Think back to 1993: Did you email? Did you do your Christmas shopping online?

The local church has been transformed since the early 90's as well: contemporary music can be found in most churches, small groups have become an essential part of body life, ethnic diversity is multiplying, PowerPoint is being used instead of hymnals, the emerging generation is being ministered to—just to name a few.

Put simply: change inspires change, which requires increasing levels of leadership.

The church, God's church, will continue venturing into uncharted waters. That will necessitate strong, flexible, growing leadership and leadership development. Therefore, the goal of the church, in this unparalleled season of change, ought to be generating new ways to inspire and develop leaders within the local body.

Here are 6 necessary shifts that I believe the church needs to make:

1. Being to Becoming.
If I asked you to name the top five leaders of all time, you might list men like: Jesus, Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., Bishop Tutu, and Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Then, if I asked you to list the characteristics that make them great leaders, you might say: charisma, boldness, servitude, a caring heart, trustworthiness, good listener or integrity-filled.

Historically, the church has sought out born leaders; however, a shift is occurring. We are beginning to realize that the characteristics of a great leader can be learned or developed. Living a life of integrity or serving others in love are all things that can be ours, as Christians.

We are all leaders. If you have children, you're a leader. If you're a Christian, you're a leader. If you teach Sunday School, you're a leader. In short, anyone in the congregation has the potential of growing into leadership. Some may grow stronger than others—but everyone has potential.

It is not a question of who you are but in what ways will you work with God to become more?

2. Technical to Spiritual.
A primary shift in educating leaders involves moving away from teaching tactics to developing the spiritual. The inner working of the heart is pivotal to leadership growth. Mentoring prospective leaders to live lives of honesty, integrity and respect for authority will produce greater eternal dividends than a list of tactics.

3. Control to Empower.
An organizational shift is just beginning to take place in the church. The age-old paradigm that leaders run and control the church, and then the congregation comes, out of no where, once a week to check out what has been going on, is changing. No longer is it only the formally recognized leader who serves.

Though hierarchical leadership is still necessary, leaders, now, share power with a growing number of lay-leaders by offering tools and training. As we continue to move from traditional models, collaboration, coaching, networking and servant leadership will continue to be on the rise.

4. Individual to Team.
As traditional church leaders continue to empower servant leaders another shift will emerge in tandem: moving from an individual to a team-oriented work system.

Not everything can be done as a team. Church leaders must be able to designate those things which are best done on an individual level (i.e., data entry) and team level (planning programs, developing processes, goal-setting, etc.) As team participation grows within the church, so will commitment, excellence and love.

5. Bureaucratic to Entrepreneurial.
To encourage servant leaders to take an on-going ownership and delight in ministry an intentional move away from bureaucratic operations to entrepreneurship must take place.

As a pastor if you are hearing, "Pastor, what should I do next?" bureaucratic strongholds have not yet been lifted. When you begin to hear, "Pastor, I have this idea, is it okay?" you have successfully entered entrepreneurial leadership.

Under this shift leaders become permission-givers, allowing people to dream and create new ways of serving the community.

6. One-Time Training to Life-Long Learning.
For years businesses have conducted corporate-training programs, with limited success. Why? The training is typically a one time event. The trainees sit down soak it in, regurgitate it back, and then promptly forget the entire session by the time they leave the classroom and buckle their seat belts.

Great leadership development is a process. It's about mentoring and continually finding new ways to discuss it, live it and apply it.

The people who perform the best in leadership roles have been forced to stretch, learn, grow, adapt and rely heavily on God. Leadership training is not a one time event but consists of life-long learning.