Key Barriers to Church Growth, part 3: The Key Component to Breaking Barriers to Church Growth

Welcome back to Part 3 of my series on barriers to ministry inflection points. In the first two parts of the series, we explored the need for change in the post-pandemic church, and how digital transformation is driving the need to adapt.

From there, we explored three barriers to finding an inflection point in ministry at the moment: heartache, technical leaders, and unique church circumstances. In this final part of the series, I want to unpack the primary component that I see as the key to breaking these barriers and reaching a turning point. 

Let’s bring this home…

Breaking barriers: Developing the crucible of your leadership team

If you’ve made it this far, you also have plenty to be optimistic about — at least, optimistic in the Simon Sinek sense. Optimism can present as positivity, but real rooted optimism comes from the willingness and ability to truly understand challenges and opportunities in order to chart a course forward. And you’re well on your way. 

It may be tempting to chart that course in response to these barriers by reaching for familiar “change management” tools, internal evangelism techniques, data, charts, and ROI analysis around budget shifts… but I’ll suggest there’s a more foundational mission in view. To truly lead your team forward with sure footing and soil fertile for innovation, you’ll need to develop the crucible of your leadership team.

A crucible holds very hot materials in a very intentional way. Not hot enough, and it won’t go anywhere. Not intentional enough, and it’ll burn the place down. 

In their book Leadership on the Line (which I referenced in Part 2), Ronald Heifetz and Marty Linsky call this the “productive range of distress.” It represents the lid on your organization's ability to innovate, adapt, and remain relevant. 

The relational and identity challenges of our barriers necessitate higher heat-holding containers than our teams have likely experienced in the past. When you start stressing relationships, pressing against comfort, and challenging identity, you need something that reframes the boundaries of pain as boundaries of opportunity. Here are just a few of the questions your team will encounter:

• What does my identity require to be true?
• Where have my values become my identity?
• What validation cycles do I rely on or embrace?
• Should all perspectives be given the same value and weight?
• Am I substituting the tyranny of positivity for true optimism?
• If my preferences aren’t sacred, are they betraying me?
• Am I a technical leader or an adaptive leader?
• How do I feed my family if I mess this up?

There are techniques for building a strong leadership crucible, and with it, you can navigate any pivot. You can re-win the hearts of your people by returning to your shared goal and aligning with your unique assignment from the King. You can seed curiosity with information to unlock creativity and experiment together. 

Experimentation is a galvanizing antidote to heartache. Everyone’s wandering. Everyone’s learning. We can speak directly to the Dual Imperative which quiets the voice of fear and anxiety in the ambiguity and unknown. We can embrace a new rebel narrative that invites the Healer in during this cultural “gap between idols”. Using technology in the palm of our hands, we can introduce this Healer into every crack and crevice of darkness and loneliness whenever and wherever it presents itself. 

As senior leaders, we can recognize that while we have experience, we no longer swim in the culture we are trying to reach — but our next generation does. We can release our preference to those things that inspire them the most. We honor the next generation by embracing what inspires them. And we know God blesses honor over the right answer or best plan. Through them, we can release the finite game of the church we know for the infinite game of God’s church. 

Ultimately, developing the crucible of the leadership team inspires belief in the team and the work. If culture eats vision, belief slowly eats culture. Belief is the linchpin. It’s the only fair trade for the best sacrifice of our careers, our lives, and our families.

Navigating inflection points as the church

The great news with all of this is that we have everything we need. God has redeemed parts of the pandemic in incredible ways. 

As we build the holding container and embrace the challenges, we can learn to sail into the headwinds we face. Sailors consider headwinds the holy grail. If you can sail into headwinds, the entire sea is open to you. If not, you’ll remain a victim of the wind and storm. For us, this work is what opens the sea for everything God wants to do through His church …and through your church.

In Joshua 5, the commander of the armies of the Lord wasn’t there for or against Joshua. He was there for the assignment of the King, and he was checking Joshua’s heart. Was he there for the preferences that left them wandering for a generation or for the assignment that led to the promised land? 

One of the hardest things we do as leaders is to look past our desires to see our assignment. But when we do, we just might be joined in the work by the commander of the army of the Lord.

Here’s the assignment: Build the crucible of your leadership team. Face the barriers. Open up the sea. Imagine what God will do from there.

If you need help with any of these barriers or help developing a strong leadership crucible, give Nathan Artt and Ministry Solutions Group a call. His team would be glad to help.

About the Author: 

Brian Chelette is an Executive Director for Sandals Church in Southern California. Sandals Church is multi-site with 13 campuses and a broad digital footprint. Brian has the honor of leading the People, Finance, Technology, and Digital Reach teams. He has been part of Sandals Church since 1998, served on the Board of Directors, and has been on staff since 2015. In addition to his role with Sandals Church, Brian serves as a Trustee for California Baptist University. Prior to vocational ministry, Brian was a business owner in Riverside, CA. Brian holds a bachelor's degree from USC and an MBA from Pepperdine.