A Correlational Study of Church Planter Emotional Intelligence and Church Sustainabilit

Church planting is an important missional task of the church. However, many church plants have failed to reach a level of sustainability. The selection of the church planter is a critical component in the future sustainability of new churches. Research discovered the emotional intelligence of leaders to be a factor of effective leadership in both secular and ministry organizations. The current study utilized correlational analysis to explore the relationship between the emotional intelligence of lead church planters, as well as the four branch scores as measured by the Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test, and the sustainability of their church plants between three years and six years after starting, as measured by a sustainability questionnaire. The findings revealed a significant positive relationship between the emotional intelligence of the lead church planters and the sustainability of their church plants. Additionally, the findings also revealed that the perceiving emotions branch had the strongest correlation to the sustainability of the church plants. Of the four branches, the managing emotions branch also showed a significant positive relationship to the sustainability of the church plants while the using emotions branch and the understanding emotions branch did not. The results warrant additional research into the relationship between church planter emotional intelligence and church sustainability.