In my travels I often run into church leaders who have lived incredible lives of faith. They were impacted by God and subsequently abandoned their previous walk and threw their lives into ministry. One of the things I see with these leaders is an incredible tenacity to follow God at any cost. The concept of obedience and stretching their horizons is a never-ending one. At the same time, these leaders who have pulled their faith up by the bootstraps tend to fall short in many areas of ministry.

The leader whose attitude is, "Why can't they just obey God? That's what the Bible says..." is often the same one who struggles to provide mentorship and structured discipleship for his church. Why? For one, because they were likely never mentored. They sat under a minister who taught them from a pulpit, but never walked with them and coached them through life. They find it hard to see why people need coaching. They didn't. To them the Christian walk, Bible study, and obedience was so black-and-white, that they cannot fathom why it is not so clearly black-and-white to everyone else. As a result, they often get frustrated when people do not follow simple steps of faith and they do not have the patience nor vision to provide the deliberate mentorship that they were never given themselves.

In reality, it is not fully their fault. Few of us were mentored. We really don't even have a mental picture of what that looks like. We were preached to, but churches have rarely had the programs needed to support healthy discipleship. And few men ever took the time to apprentice the young believer from their gray world into black-and-white faith. As a result, many churches have a chasm between those that "get it" (and do all the work in the church) and those who never seem to possess the same reality of God.

A few years ago, a pastor read my book and called me for help. He had pastored for about 15 years and had struggled to get his congregation over 50 people. He was an honorable man who had given his all to help people. His wife and family had stood beside him as he endured hardship year after year in order to stay afloat. He spoke of desiring to see growth, but was saddened in that he lacked strong leaders. He was a man of bootstrap faith. He listened to the preacher as a young believer and he acted on what was said. His action led him into ministry and now he was struggling with people that simply would not take the same initiative in their faith.

I asked him, "How are you mentoring leaders?" He was puzzled, responding, "Well, I prepare and preach every week." For fifteen years, he had given people words—powerful words, but had never really built people. As a result, he never had an infrastructure that would support growth. Let me challenge that the job of a church leader as a mentor is never done. Even when you have a congregation of 10,000 and hundreds of mentors leading healthy people, you are still responsible to seek a handful of people who you can pour your life into in a deeper way.

"And the [instructions] which you have heard from me along with many witnesses, transmit and entrust [as a deposit] to reliable and faithful men who will be competent and qualified to teach others also." 2 Tim 2:2 (Amplified)

This was Paul mentoring to Timothy—writing him a personal letter—teaching him to mentor others. Are you a person of bootstrap faith? What are you doing to pour you life into a small group of people that you will mentor into true leaders? For every bootstrapper, there are dozens who will need a lot more effort in order to become whom God has called them to be. As leaders, the next move is ours.

It’s fair to say that brochures and print materials are seldom read, but always evaluated. The same is true of your website. Bulletins are read more commonly, partly because of their focus on headlines, dates and bullet points--but also because people find lulls in the church service and use bulletins for mindless entertainment. To some degree, bulletins have cross-gender appeal. It’s a long-standing truism in marketing that men read headlines and women read the details. Now, this isn’t universally exact, but has been found to be common. A good brochure or printed piece will connect with both men and women—allowing headliners to get the basic information out and those who enjoy the details can get their fill in the body text.

All printed materials that you put out as a church form to create your church’s personality in printed form. If your printed materials are not consistent in style and quality, that’s what people will take away from your church, consciously or sub-consciously. If they are outdated, you’re telling people your church is outdated. On the other hand, these pieces might be telling people that you’re the “cool” church. This would work if you genuinely are the cool church, but if you’re not, that’s an awkward disconnect.

You can and should have contemporary materials that are relevant, creating a bridge between your style and values and those of your target audience. In doing this, design consistency, or branding, will become the catalyst to defining who you are and will enhance your ability to reach your target audience right from the start.

What are your print materials saying about you?

A few years ago, I was sitting in my local Starbucks and happened to overhear a group training session for new employees. And it was awesome! The employees were being trained on the atmosphere and experience that they were hired to create. The mission statement was given clearly through examples, so everyone could grasp it. The meeting was visionary. I was just about ready to fill out an employment application!

The people holding the training had a picture of how the employees were to treat each other and the leadership, but the tone was not focused on what the workers wanted to get out of the job. Instead, the training was centered around the experience they were to provide for each other and in turn, the customers. They were taught to be relational with frequent guests and sensitive to those who might not even know what a latte is.

What if we, as the church, put this much effort into inspiring workers—volunteers and members alike—with a vision for how the church could be and the atmosphere we would create for our visitors? Without this alignment, is it any wonder why we often come across as so fragmented and ineffective to the people we are trying to reach? Is it a surprise that there are so many churches connecting with so few people?

What are you doing to allign your ministry team? Do you have an atmosphere that's deliberate and effective?

Have you ever noticed that the average designer looks like they are in the band? Ever notice the odd coincidence that so many music people also dabble in design? Ever wonder why? Let me play a few chords of the common bond between music and design... When a musician begins learning, let's say... guitar, he (or she) first learns how to play the notes, but then begins to learn on a higher level how different notes and sounds make up the songs that create his moods. He learns the chords that stir him up, wind him down, and make him wax melancholy.

The longer he plays guitar, the more he learns the characteristics of the sounds and is able to see the direct correlation between chord and emotion. He learns how to use his instrument to create whatever reaction he desires. He can make the audience laugh, cry, bang their heads or squeeze their lover's hand—all with the choice of notes and the combination and speed thereof. A great guitarist is someone who has mastered the elements of music and combines them like a mad scientist to create specific response. He does not merely play the guitar. He plays the audience.

How different is design? Instead of using the tools of notes and timing, designers use color and shape to instigate a response. In the same way, they combine elements time after time and begin to learn the responses they create in the hearts and minds of the viewer. This correlation between the musician and the designer is a simple bond... the study between creative inputs and human outputs. Great chefs, great comedians, great interior designers all have it—it is an innate drive to know an audience and bring elements together that would captivate them in some way.

The reason a guitarist often makes a good designer is that he/she has already strengthened their sense of deliberative mood setting. They bring the same root logic into a new medium and they are far ahead of those that are just starting to hone that gift. The challenge, as it is with musicians, is that they often only learn to play their songs for just one group of people. Sure, you know how to make a 20-year-old sing a worship song, but can you master the sounds of the 60-year-old's worship set? In the same way, many designers can only play design tunes that reach certain age groups. They are not masters of their craft, but yet masters of their target audience.

To the musician and designer: never stop studying the correlation between your elements and the response that follows it. At the same time, never stop expanding the reach of the notes you play. In doing so, you become all things to all men... reach them.