That’s a question that I think many leaders ask, perhaps privately to themselves, when they embark on a multiplication journey; and find that it’s not working.

Most leaders who are passionate about multiplication eventually arrive at this uncomfortable point. They’ve attended the conference, read the books, cast vision for disciple making and even challenged their church to think beyond addition and towards multiplication. They’ve probably also launched new initiatives, started leadership development pathways, and talked about church planting.

Yet multiplication still doesn’t seem to be happening in the way that was hoped. Disciples aren’t multiplying disciples, leaders aren’t multiplying leaders and churches aren’t multiplying churches.

So why isn’t it working?

The answer may be simpler than we think. Multiplication Is More Like a Flywheel Than a Switch. We can’t just flick a switch and see multiplication momentum happening. It takes time with perseverance added in.

In his book “Multiplier: How Healthy Leaders Create Lasting Impact”, Dave Ferguson draws on Jim Collins’ famous flywheel analogy from “Good to Great”. It explains that lasting success comes from a series of small, consistent “pushes” in a single direction rather than one defining silver bullet or revolutionary change.

Imagine a massive, heavy flywheel. At first, it barely moves. You push with all your strength and see almost no visible progress. You push again and again and again, and the wheel moves only inches.

But with each push, momentum slowly builds. Eventually the wheel begins to turn faster. What once required enormous effort now seems almost effortless because the accumulated momentum is doing much of the work.

Multiplication works the same way. Many leaders expect multiplication to behave like a light switch. Flip it on and things change quickly. But momentum isn’t built that way.

Multiplication is actually a flywheel that requires consistent, intentional actions repeated over time with the momentum breakthrough often coming long after the initial effort began.

The challenge is that many churches stop pushing before the flywheel gains momentum. And often, there are deeper forces working against us; obstacles like the following:

Obstacle #1: What We Do Will Be Consistent With Our Culture

Every church has a culture. Culture is not what we say we value; it’s what people actually experience and repeat. If multiplication is not embedded in the culture, every new multiplication initiative will feel like swimming upstream.

To gain clarity around what culture exists, leaders need to ask questions like:

• What behaviours does our culture currently reward?
• Do we celebrate people who make disciples?
• Do we tell stories of disciple making and leadership multiplication?
• Do we recognise ordinary people taking mission into their neighbourhoods, workplaces, and schools?

Flywheel momentum begins when multiplication becomes part of the church’s DNA rather than simply another ministry that has been implemented.

Obstacle #2: We Do What We Know and Have Done in the Past

Most leaders are products of the systems that formed them. We repeat what we have learnt and done in the past and we naturally lead the way we were led. We also build ministries like those we have experienced in the past and in doing so we repeat the methods that previously brought success.

The problem is that many of the approaches that helped churches grow through addition are not the same approaches that produce multiplication.

Addition and multiplication require different mindsets. Addition often focuses on gathering more people. Multiplication focuses on developing more people.

Addition asks, “How can we do this ministry better?” Multiplication asks, “How can we equip others to do this ministry?”

Addition tends to centralise activity. Multiplication decentralises it.

None of this means that previous ministry experience was wrong. It’s not. It simply means that yesterday’s solutions may not produce tomorrow’s outcomes. A healthy multiplying church will likely see both addition and multiplication occurring rather than just one or the other.

Leaders pursuing multiplication must continually ask “Are we building something people can join, or something people can reproduce?”

Obstacle #3: We Do What Systems Would Have Us Do

Perhaps the greatest challenge is that systems are perfectly designed to produce the results they currently produce. Most churches have systems for worship services, for pastoral care, for administration, for finance, for governance, for …

But do we have systems that consistently produce disciple-makers, leaders, and church planters? If not, we shouldn’t be surprised when multiplication remains scarce.

Vision inspires people, but systems sustain movement. I recall Alan Hirsch saying that we can have a deep passion and desire to see disciple making multiplication occur, but the systems that we have in place will always win. Unless the systems we have in place back in, disciple making multiplication, it won’t happen.

Moving Beyond the Obstacles

At Exponential Australia, we believe that building multiplication systems and pathways is critical. Healthy multiplication systems will typically include:

• A clear disciple making pathway.
• A leadership development pathway.
• A church planting strategy.
• A culture that reinforces multiplication at every level.

When these elements begin working together, the flywheel starts to turn. The good news is that multiplication momentum is possible. But we need to keep pushing the flywheel to gather momentum.

Around Australia we are seeing positive signs of multiplication gaining momentum with churches, networks, and denominations beginning to build the foundations that lead to long term multiplication.

But it does take patience and persistence over time as there is rarely a single breakthrough moment. Rather, momentum will be built through thousands of small, consistent “pushes” in a single direction with culture and systems being aligned to the destination that we wish to arrive at; the multiplication of disciples, leaders and churches and ultimately healthy multiplication movements.

Exponential Australia will be offering a “Multiplying Movements” Learning Community in Melbourne on 21 and 22 October 2026. This Learning Community will help denominational and network leaders build multiplication movements that see the multiplication of disciples, leaders and churches. For more information, contact tim@exponential.org.au