EFCAndrew.com

 Churches need leaders.  I think that anyone in church leadership will agree with that (if only to justify their own position), but the challenge has been to get leaders involved on the right level.  As churches are moving to more, smaller groups, many struggle with what leadership will look like.

I believe that in 2010 we will see churches trending toward more and stronger leaders.  The Grand Junction church that I am at, for example, is working to build small group leaders whose leadership goes beyond opening prayer and reading some questions.  The upper leadership of the church, the pastors and elders and committee people, need to be empowering more leaders of smaller groups to truly take a leadership role.

Stronger leaders are able to keep groups together and build stronger relationships.  As people's connection to their church gets more decentralized, they will need people close to them to be in leadership.  The times are already past for many churches when the senior pastor visited everyone in the church regularly.  Now, many people don't even want the pastor to visit, they have the small group they are part of and that is enough.  Unfortunately, many pastors are fighting this trend, either out of their view of what their position should be or because they don't want to lose the leadership that comes with those close connections.

2010 will be a year when more people in the church feel that they are watching over others and helping their brothers and sisters grow, but only if we work to empower them.