MOL Equips Church Leaders, as published in "Church Executive Magazine"

Even the most winning head coach won’t keep his job long if his players won’t follow his plays. No matter what your vocation, leadership requires more than knowledge – it requires an understanding of how to influence others with both skill and integrity.

Reverend Dennis Estill believes this to be especially true for church executives. Senior Pastor of Heartland Community Foursquare Church in El Cajon, CA, he affirms, “Leadership is an art, and no one is born a good leader. It takes time, experience and discipline.”

Estill acknowledges that a gap existed in his education when he entered the ministry several decades ago, a gap that time alone could not fill. “I came to the realization that even with 25 years of pastoral experience, I lacked understanding of leadership theory,” he recalls. “To be more effective as a leader who could influence and mentor other leaders” – what he believes to be one of his primary responsibility as a pastor – “meant I needed to prepare myself.”

Estill, along with other pastors and church leaders, turned to the Master of Arts in Organizational Leadership (MOL) at Biola University to fill this gap. Designed to help students grow in their unique leadership abilities, the MOL focuses on building skills such as leadership development, group dynamics, people management, and ethics. MOL students retain full time employment, allowing them to immediately test and apply what they are learning in their circles of influence.

Unlike either a seminary degree or an MBA, the MOL focuses on what student Patti Fenton calls “the human component of leadership.” Such a distinction was what led Fenton, Estill and others to choose the degree over other options.

Fenton joined the MOL after sensing a personal need “to gather tools and resources.” She firmly believes that it was through the “empowerment” of her time in the program that led her “to initiate change in our church community as well as our local community” by transitioning from children’s to family ministry.
Now serving as Pastor to Families at The Beacon Orange County, Fenton enthusiastically recalls having her “world rocked” in a class taught by Dr. Henry Cloud and being led by a professor in solving a church staff communication problem. “As one who longs to initiate change, I cannot speak highly enough of my experience at Biola,” she commented.

Integrating contemporary leadership theory with a biblical worldview and intentional character development, it’s no wonder this program has found an appeal among church leaders like Ryan Sharp, Associate Pastor of The Lamb’s Fellowship of Murrieta, CA.

At Sharp’s church, which “has grown from 50 to more than 600 over a three-year span, internal organizational challenges are a daily reality.” Sharp affirms, “The MOL classes and professors have not only presented solutions to many of these challenges, they have also provided answers to questions I didn’t even know I should be asking.”

Students participate in the MOL in two formats: a traditional on campus program at Biola’s main campus in La Mirada, CA, and a distance learning modular program.

The modular program, a recently added delivery format, has allowed the MOL to expand the impact of the degree beyond the Southern California area, meeting a national demand that has existed for some time. Students nationwide participate in online discourse with classmates and professors, traveling to campus twice during the course of the program to enrich their education with face-to-face learning. While maintaining the high academic standards of all Biola University programs, the modular program provides increased flexibility to students, allowing students to outside the Southern California area to enroll in the MOL.

Pastor Ryan Sharp speaks to the value of the Biola’s MOL program, saying “I highly recommend this program for any pastor who sees a need for growth or transformation within the local church…or simply within himself.” For more information on the MOL, visit www.biola.edu/leadership or call 1.866.99.BIOLA.

By Dr. Alexis Alipuria and Carissa Abrego
Originally published in Church Executive Magazine, March 2008
Masters in Organizational Leadership