| If the Christian church of this generation is going to be effective in ministry it will need effective Christian Educational Leadership to disciple them in practices and application. The central phenomenon of this study is to analyze the perceptions of pastors, staff, and church members about their opinions and beliefs about effective practices of an effective Christian leader. The problem that this study addressed is that the perceptions of pastors, church staff, and church members regarding effective Christian Educational Leadership were unknown and therefore church/Christian leadership training fails to benefit from the perspective and experience of these leaders and church leadership training remains ineffective. The qualitative comparative content analysis method was used to conduct this research study. There were 30 Christian Leaders of three churches in the congregations of The Church in St. Amant, Healing Place Church, and New Life Church in the cities of Gonzales, and Baton Rouge Louisiana, and Conway Arkansas. These churches were chosen because they are successful growing multi-denominational churches that effectively serve their surrounding community as well as plant other churches in their state and throughout the world. Thirty hours of interviews were audiotaped and transcribed resulting in 60 pages of transcripts. The transcripts were then subjected to thematic analysis resulting in 11 key themes that directly address the primary research questions. These 11 themes emerged from studying the spiritual, organizational, mentoring, teaching, and cognitive skills that are related to effectiveness in ministry. According to all interviewees, the effective Christian leader must embrace the process of continually developing and establishing these five skill areas if he or she is to be effective. |
