CRC and RCA Working Together

In 2014 at Central College in Pella Iowa the CRCNA and the RCA held a joint Synod meeting in which they made a partnership declaration. Out of that came The Reformed Collaborative.

This May a new joint CRC/RCA effort was announced called the Reformed Leadership Initiative. I served as a regional leader in the Church Multiplication Initiative (KEZ) effort and was now asked to again lead this new effort in Northern California with RCA Pastor Steve With of the Impact Church in Brentwood.

I agreed to serve without a lot of information about what exactly this program would involve. Today Steve and I sat down with Ken Eriks (RCA) and Denise Posie (CRC) to learn more about the program and get things underway. Since the conversation is fresh on my mind I thought it would be helpful to write about it a bit.

Here is an official description from the Initiative.

What Is It? 

From the initial documents I was given it was clear that the purpose of the program was to help local CRC and RCA churches develop leaders but I was unclear as to exactly how this was going to be pursued. Now I know why I was not clear on this. The program is designed to help each individual congregation develop their leadership according to the needs and goals of their local context.

What Is Your Local Leadership Development Challenge?

Every local pastor knows that developing new leaders is key to the future of their congregation.

• New leaders to become elders, deacons, program leaders, worship leaders, etc.
• New leaders for community development programs outside the congregation
• New leaders to develop new ministry initiatives along side the local congregation
• New leaders to help plant new churches
• New leaders to develop not-for-profit organizations for other churches and non-church community organizations.
• New leadership to continue to grow the discipleship ministries within and outside your congregations

Leadership development is something that all pastors know they must do and when done well multiplies the capacity and impact of their local congregation. Unfortunately it is often one of those items that doesn’t have the weekly calendar demand like the worship service, committee meeting or council meeting and therefore gets pushed to the back of the priorities list or on the “when I get some time” list.

Failing to develop that next generation of leaders will, however, keep too many things as the direct responsibility of the pastor and limit the long term capacity and impact of the local church.

Most of us do leadership development on the fly, taking someone out to lunch, looking for a conversation or a slot in which to plug in a new leader that shows promise, but a number of these efforts lack consistency and follow through. It would be better for a local church with its present leaders to sit down and develop a plan for developing the leaders the church will need for its desired future.

What this Program Intends to Deliver

The goal of this program is to assist participating local CRC and RCA churches to develop their leadership development program and goals according to their individual, specific and contextual needs. This isn’t a program that comes to the local church and says “here is a leadership development program” because no one else but your local leadership knows what you need to develop in the next for years for your church.

• Maybe you want to develop leaders for a discipleship program?
• Maybe you’ve got a lot of community relief work going and know you need leadership who will spearhead that effort for the next few years?
• Maybe you’re a church plant with some young leaders and members but you need to develop deacons and elders
• Maybe you’re an aging congregation and you need to develop new leaders for new kinds of ministries that will serve a younger community than your present ministry programs are connecting with?
• Maybe you want to hive off a new congregation in a neighboring community but know that that new group will need its own, developed leaders or you will new leaders to replace them?
• Maybe your congregation is doing a lot of community development work and you need new leaders for that effort?
• Maybe you envision an entirely new outreach project but don’t currently have the leadership to maintain your current program and start that new thing?

This initiative is designed to do the following:

• Assist your local leadership to put together a leadership development team and plan targeting the needs and goals of your specific congregation
• Create a Congregational Learning Network to connect your team with other local churches who are trying to do similar things. Through this you can learn from other churches about resources, what is working, what isn’t working, etc.
• Provide coaching for your pastor or staff person who is in charge of this development effort
• Provide accountability to help your church not drop the ball on this effort but sustain it for at least 18 months
• Receive assistance in locating resources for your local congregation leadership development program
• Collaborate with other congregations to develop resources for reaching your goals
• At the end of the process participating congregations will be able to apply for grants to continue what you began.

How Do We Get Started?

If you are in the CRC Classis Central CA please contact me (Paul Vander Klay). If you are in the RCA Classis Central CA please contact Steve With.

We are planning a “Taste and See” event likely in the Modesto April 23, 2016. More information will be forthcoming.