Willow Creek summit aims to inject new passion into local churches

The local church, say organizers of a major conference in South Barrington, is the hope of the world.

And that belief is the inspiration that encourages thousands of workers and volunteers through the months of planning required to produce Willow Creek Community Church's annual Global Leadership Summit.

This year's program started Thursday at the South Barrington church and continues today. The event, which is being broadcast via satellite to nearly 220 cities across North America, assembles top leaders from the religious, political, business and entertainment realms to inspire local churches to effect real change in their communities and beyond.

Among the speakers at this year's summit are former General Electric CEO Jack Welch, renowned economist Zhao Xiao and former professional football coach Tony Dungy.

The summit is geared toward people involved in some way with their local churches. That includes members of the clergy and full-time staff people, as well as citizen volunteers who come from all walks of life.

Organizers believe that stronger leadership inside churches will create better leaders at home, in government and in corporate board rooms.

Willow Creek founder and Senior Pastor Bill Hybels kicked the summit off on Thursday by saying that the event isn't designed to discuss theoretical or impractical ideas.

"We are realistic leaders, trying to lead better in the real world," he said.

Roughly 7,000 people watched Hybels speak inside the South Barrington church, and another 57,000 across North America watched him via satellite. When the summit is broadcast to international leaders later this year, it will have reached an estimated 125,000 people, organizers said.

Putting on such a massive event requires more than a year of planning and dedicated work from thousands of volunteers around the country, said Steve Bell, executive vice president of the Willow Creek Association and one of the overseers of the summit.

"We usually spend 14 months putting one of these together," he said. "Even as this year's event unfolds, we're already hard at work on 2011."

The Global Leadership Summit, now in its 15th year, boasts a record of attracting top-shelf speakers, some of whom appear live in South Barrington while others participate via videocast. Last year's event included interviews with U2 lead singer Bono and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair.

Bell said bringing together "world class" speakers is a key priority for the main eight-member planning team that kicks off the preparations.

"We work long and hard on that," he said. "One year, I felt like I'd become best friends with (former U.S. secretary of state) Colin Powell's assistant, because I just kept calling and calling."

Bell said organizers look for people who have proven to be exceptional leaders and good communicators.

"We want people who can inspire others," he said.

Five or six subcommittees, meanwhile, attend to a mountain of other details, like securing remote sites for the satellite broadcast and putting together the necessary audiovisual technology. Additional preparations are made at each of the 219 host sites in the U.S. and Canada. In the end, between 9,000 and 10,000 volunteers help with the event, Bell said.

It's a tough job, but organizers stay positive by focusing on the core belief that local churches are the hope of the world.

"It's easy for churches to just hold services each week," Bell said. "It's easy for churches to become isolated. What we try to do with this event is inspire local church leaders to engage with the world around them and try to fix its problems.

"It's true that we live in a broken world. But really, the world's problems are just people problems. And churches, more than anything else, can help solve them."

Daily Herald staff writer Ben Geier contributed to this article.