Church leaders have come to the same realization—your congregation is only as passionate about making disciples as you are. It’s a sobering thought. A clarifying one. And for many leaders, a moment that reshapes everything.
Because here’s the reality: your church will never rise above your own personal commitment to making disciples.
Sit with that for a moment. Read it again before moving on. Let it settle into the places where excuses tend to grow.
If personally and relationally making disciples who make disciples isn’t showing up in your calendar, shaping your conversations, or directing your decisions, then it’s not truly a conviction. It’s merely a belief you mentally affirm, a line you agree with but don’t build around. And beliefs, however true, don’t transform churches. Convictions do.
Somewhere along the way, many churches have drifted. We’ve learned to celebrate attendance more than obedience. We’ve prioritized relevance over reverence. We’ve built ministries that dazzle the eye but rarely multiply the heart. Some have substituted Jesus’ mission for their own ambitions. And all the while, the command Jesus gave us—to make disciples who make disciples—slides quietly out of view.
The issue isn’t that churches don’t want to make disciples. The church doesn’t have a disciple making problem. The issue is: the church has a leadership conviction problem.
“The issue is: the church has a leadership conviction problem.”
Every church eventually reflects the convictions of its leaders. When conviction fades, the mission drifts. When conviction deepens, the mission multiplies. Convictional leadership means carrying a holy stubbornness—an unshakable belief that making disciples isn’t seasonal, optional, or an add-on to “real ministry.” It is the mission; it’s the mission of leadership and it’s the core mission of the church.[1]
Conviction never begins in a strategy session. It begins in prayer, survives through obedience, and is strengthened through surrender. It holds leaders steady when the results are slow and the cost feels sharp. It anchors them when criticism comes and when comfort tempts.
Convictional leaders don’t wait for ideal conditions. They act on what they know God has said. They stake everything on the truth that Jesus’ way still works—even when others are chasing popular models, trends, and shortcuts.
If you lead anything—a small group, a ministry, a church—start here: What do you really believe about the Great Commission? What do you believe about discipling lost people? What do you believe about discipling people into Christlikeness? Not what you affirm on paper, but what your calendar, budget, and conversations reveal.
Convictional leadership always shows up in how you spend your time and energy.
“Convictional leadership always shows up in how you spend your time and energy.”
Conviction Lived in Everyday Rhythms
Brandon Guindon’s conviction shows most clearly in how he lives his days.
For Brandon, making disciples who make disciples isn’t a sermon topic or staff initiative—it’s breakfast, conversations, and being in the Word with others. It’s woven into the rhythms of daily life.
Brandon’s conviction was shaped during his years at Real Life in Post Falls, Idaho, under Jim Putman. There he watched a community built on one simple, uncompromising truth: the Great Commission isn’t optional. When Brandon later planted Real Life Texas, that conviction became his organizing principle.
“The conviction for me as a leader comes from a place of this is what the King called and expects us as his disciples to go and do. So it’s not just a programmatic conviction. It’s not something—well, this is the best system, or this is whatever. No, this is what my King called me to go do and lead, and so it’s not an optional thing for me or my elders or anybody.”
At Real Life Texas, every staff member and elder is first a practitioner. Brandon leads a men’s group—not to model from a distance but to keep his hands in the soil of disciple making. His staff meetings feel more like discipling sessions than strategy huddles. He measures success not by how many attend services but by how many are discipling someone else.
“He measures success not by how many attend services but by how many are discipling someone else.”
For Brandon, conviction isn’t an emotion or a brand of ministry—it’s obedience over time. His daily faithfulness has produced a culture where making disciples who make disciples is the most normal thing in the world.
“Before I’m ever a senior pastor, I’m a disciple maker. It has to be an intentional lifestyle that I live.”
That conviction doesn’t just shape his preaching. It shapes his breakfast meetings, his calendar, his family rhythms, and his friendships. Every week he sits with men who are learning to follow Jesus—not because it looks good or because the church expects it, but because his King commanded it.
Conviction at the Root of Every Movement
Convictional leadership doesn’t come from ambition or innovation. It comes from an encounter—the moment a leader realizes making disciples who make disciples isn’t one option among many but the only mission that matters.
Conviction is what remains when comfort, applause, and numbers are stripped away. It’s what drives a pastor back to prayer, back to Scripture, and back into relationship with people.
When conviction takes root, it spreads. A leader on his knees becomes a praying church. A disciple maker in the living room becomes a multiplying movement. Conviction is contagious because it carries the weight of eternity.
[1]Â See Harrington and Sager, Disciple Making: The Core Mission of the Church (RENEW.org, 2021).
