Summary
- CLI is a Christian leadership development program that builds character, emotional health, and practical leadership skill alongside theological knowledge. CLI offers about 50 courses across several tracks, and each course is one month long.
- CLI is for residents, interns, staff, key volunteers, and emerging leaders. CLI exists to cultivate the purpose and passion for leadership that God has placed in each individual.
- CLI is a self-paced coursework on the Develop.Me platform and mobile app, paired with a developmental cohort for discussion, feedback, and accountability. Courses are taught by CLI instructors, and organizations can arrange live sessions.
Seven Years In, and Growing
Michael Mattis pastors Saltbox Church in Wilmington, North Carolina — a church approaching its seventh anniversary, whose stated mission is to lead people to become fully surrendered disciples of Jesus.
"We're getting ready to celebrate seven years, and it's been a beautiful journey." Michael Mattis Pastor, Saltbox Church
Growth at that stage brings a particular problem, and most young churches hit it at roughly the same point.
The Challenge
The Leadership Gap a Young Church Runs Into
"In a younger church, you often experience a leadership vacuum." Michael Mattis Pastor, Saltbox Church
A seven-year-old church hasn't had time to grow its own leaders from the ground up. Needs arrive on the church's schedule, not the leaders' — a ministry opens, a team needs a head, a role has to be filled — and the people available may not yet be formed enough to carry it.
Michael was clear about where Saltbox wanted to go, not just how fast.
"What CLI is actually doing is helping us bridge the gap between where we are and where we want to go. We're trying to grow deeper. We're trying to grow richer. We're trying to establish an abiding relationship with Christ Jesus and deeply formed people who are taking care of themselves." Michael Mattis Pastor, Saltbox Church
What Seminary Doesn't Give You
Michael is careful here. This isn't an argument against theological training. It's a description of what theological training leaves out.
"CLI really gives you, in some ways, the things you don't get in seminary. CLI is the emotional framework, the spiritual framework, the framework of what it looks like to actually be formed as a person." Michael Mattis Pastor, Saltbox Church
"It's taking next steps in helping people in their own formation journey, their own discipleship journey, in ways that people who are merely trained theologically — or in a Master of Divinity sort of program — don't often get." Michael Mattis Pastor, Saltbox Church
The Danger of Discipleship in Three Easy Steps
Michael names something that most pastors will recognize and few say out loud.
"Discipleship is such an integral part of this Christian journey. But as pastors and leaders, if we unintentionally reduce discipleship down to a few key steps that can be taken in a few months, we're really putting ourselves in a dangerous place where we're cultivating a group of really infantile Christians." Michael Mattis Pastor, Saltbox Church
Nobody sets out to do that. It happens by default — a curriculum gets compressed to fit a semester, a pathway gets simplified so it can scale, and formation quietly becomes a checklist.
The Decision
"This Is Everything We're Looking For"
For Michael, choosing CLI didn't require a long evaluation. It required reading the curriculum.
"It was very easy for me as a lead pastor. I looked at their curriculum and went, 'Oh my goodness, this is everything that we're looking for.' I believe in what CLI is. It helps people mentally, emotionally, spiritually become effective people and effective leaders." Michael Mattis Pastor, Saltbox Church
The Solution
Formation for Everyone Who Might Lead
Saltbox doesn't restrict CLI to staff. Three groups are in it.
STAFF
The people already carrying ministry responsibility.
KEY VOLUNTEERS
The ones the church is already leaning on.
FUTURE LEADERS
People identified as having the capacity and potential to lead, before any role exists for them.
"It is working with the discipleship and the Jesus formation in our staff, in our key volunteers, and even in people that we've identified as having the capacity and the potential to be future leaders." Michael Mattis Pastor, Saltbox Church
That third group is the strategic move. Saltbox forms people before the need arrives, rather than scrambling once it does.
And the material doesn't stay theoretical.
"It helps people step into their own Jesus journey in a way that makes it real. It makes it practical. It puts them in small groups where we're talking about it. We're applying it in their leadership setting." Michael Mattis Pastor, Saltbox Church
What It Looks Like When a Need Arises
Heart Work, Head Work, Time
The payoff shows up at the moment a church usually feels the pinch — when a leadership role opens and someone has to fill it.
"When a leadership need arises, we have a group of people that we can call on and say: this person has done the heart work. They've done the head work. They've been in this journey for a length of time. We trust them, and we want to put them into leadership at our church." Michael Mattis Pastor, Saltbox Church
Three things in that sentence, and all three matter. Heart work. Head work. Length of time. None of them can be manufactured in the week a role comes open.
Inside Over Appearance
What Michael values most in CLI is where it puts the emphasis.
"What I love about CLI is the emphasis is actually on making the things that really are inside of you more important than the way things seem — because I'm convinced that when people are changed and transformed internally, they will transform and change other people." Michael Mattis Pastor, Saltbox Church
That conviction is also why Saltbox doesn't treat formation as a cost against growth. It's the mechanism of growth.
"We're convinced that as that happens, they will naturally help other people do the same, which will result in growth." Michael Mattis Pastor, Saltbox Church
The Cost Question
"I'm Not Sure That You Cannot Afford CLI"
Michael has heard the objection, and he turns it around.
"In a situation where a church would ask, 'I'm not sure we could afford CLI' — my question back would probably be, 'I'm not sure that you cannot afford CLI.'" Michael Mattis, Pastor, Saltbox Church
He knows exactly what he's weighing it against. Every growing church has the same list of competing needs.
"As a senior pastor of a growing church, there's so many things that you're faced with. What, how, when, and where do we spend money? And for us, why have we chosen CLI? Because we can't afford not to spend money on discipling and developing people internally." Michael Mattis Pastor, Saltbox Church
His reasoning is about risk, not price. The expense a church actually can't carry is the one it takes on by skipping formation.
"If we're just using people to do the thing and we're not effectively building the internal framework inside someone's spiritual development, I think we're in a spot where it's really risky." Michael Mattis Pastor, Saltbox Church
Using people to do the thing. Most pastors will recognize the pattern, and recognize that it's what happens by default when there's no pathway in place.
"Taking the time to effectively develop someone's spiritual formation, their relationship with Jesus, their heart work — it is essential. It makes it worth almost any expense." Michael Mattis Pastor, Saltbox Church
Key Outcomes
READY
A Pipeline That's Formed Before It's Needed
When a leadership role opens, Saltbox has people who have already done the heart work, the head work, and the time.
DEEPER
Discipleship That Doesn't Stop at Month Three
Formation is treated as a journey rather than a short sequence of steps, across staff and key volunteers alike.
DURABLE
Leaders Built to Finish Well
Formation aimed at leaders still standing — and still in love with Jesus — decades from now.
The Reason Underneath All of It
"Pray That I Don't Lose My First Love."
Asked why this matters, Michael answers about himself before he answers about his church.
"For me as a lead pastor, if I was vulnerable — my biggest fear is not finishing well. People ask me all the time: what can we pray for? And my answer has become, pray that I don't lose my first love." Michael Mattis, Pastor, Saltbox Church
That fear is the thing CLI is answering at Saltbox. Not a staffing gap. Not a curriculum need.
"What I'm convinced of is that if we help our key leaders take care of their soul, take care of their hearts, be deeply formed in Christ Jesus, then they will finish well and they won't lose their first love." Michael Mattis Pastor, Saltbox Church
And a church made of people like that doesn't have to be driven.
"If as a church we're built of people who don't lose their first love, who are deeply formed in Christ Jesus, then we are naturally going to fulfill the Great Commission — not because we're working or performing to do that, but because we can't help but do it, because Christ is in us." Michael Mattis Pastor, Saltbox Church
Why Saltbox Church Recommends CLI
Michael's recommendation is aimed at his peers.
"I'm confident that if you're a senior pastor, or if you're in senior leadership at a church, considering CLI in your organization would be a wonderful blessing, benefit, and improvement on the discipleship journey where you all lead and where you worship." Michael Mattis Pastor, Saltbox Church
And then he puts the decision back on the reader.
"I don't think you can afford, as a lead pastor of a growing church, not to give people an opportunity and a pathway that they can be deeply formed in Christ Jesus."Michael Mattis Pastor, Saltbox Church
For Saltbox, this isn't a staff development line item. It's the second half of the church's own mission.
"This is the fulfilling of the Great Commission. It is leading people to Christ, but then it's also helping people become fully surrendered disciples of King Jesus. That's CLI. That's why this is worth it." Michael Mattis, Pastor, Saltbox Church
Watch the Saltbox Church Story
Hear directly from Pastor Michael Mattis about the leadership gap young churches face, what seminary doesn't teach, and the fear that shapes how he develops his people.
Build the Leaders Before You Need Them.
CLI gives churches a pathway for forming staff, volunteers, and future leaders — so that when a need arises, there's already someone ready to carry it, and so the people carrying your church are still standing in thirty years.