Red Deer, Alberta, Canada. Halfway between Calgary and Edmonton. Unlikely location for one of Canada’s largest most influential churches.
I have known Word of Life founding pastors Mel and Heather Mullen for about twenty years, and I’ve always been impressed with the youth in their church. Most pastors reach people ten years older and ten years younger. Not Mel and Heather. They have always reached their peers and the generations coming behind them—people twenty and thirty years younger.
Right now as I type this blog on my Air, Mel is talking to about 200 Canadian pastors and church planters, trying to get them to think big.
I’m doing the afternoon sessions. As usual, I will talk about discipleship principles and processes. The theme of this conference is “MULTIPLY.”
Here’s what Mel just said, that explains why his church has always had a vibrant youth movement.
“I walked into a staff meeting four years ago and said to my team: ‘I’m no longer asking you to build a church for my generation. From now on, I’m doing church to reach your generation.”
Then Mel asked his young leadership team a question that all over-forty leaders need to ask: “What do I need to change about my leadership and this church in order to reach your generation?”
Mel went on to say, “Then they started telling me what I need to change. And they still tell me, everyday. And I’m changing.”
I wish every pastor leader would ask that question and listen to the answer.
Mel and Heather have built a great church because they listen and they change.
That’s a good idea for all leaders, no matter what we are leading.
