Glenn Packiam, Carey Nieuwhof, Helen Burns and More from the Emerging Leaders Lab on Friendship, Calling, and Finishing Well
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This summer, we're taking you inside the two pastoral formation cohorts at the heart of The Pastorate: the Emerging Leaders Lab and the Lead Pastor Fellowship. Over four episodes, we're sharing the best teaching from this past year’s Lab and Fellowship and sitting down with participants from both programs to hear what an intentional season of formation actually does in the life of a pastor. This is the first episode of our four part series, replaying some of the best moments from last year’s Emerging Leaders Lab.
The Emerging Leaders Lab just wrapped up its third year and kicked off its fourth year. In the 2025-2026 cohort, 24 pastors gathered monthly on Zoom to sit under the teaching of a remarkable lineup of guest teachers, and to do the thing you rarely get to do with someone you've only read or listened to: ask their questions, out loud and in real time. Each guest came to teach around one of the eight formation areas that shape the Lab, covering everything from calling and community to character and craft. In this episode, our team pulled together the moments the cohort named as most impactful.
In this episode you’ll hear from:
Glenn Packiam on why pastors need a constellation of relationships and the diverse voices every pastor needs around them: rulers, peers, sages, healers, and friends,
Carey Nieuwhof on burning out in the middle of a decade of explosive growth, finding your line, and how this generation of pastors can finish differently,
Helen Burns on why balance is a misaligned goal, what to anchor to instead, and the confession she keeps hearing from pastors: my soul is so tired,
Jason Ballard on the difference between the friends you play with and the deep friends who know your shadow side, say the hard thing, and have to be pursued on purpose,
Lance Odegard on why you can't know your calling until you know your design, blind spots and the true self, and the game-changing leadership question: “how do you experience me?”,
Mark Buchanan on the difference between who you're called to be and what you're called to do, and why the calling on your life can't be revoked.
With thanks to the many other voices who contributed to the Lab this past year, including Darrell Johnson, Chris Price, Mark Peters, Milissa Ewing, and Preston Pouteaux.
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