Addressing the Leadership Gap

Last month, the Candidacy Committee of the Christian Reformed Church in North America gathered representatives from more than a third of the denomination’s classes to discuss and develop ways to raise up more ministry leaders. The aim: to strengthen leadership development and build clearer pathways into local church ministry.

Called the Classis Ministerial Leadership Team (CMLT) Gathering, the event took place in early February at a retreat center in Paradise Valley, Ariz. The gathering focused on supporting classis staff who are tasked with training efforts, especially those who train lay leaders, people seeking a license to exhort, and commissioned pastors, said Susan LaClear, director of Candidacy. 

Crucial to this event, LaClear added, was the increasing need to find leaders to fill positions in the church that, for various reasons, are not being filled as efficiently as they once were. According to church statistics, nearly 20 percent of CRCNA congregations were searching for a pastor in early 2026. 

Recent synods have addressed the need to expand leadership training and have called on the Candidacy Committee to coordinate the work. In particular, said LaClear, synod has called on the committee to raise up leaders to plant churches. 

“The goal of the event was to encourage and equip these leaders to become catalysts of leadership development within their classes—serving to cast vision and to resource and strategize with classis leaders about how to create a clear pathway of training and support for those who are called to ministry,” said LaClear.

Normally, said LaClear, she holds two online events with a similar agenda each year, seeking to discuss ongoing classical leadership programs and to spur efforts to train leaders for the future.

Through support from Calvin Theological Seminary, the Candidacy Committee was able to hold the in-person gathering. Meeting face-to-face, LaClear said, provided opportunities to see up close the creative work being done by Classis Ministerial Leadership Teams (CMLTs).

“The work of leadership development is essential to the health and growth of churches, so it has been incredibly encouraging to observe a renewed energy for, and commitment to, this work in classes across the denomination,” she said.

CMLTs, she pointed out, have historically had the role of guiding emerging leaders to serve in ministry. They have also provided financial support for seminary students. Recent synods have broadened that mandate to include other key functions, such as serving as a “consultation and advisory resource to classis . . . regarding matters related to ministerial candidacy in the CRC” and encouraging congregations to focus on “identifying possible candidates for ministry.”

The event helped to clarify this added emphasis and offered participants the chance to brainstorm ideas and discuss programs. 

“The gathering gave them [CMLT leaders] an opportunity to talk together about the leadership needs within their classes and to share strategies they have used to try to address them,” said LaClear.

A number of participants talked about specific programs at work in their classes, she said. For instance, Classis Hackensack has enrolled 15 lay leaders from immigrant congregations in a preaching class organized and taught by local leaders. And Classis Southeast U.S. has trained individuals for licensure to exhort and to serve as commissioned pastors.

Meanwhile, said LaClear, a CMLT member from Classis Lake Superior reiterated the need for a strong focus on the discipleship and training of lay leaders, since that is foundational to producing more commissioned pastors and ministers of the Word. And in doing this, that person said, it is crucial to consider leadership training as a valuable gift, instead of referencing it as “hoops to jump through.” 

Not mentioned at the Gathering but worth pointing out, added LaClear, is the recent success of Classis Thornapple Valley in starting a wide-ranging education effort by working through its Thornapple Valley Student Committee. Beginning in 2018, the committee supported work to help cover the cost of training students for leadership, and they have had strong results. For instance, churches in Thornapple Valley have supported dozens of students over the past several years to work on a range of degrees at Calvin Theological Seminary.

Classis Arizona officials shared how they have been able to catalyze leadership development by providing internship grants and offering church planting residencies.

Rod Hugen, a church-growth specialist in Classis Arizona, expanded on this work in an email written after the gathering. He said the classis began to move ahead in this area when it realized that the primary reason they were not planting churches was not because they lacked financial and support resources, but because they lacked leaders.

As a result, they decided to use funds to hire, train, and support church planting. For example, they used the funds so that a number of churches could each “hire a part-time intern under the age of 35 who would work in all aspects of ministry, including preaching and being part of the local council and classis meetings.”

These church-planter interns were to be generalists, meaning they came to have various skills besides preaching. For example, they developed skills to serve as worship leaders, youth directors, or administrative aides. 

“All of the churches who have taken part in the project have reported wonderful results,” commented Hugen. He said the new leaders have planted churches or have been able to help existing churches thrive. “It has been beautiful to watch God at work,” he said. 

However, he added, “It has not been without pain and suffering. Several interns did not work out for various reasons. That was to be expected.”

In one tragic setback, the son of an area pastor was killed in an accident before being able to take over his father’s church. That was “a devastating blow to the church community and to Classis Arizona,” wrote Hugen.

And yet, he stated, “God has moved powerfully in the churches through the intern program. We have extended funding for three more years at a decreasing rate to help churches continue to afford their interns. It has been a delightful time of putting God’s resources to work and seeing him raise up new leaders to shepherd his people.” 

Andy Sytsma of Classis Yellowstone reflected on his experience after the event as well, saying, “The gathering itself was positive and energizing. There was synergy, alignment, hope and shared vision.” 

He added that he was encouraged to see denominational agencies at the gathering and to learn about the ways they were working together. For example, he said, Resonate Global Mission and Calvin Seminary are working on Empower, a competency-based training for commissioned pastors tailored for church planters.

Meanwhile, the Candidacy Committee and the seminary are working together on training that is “stackable,” which means, he wrote, that “a student can start with certificate-level training to become, for example, a commissioned pastor. Then, if desired, that person’s work can be applied toward a future M.Div.”

Sytsma also said he learned that Thrive is working with church agencies “to cultivate a culture of discipleship in local churches, engaging youth and young adults, and is close to publishing new elder and deacon training for churches.” These combined efforts, he said, are making a difference and helping to address the need for more church leaders.

Reflecting further, Sytsma added, “We all recognized that the past several years have been difficult. . . . That said, we also sensed we are in a new chapter, looking ahead.”

For instance, synod has asked church leaders to come to Synod 2026, said Sytsma, “with a 10-year plan for church planting, anticipating we may be tasked with planting approximately 1,000 new churches in the next decade.” In order to do this, a number of issues such as “deepening connections with the global church and international church planting” must be addressed, wrote Sytsma, who is leading one of six subteams working on this plan. 

Reaching a church-planting goal of this size, he added, also involves “supporting diverse leaders and obtaining adequate financial resources,” which plays into the overall mission of the Candidacy Committee and the CMLTs. And “while most of my experience as a local pastor has been on the church planting side,” he wrote, “more and more of the work I do falls in the category of creating a culture of multiplying disciples and developing leaders.” 

Stephen Terpstra, a CRC pastor in Orange City, Iowa, who helped to put on a conference at Dordt College in late 2025 on the topic of training leaders, offered a final reflection on the issue that brought so many CMLTs to Arizona in February.

“As a denomination, we have been talking about the looming shortage of pastors for years,” he said. 

Both the conference he helped out on and the gathering in Arizona are examples of work being done to address the shortage, he said, and he hopes this emphasis is only starting: “I long to see God raise up an army of young people ready to follow Jesus to the ends of the earth, proclaiming [the kingdom] in word and deed, in their joyful suffering, in their preaching and teaching, in their love and service. . . .”