Blake Bradford

Mission Possible, by Kay Kotan and Blake Bradford, has been taken to a new level. In Mission Possible 3+, Kay and Blake have re-written and updated their best-selling resource for local churches to better assist congregations seeking to use the simplified, accountable leadership structure, often called the one-board model.

The authors remind the reader that meetings are not ministry. The idea of the simplified, accountable leadership structure is to focus on ministry while making meetings fewer in number but larger in meaning. In this third edition of the bestselling book aimed at congregational leaders, particularly United Methodists, the authors provide practical, field-tested steps to simplify your church structure, practice accountable leadership, and unleash more people into ministry.

Too often churches try to simplify their structures by just having less meetings and having fewer people at the meeting table. But real simplification and accountable leadership means that meetings – and leaders – are transformed. Kay and Blake walk you through the three distinct phases: discern the right path, equip participants for accountable leadership, and implement both the technical and adaptive changes to simplify your structure and align your resources for missional effectiveness.

This expanded and updated version also includes two new sections: a section chock full of 26 indispensable resources and an exclusive nearly 40-page brand-new, judicatory section. This expansive resource is packed with invaluable tools for leadership board members, pastors, nominating committee members, and judicatory leaders. Because of both Kotan’s and Bradford’s deep and on-going commitment and investment in the evolution of simplified accountable structure, this resource is expanded in size to 300 pages. The authors share the latest best practices from working with hundreds of congregations of all sizes and thousands of leaders from across the nation. This essential resource is now in a larger user-friendly workbook format (8.5 x 11) and offers new expansive worksheets, charts, samples, and checklists to assist leaders in effectively implementing the model with thoroughness and efficiency. No church leader will want to lead a post-modern, post-pandemic church without this tool in their hands!

Vital and fruitful churches must be governed and led in new ways today so that Christ’s mission for us can be fulfilled! The disciple-making mission which Christ has given us is too important to let bureaucratic redundancies distract us from our work. For the sake of Christ’s mission and our mission fields, many churches are discovering that there are simpler ways to provide governance and strategic direction, so that the congregation can be unleashed for ministry.

A simplified single board structure makes it possible for your church to better focus on leadership equipping, missional alignment, and your next steps in ministry. Meanwhile, removing bureaucratic redundancies allows more members to spend their time in service as disciples who make disciples. By consolidating administrative functions into a single board, disciples can focus on using their spiritual gifts and passions for ministry to contribute to the vitality of the congregation as it seeks to reach the mission field.

This method of simplifying your church’s administrative leadership and governance is allowed by¶247.2 of the 2016 Discipline of the UMC :

The charge conference, the district superintendent, and the pastor, when a pastor has been appointed (see ¶ 205.4), shall organize and administer the pastoral charge and churches according to the policies and plans herein set forth. When the membership size, program scope, mission resources, or other circumstances so require, the charge conference may, in consultation with and upon the approval of the district superintendent, modify the organizational plans, provided that the provisions of ¶ 243 are observed.