the motivation for planting new churches to be free to do church as

they like, attending mega churches to hide in the crowd while enjoying multiple

ministries, or to stay marginal in a small church to avoid criticism. It also explains the

phenomenon of a generation our churches are losing who say “yes” to Jesus and “no”

19 1 Thessalonians 5:14-18 (This and all other biblical quotations come from the NIV, 1984). 20 Hebrews 13:13, 15-16 . 21 Hebrews 13:7, 17.


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to church—any church. The spiritual reality at the core of Paul’s admonition would call

for a process of inner life development and spiritual formation to be able to value the

spiritual guidance of leaders.

Many Christians are so stuck in the believing phase that movement toward

discipleship, to being an active follower, will require a strategic process and generate

new areas of stress for everyone. The easiest thing to do is leave them where they are,

which I have been known to do. McIntosh and Reeves identified the goals of gifts-based

ministry as moving members into active discipleship. “Everyone is encouraged to be in

a group or a team as soon as possible, with few if any prerequisites.”22

From Active Followers to Leaders (B)

Theories on the development of leaders have long debated the degree to which

leaders are made or born.23 Robert Clinton proposed a theory of leadership

development (Leadership Emergence Theory) that evolved from comparative studies of

hundreds of leaders. The theory traces the development of a leader over a lifetime

where divine sovereignty and providence shape the leader so that “the lifetime of

learning involves the intervention of God.”24

Context also influences the development of leaders. If leadership in small

churches resides in a few key families, in committees in medium size churches, and in

select leaders in larger churches, then the path of that development will vary

accordingly.25 John Maxwell would call this the “law of process” where leadership

develops daily, not in a day.26

Israel Galindo, in The Hidden Lives of Congregations, moves the paradigm of

leadership in churches from an individualistic to a corporate focus.

22 McIntosh and Reeves, Thriving Churches, 101. 23 J. Robert Clinton, A Short History of Leadership Theory (Barnabas, 1992), 28-38. The “Great Man Era”

(1841-1904) argued for leaders being born, followed by the “Trait Era” (1904-1948) which assumed

specific traits made a leader. Both theories have been challenged by the complexity of leadership. 24 J. Robert Clinton, Leadership Emergence Theory (Barnabas, 1989), 27. 25 Gary McIntosh, 50-53. 26 John C. Maxwell, The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership: Follow Them and People Will Follow You (Thomas

Nelson, 1998), 21-32.


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The insight that a congregation is an organic relationship system with hidden life

forces dictates that what effective congregational leaders provide for the church

are the specific functions for the systemic relational processes in the

congregation. More specifically, leadership in the congregational context is

primarily a corporate function, not an individual one. It has more to do with the

leader’s function in the system than it does with the leader’s personality or even

with the ability to motivate others.27

He gives theological and practical reasons to shift from a pastor system to shared

leadership. For him, congregations need more leaders, not managers. From my

experiences in consulting, churches tend to be over managed and under led. When

leaders mentor, more focus will be given to developing leaders, to the influence of

culture on the church, to their influence through relationships, to empowerment, to the

process of how people function, to coaching/consulting the most mature, and to the

mission of the church.28

Leaders Learn

I have often wondered if the assumption that leaders are born and not made has

influenced the lack of leadership development in churches. Should we also debate the

issue of whether followers are made or born? Not as debatable, is it? It seems easier to

observe how followers are made (transformed, sanctified, grown) than how leaders are

made. Few scholars accept the assumption that leaders are born.

Kouzes and Posner, like Clinton, share the accepted norm that leaders emerge

through a process to develop a set of skills and abilities.

What we have discovered, and rediscovered, is that leadership is not the private

reserve of a few charismatic men and women. It is a process ordinary people use

when they are bringing forth the best from themselves and others. What we’ve

discovered is that people make extraordinary things happen by liberating the

leader within everyone.29

27 Israel Galindo, The Hidden Lives of Congregations: Discerning Church Dynamics (Alban Institute, 2004),

138. 28 Galindo, p. 185-204. 29 James M. Kouzes and Barry Z. Posner, The Leadership Challenge (Jossey-Bass, 2002), xxiii.


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And any skill can be strengthened, honed, and enhanced, given the motivation

and desire, the practice and feedback, and the role models and coaching.

It’s very curious—and revealing—that no one has ever asked us, “Can

management be taught? Are managers born or made? Why is it that management is

viewed as a set of skills and abilities, while leadership is typically seen as a set of

innate personality characteristics? It’s simple. People assume management can be

taught. 30

If we adapt managing and leading to the biblical language of oversight and

shepherding, the same assumptions exist in churches. Why would church leaders be

more open to consultants coming to their church for help in managing the church but

seldom seek guidance in shepherding the church? For example, the elder with the least

management skills often wonders what good he is doing and why he is an elder.

LeaderLoop theory urges leaders, especially elders, to move beyond managing in order to

develop mentoring and shepherding skills (C and D) so they can be effective at

mentoring disciples (A). They still manage (oversight) but not at the expense of good

shepherding. In doing this, they reap the joys of ministry. One such joy comes from

helping release the gifts of others. It can be a reliable way of overcoming the stagnation

of churches.

Of all the life-giving systems, none creates more satisfaction than a mentoring

process. It is, in fact, needed to produce consistent, balanced and healthy growth

in people. Not only is a mentoring process easily transferable across ministries, it

identifies giftedness and then challenges people to place themselves accordingly

within the body of Christ.31

We can assume a certain level of inner life maturity and life maturing as one

transitions from an active follower to a leader in some area of ministry. To skip “A” and

appoint a follower to a leadership position usually ends in failure for the individual and

the church. Yet it happens too often, because the emerging leader had no mentoring or

guidance. A new believer will be given a leadership role with the assumption that he

will rise to the level of expectation—only to find that he or she burns out trying to

30 Ibid., 386. 31 McIntosh and Reeves, Thriving Churches, 98.


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please everyone or is crushed by the criticism. A successful businessman meets the

minimum requirements of being an elder, yet never established himself as an active

follower. Everyone suffers when he has a moral failure and will not submit to the

spiritual influence of his fellow elders or those who were close to him. Their spiritual

authority in his life could redeem his soul and spiritual influence.

I had a young, energetic couple share their plans with me to plant a new church

or become missionaries so they will not have to “mess with elders.” That did not sound

good. They wanted to be at “B” and skip “A.” This principle finds support in the

admonition not to appoint a recent convert as an elder.32

Malphurs and Mancini call attention to the “M-myth” in developing leaders.

They argue that mature and mobilized believers as well as “ministry masters” may not

be leaders. Good people can be put into leadership roles but not become good leaders.33

In small or smaller congregations, where the informal structures share the

organization of the church, a domineering personality can create a very unhealthy

environment—one in which the potential leaders give up and leave. Callahan

recommends a good three-step process in this situation: commit to develop and

encourage competent leaders, add new people to the leadership team, and advance a

shared understanding of congregational leadership. He offers four stages to developing

competent leaders: picture accomplishing something, match strengths to goals, mobilize

a team to accomplish goals, and “let the leader and the team come to their own.”34

A Baseline for Leaders

What sets the baseline for being a leader? We do not find in scriptures the

expectation that everyone will be a leader in the church. Not everyone has the gift to

lead.35 However, expectations that everyone will seek to be an active, mature, authentic

disciple of Christ seem clear.36 Every disciple is expected to have spiritual influence.

32 1 Timothy 3:6. 33 Aubrey Malphurs and Will Mancini, Building Leaders: Blueprints for Developing Leadership at Every Level of

Your Church (Baker, 2004), p. 191-192. 34 Callahan, p. 221. 35 Romans 12:8. 36 Colossians 1:28-29; Hebrews 5:11-14.


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Paul describes leaders as people who “work hard among you, who are over you

in the Lord, and who admonish you.”37 What prepared them for this seems to be their

maturity as disciples or active followers who had experience in warning the idle,

encouraging the timid, helping the weak and learning to be patient with everyone.

So what core competencies do we develop in our lives to become leaders? I will

suggest a few.

Responsible for others: Leaders in any ministry show concern and love for

others. They build trust in caring for those who follow them. They manage their

time well enough to balance the priorities of immediate tasks with the

importance of relationships.

Initiates structures: Leaders can begin new ministries or expand existing

structures to serve the church. Followers can demand such high maintenance

that they literally drain the energy out of a system (church or ministry).

Followers will often be heard saying: “Well, no one asked me to do that” or “It

did not appear that anyone else cared about this as much as I did so I quit

trying.” Active followers will be advancers, stepping in and marshalling

resources to get a task done or to meet a goal. Leaders see the need for a ministry

and initiate the structures to get the task done. They are forward-looking.38

Copes with criticism: Consumers demand so much that church leaders find

themselves catering to and even sidetracked by the complaints of followers.

Developing leaders in any area of ministry within the church requires continual

training in coping with criticism. Leaders know how to discern the legitimate

feedback from the criticism of those followers who make no contribution to the

growth of the church or resolving problems.

Seeks to do what is right: Paul exercised good leadership skills in the collection

for the poor in Jerusalem by asking the church to appoint someone to help him

take the money to Jerusalem. As an apostle he did not have to work with his

hands or limit how he did things to avoid criticism—yet he did. He wrote: “We

37 1 Thessalonians 5:12. 38 Kouzes and Posner, 136.


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want to avoid any criticism of the way we administer this liberal gift. For we are

taking pains to do what is right, not only in the eyes of the Lord but also in the

eyes of men.”39

Attracts followers: A deep reflective question we all might ask is “why would

anyone follow me?” The common scenario in the church for developing

followers starts with the respect and credibility one gains as an active follower.

Their involvement in the life of the church and their commitment to the Word

earns the respect of other active followers to the point that active followers ask

them to lead a ministry, to serve as elders, or seek their guidance.

Ability to exercise spiritual authority without dominating or manipulating

others. Through our experience, knowledge and relationships people will follow

us. However, we must first know ourselves well.

Learning to lead is about discovering what you care about and value.

About what inspires you. About what challenges you. About what gives

you power and competence. About what encourages you. When you

discover these things about yourself, you’ll know what it takes to lead

those qualities out of others.40

In weak and unhealthy churches, church leaders can’t seem to get past being

active followers. Elders suffer paralysis from the inability to lead the church through a

crisis or cope with any conflict. They may be loved but not followed because they do

not know where to go. Their lack of courage or wisdom may have cost them credibility

to lead. Leaders can get stuck between “A” and “B” (see Figure 1) and only appear to

lead. I know, that did not sound right—they should be between “B” and “C.” The same

dissonance can be felt at churches where leaders should at least function at “B” but

have slipped back to “A” at a time when “C” is really needed. When a deacon takes no

risks, makes no commitments, and simply maintains status quo in his ministry, he fails

to step up as a leader. When a “ministry leader” waits for years for someone to create a

new structure for his/her failing ministry while blaming the leaders for the

39 2 Corinthians 8:20-21. 40 Kouzes and Posner, 391.


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ineffectiveness or inactivity of that ministry, the “ministry leader” has slipped back to

“A.”

If leaders and followers are made—not born—then how can they be developed?

Teaching and preaching may point the way, but it is no substitute for personal coaching

and mentoring. The evidence continues to point me to the necessity of more leaders,

especially elders and preachers, shifting their priority to mentoring, knowing that such

a shift will not be easy.

From Leaders to Mentors (C & D)

Because we have no presidents, prime ministers, or popes as leaders in the New

Testament church, no leadership role would be viewed as “top of the mountain.” When

one becomes an elder he has not “arrived” to the highest point in the church. That place

is reserved for Christ alone. Is there something beyond—not above—being an elder or a

leader in the church?

Consider the ministry of Christ. He emptied himself and took on the form of a

servant. How do leaders do that in the church today? LeaderLoop theory suggests leaders

do this in mentoring relationships. Old leader-follower structures, where the position

and title define authority, will no longer work in contemporary western society. Good

leaders create more leaders, not more followers. They find ways to turn loose of

responsibilities in such a way that will bless those who accept these responsibilities. The

ability to initiate and engage in mentoring relationships has been considered the “one

indispensable skill set for leadership development. . . Church leaders’ doing so enables

those around them to release others in exhilarating, reproductive ministries.”41 These

relationships require the skill to enter and exit relationships in a healthy way.42

What Do Mentors Do?

Kouzes and Posner, in The Leadership Challenge, identified five practices of good

leadership based on several decades of research. These five practices of exemplary

41 McIntosh and Reeves, Thriving Churches, 90. 42 Ibid., 96.


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leaders are: model the way, inspire a shared vision, challenge the process, enable others

to act and encourage the heart.43

They’re available [the five practices] to anyone, in any organization or situation,

who accepts the leadership challenge. And they’re not the accident of a special

moment in history. They’ve stood the test of time, and our most recent research

confirms that they’re just as relevant today as they were when we first began our

investigation over two decades ago—if not more so.44

They give several case studies to illustrate these practices. One example came from

Lindsay Levin of Whites Limited. She made a commitment to training people 16 hours a

month—10% of their time.

She admits that it is expensive and that pulling people off the job is not always

popular, but it’s a long-term strategy that pays off in two directions. One is that

skills transfer is a reality and the people who have been on training courses

(covering both technical and people skills) go on to train others on the job. The

other is the bottom-line effect, where revenue and growth have more than

doubled, contributing to many awards both inside and outside the industry.45

In LeaderLoop theory, these five practices start with active followers. Just imagine

the impact on a church culture in which every leader devotes 10% of his or her time to

training others. As this case study shows, when leaders mentor followers, the

mentoring loops around and the mentoree mentors others. I find in this a convincing

illustration of a core competency for mentoring (“D”) and modeling the way—a model

of service that can start as an active follower.

Sure, leaders had operational and strategic plans. But the examples they gave

were not about elaborate designs. They were about the power of spending time

with someone, of working side by side with colleagues, of telling stories that

made values come alive, of being highly visible during times of uncertainty, and

43 Kouzes and Posner, 13. 44 Kouzes and Posner, 14. For further research on the theory and evidence behind the five practices see

http://www.leadershipchallenge.com/WileyCDA/Section/id-131362.html. 45 Kouzes and Posner, 5.

http://www.leadershipchallenge.com/WileyCDA/Section/id-131362.html


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of asking questions to get people to think about values and priorities. Modeling

the way is essentially about earning the right and respect to lead through direct

individual involvement and action. People first follow the person, then the

plan.46

Where in our churches do leaders spend time, work side by side, tell stories and

ask questions? Several times, as an elder, I saw elaborate plans with no one to execute

them or the wrong person wanting to execute them. For example, large suburban

churches can make two or three false starts to a small group ministry or to multiple

services. Most plans focus on everything but the credibility and influence of the people

leading the change, and fail. Granted, a much greater issue is the shortage of active

followers!

The most common phenomenon in churches where 80% of the work is done by

20% of the members means that the leaders will assume most of the work load and

make most of the decisions, but seldom, if ever, develop new leaders.47 They cannot free

themselves from the burden of their responsibilities long enough and often enough to

spend the time it takes to mentor someone else. Like Moses, they keep wondering when

the Lord will send someone to help lead the people, ignoring the fact that Joshua and

Caleb were at his side!48 Without a strategy and the maturity to cope with the stress, it

will be very unlikely to find a church culture naturally developing leaders at every

level. We will also find a church with a “shortage” of volunteers because leaders take a

program-based approach where it seems more emphasis has been given to the program

than to the persons being recruited.49

A Baseline for Mentoring

If no one seems to gravitate to a leader for mentoring, McIntosh and Reeves

would conclude that they are in the “pre-mentor stage of their effectiveness.”50 Thus, a

baseline for a mentor (“C”) would be at least one or two people seeking a mentoring

relationship with the leader in transition to being a mentor.

46 Kouzes and Posner, 15. 47 McIntosh, One Size Does Not Fit All, p. 121; see the Pareto Principle or 80/20 rule where 20% of the

efforts yields 80% of the results. 48 Exodus 33:11-12. 49 McIntosh and Reeves, Thriving Churches, 100. 50 McIntosh and Reeves, Thriving Churches, 92.


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According to John Maxwell, reproducing generations of leaders would be a good

leader’s lasting contribution. It is the true test of a leader to develop other leaders, not

to see how many followers he can find.

Those types of leaders have no idea how much they are limiting their own

potential and the potential of the people around them. As I have said before, a

leader who produces followers limits his success to what his direct, personal

influence touches. His success ends when he can no longer lead. On the other

hand, a leader who produces other leaders multiplies his influence, and he and

his people have a future.51

Maxwell would set the baseline for being a leader as a desire to lead, relational

skills and practical leadership skills.52 Baseline competencies for mentoring begin with

the ability to balance leading and managing the urgent and the important, setting

priorities, connecting people to the mission, and coping with the increased complexities

of matching people to ministry. To become a mentor, a leader will spend more time

with fewer people.53 As I see it, all the expectations of Paul for active followers/disciples

at Thessalonica required some form of mentoring. How else would one know how to

warn the idle, encourage the timid, help the weak, be patient with everyone, be kind to

others, find joy in everything, pray continually, and give thanks in all circumstances

without a guide on the side helping one exegete life? I would assume a relationship

would be necessary for this spiritual growth to take place. Paul wrote I Thessalonians as

a mentoring more than an apostle issuing commands. His guidelines were general,

assuming the Holy Spirit would help the disciples fill in the gaps.

If we define leadership as influence in relationships, mentoring will be a natural

process.54 Two of Maxwell’s “laws of leadership” illustrate this point: “only secure

leaders give power to others” and “it takes a leader to raise up a leader.”55

51 John C. Maxwell, Developing the Leaders Around You: How to Help Others Reach Their Full Potential

(Thomas Nelson, 1995), 197-198. 52 Ibid., 199-200. 53 McIntosh and Reeves, in Thriving Churches (p. 90) suggests the mentor adopt a good screening process

“for selecting those with the highest aptitude and desire.” 54 Kouzes and Posner, xxviii. 55 Maxwell, The 21 Irrefutable Laws, 121-142.


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Lawrence O. Richards and Clyde Hoeldtke wrote Church Leadership in the 1980s,

long before the contemporary focus on mentoring. They made a distinction between the

tasks of the “body leaders” and the “institutional leaders.” They took what seemed to

be an extreme position, that elders do not accept responsibility for ministries or

mission—it is done by those who own the ministry. However, they raise the issues a

leader needs to think through to move beyond leading (“C”).

If we are a body, and Jesus is head over all things for us, then policy making,

goal setting, organizing, decision making, and all the other roles of management

cannot be the responsibility of the human leadership of the body.56

Spiritual leaders need to encourage members of Christ’s body to accept

responsibility for the achievement of those tasks Jesus wants to accomplish in

our world through His body. Spiritual leaders in the church should not accept

responsibility for, or take control of, task-focused ministries or missions, as

though these could be “church programs.” Spiritual leaders in the church must

recognize that they are body leaders and that the “church” cannot be shaped to

accomplish any task/produce/service objective.57

If leaders moved beyond making decisions for the church or a ministry, what

would they do? They would mentor followers to become active, and active followers to

be leaders. Peter Senge identified five roles the mentor fulfills: facilitator in connecting

gifts to ministry, appraiser of performance and actions to improve, forecaster of new

developments, advisor to give support in the face of obstacles, and enabler in developing

a strategy and network.58 These factors describe the functions I have experienced as a

mentor over the past thirty years. They cannot be done in a classroom. They require the

mentoring relationship Leith Anderson describes as “teachers-friends-influencers who

shape our lives and leadership more than anyone else.”59

56 Richards and Hoeldtke, Church Leadership, 90. 57 Ibid, 203. 58 Adapted from Caela Farren and Beverly L. Kaye, “New Skills for New Leadership Roles,” in The Leader

of the Future, ed., Frances Hesselbein, Marshall Goldsmith, and Richard Beckhard (San Francisco: Jossey-

Bass, 1996): 179-180; quoted in Gibbs, LeadershipNext, 214. 59 Leith Anderson, Leadership that Works: Hope and Direction for Church and Parachurch Leaders in Today’s

Complex World (Minneapolis: Bethany House, 1999), 185.


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Eddie Gibbs observed, in 2005, that mentoring was still a novel concept in

churches but vital to leaving a legacy. Mentoring enhances spiritual and ministry

formation. He urged churches to make the training of mentoring a priority since there

are so few doing it. “The most significant test of leadership is not present performance

but the legacy that the leaders leave behind them.”60

A LeaderLoop Response

At the beginning of this paper I raised the following questions:

1. How do we learn to pass the baton when it no longer seems to be a natural thing

to do?

2. How do we become better followers?

3. How do we, as a church, discover and identify our mission from generation to

generation without effective leaders and willing followers?

4. How do we develop more followers into leaders with spiritual influence?

5. How do we pass the desire to lead on to others? How do we create an

environment to develop more leaders in the local church?

We become better followers when leaders loop back around and start mentoring

followers to be active followers—like themselves. Through personal story telling and

shared reflection, it will become clear that the mentor is both an active follower and a

leader—because a leader did not become a leader and cease to be a disciple. As

mentoring increases (D), leaders will become more aware of what God is doing through

the church and empower members to use their spiritual gifts. The percentage of

followers growing into active followers, with this process, will grow exponentially with

the multiplication of leaders who engage in consistent mentoring and empower new

ministry. Mentoring reaches into the heart to give both the desire to lead and the

confidence to lead, knowing the journey will not be taken alone or without support. A

heart shaped for leading will naturally touch other hearts—as the LeaderLoop goes on

and on.

60 Eddie Gibbs, LeadershipNext: Changing Leaders in a Changing Culture (Downers Grove, IVP: 2005), 214-

216.