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4th Dimensional Spirituality School: Institute for Church Growth
by: David Yonggi Cho
Publisher: Bridge-Logos
Published: 2008-09
ASIN: 0882704826
Read reviews >> |
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| | More details | | Discover the keys that open the door to the Fourth Dimension for every child of God who wants to know and experience God in all His fullness. This book unlocks the door and leads readers into the spiritual dimension, a wonderful place of love, peace, and joy, where they'll be inspired to fully live. Jesus said, "Knock and it will be opened to you." |
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52 Lies Heard in Church Every Sunday: ...And Why the Truth Is So Much Better
by: Steve McVey
Publisher: Harvest House Publishers
Published: 2011-02-01
ASIN: 0736938648
Read reviews >> |
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| | More details | Could many churchgoing Christians be getting a diluted Christianity—one that diminishes the loving, giving, personal God who provides the believer everything in life? Author Steve McVey passionately but unwittingly taught from the pulpit the very lies he now exposes. Forthrightly but humbly, he shows how pastors and churches can end up distorting scriptural truths because of their preconceptions. Opening up the Scriptures freshly, Steve examines typical problems such as - Leaving out half of the truth: “Becoming a Christian means having your sins forgiven.” (We also are made alive!)
- Using “shorthand” that promotes an unbiblical view: “Our sins are under the blood of Jesus.” (Far better, they’ve been taken away!)
- Confusing our role with God’s: “Salvation is giving your life to Christ.” (More important, He gives His life to us!)
Readers will see that God’s undiluted truth is always best…and brings a fulfilling, close relationship with Him.
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A Biblical Walk Through The Mass: Understanding What We Say And Do In The Liturgy
by: Edward Sri
Publisher: Ascension Press
Published: 2011-01-04
ASIN: B004I1L510
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| | More details | As Catholics, the Mass is the center of our Faith. We celebrate it every day. We know all the responses. We know all the gestures. But do we know what it all means?
In A Biblical Walk Through the Mass, Dr. Edward Sri takes us on a unique tour of the Liturgy. Based on the revised translation of the Mass which goes into effect Advent, 2011, this book explores the biblical roots of the words and gestures we experience in the Liturgy and explains their profound significance. This intriguing look at the Mass is sure to renew your faith and deepen your devotion to the Eucharist.
This book is used as the text for the Adult Faith Formation Program, but may also be purchased separately at steep bulk discounts. For parishes not doing a study, this is a perfect resource for catechizing adults on the true meaning of the Mass, and why it is so central to our faith. |
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A Failure of Nerve: Leadership in the Age of the Quick Fix
by: Edwin H. Friedman
Publisher: Seabury Books
Published: 2007-02-01
ASIN: 159627042X
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| | More details | | Ten years after his death, Edwin Friedman's insights into leadership are more urgently needed than ever. He was the first to tell us that all organizations have personalities, like families, and to apply the insights of family therapy to churches and synagogues, rectors and rabbis, politicians and teachers. A Failure of Nerve is essential reading for all leaders, be they parents or presidents, corporate executives or educators, religious superiors or coaches, healers or generals, managers or clergy. Friedman's insights about our regressed, "seatbelt society," oriented toward safety rather than adventure, help explain the sabotage that leaders constantly face today. Suspicious of the "quick fixes" and instant solutions that sweep through our culture only to give way to the next fad, he argues for strength and self-differentiation as the marks of true leadership. His formula for success is more maturity, not more data; stamina, not technique; and personal responsibility, not empathy This book was unfinished at the time of Friedman's death, and originally published in a limited edition. This new edition makes his life-changing insights and challenges to a new generation of readers. |
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Absolute Monarchs: A History of the Papacy
by: John Julius Norwich
Publisher: Random House
Published: 2011-07-12
ASIN: 1400067154
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| | More details | Critical praise for ABSOLUTE MONARCHS
“Absolute Monarchs sprawls across Europe and the Levant, over two millenniums, and with an impossibly immense cast: 265 popes, feral hordes of Vandals, Huns and Visigoths, expansionist emperors, Byzantine intriguers, Borgias and Medicis, heretic zealots, conspiring clerics, bestial inquisitors and more. Norwich manages to organize this crowded stage and produce a rollicking narrative. He keeps things moving at nearly beach-read pace.”
—Bill Keller, New York Times Book Review, Cover review
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“Renowned historian Norwich offers a rollicking account of the men who held the papal office, their shortcomings and their virtues, and the impact of the papacy on world history. He conducts us masterfully on a tour of the lives of the popes from Peter to Benedict XVI. . . . Entertaining and deeply researched, Norwich’s history offers a wonderful introduction to papal lives.”
—Publishers Weekly
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“Historian, travel writer, and television documentarian Norwich presents an excellent, often surprising history of that 2,000-year-old institution….he focuses on political history as he traces the evolution of the papacy as an institution, while at the same time providing entertaining profiles of the most historically significant popes….An outstanding historical survey.”
—Booklist
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“When Norwich writes, I read; this member of the House of Lords is a notable and engrossing historian, perhaps best known for his monumental study of Byzantium. Here he offers a history of the nearly two-millennia-old papacy that should be popular with many readers.”
—Library Journal
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“A spirited, concise chronicle of the accomplishments of the most noteworthy popes. . . . Norwich doesn’t skirt controversies, ancient and present, in this broad, clear-eyed assessment.”
—Kirkus Reviews
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 A SWEEPING CHRONICLE OF ONE OF THE MOST SIGNIFICANT—AND CONTROVERSIAL—INSTITUTIONS IN HISTORY
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With the papacy embattled in recent years, it is essential to have the perspective of one of the world’s most accomplished historians. In Absolute Monarchs, John Julius Norwich captures nearly two thousand years of inspiration and devotion, intrigue and scandal. The men (and maybe one woman) who have held this position of infallible power over millions have ranged from heroes to rogues, admirably wise to utterly decadent. Norwich, who knew two popes and had private audiences with two others, recounts in riveting detail the histories of the most significant popes and what they meant politically, culturally, and socially to Rome and to the world.
Norwich presents such brave popes as Innocent I, who in the fifth century successfully negotiated with Alaric the Goth, an invader civil authorities could not defeat, and Leo I, who two decades later tamed (and perhaps paid off) Attila the Hun. Here, too, are the scandalous figures: Pope Joan, the mythic woman said (without any substantiation) to have been elected in 855, and the infamous “pornocracy,” the five libertines who were descendants or lovers of Marozia, debauched daughter of one of Rome’s most powerful families.
Absolute Monarchs brilliantly portrays reformers such as Pope Paul III, “the greatest pontiff of the sixteenth century,” who reinterpreted the Church’s teaching and discipline, and John XXIII, who in five short years starting in 1958 “opened up the church to the twentieth century,” instituting reforms that led to Vatican II. Norwich brings the story to the present day with Benedict XVI, who is coping with a global priest sex scandal.
Epic and compelling, Absolute Monarchs is the astonishing story of some of history’s most revered and reviled figures, men who still cast light and shadows on the Vatican and the world today. |
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Activate: An Entirely New Approach to Small Groups
by: Nelson Searcy
Publisher: Regal
Published: 2008-06-02
ASIN: 0830745661
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| | More details | Church leaders want to know how to make small groups work for their church communities, yet a quick look around shows that while small groups are all the rage, much of the time they create more problems than they solve. Nelson Searcy and Kerrick Thomas, founding pastors of The Journey Church in the heart of New York City, suggest that this failure is due to widely held beliefs about small groups that just aren’t true—and they aim to debunk the myths and set the record straight! Drawing from the startling success of small groups at The Journey Church (which has had over 100-percent participation in small groups for more than 4 years) Searcy and Thomas show how church leaders can implement a life-changing small-group ministry that gets the maximum number of people involved and solves many of the important (yet irritating) problems facing churches of all sizes.
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Advanced Strategic Planning: A New Model for Church and Ministry Leaders
by: Aubrey Malphurs
Publisher: Baker Books
Published: 2005-08-01
ASIN: 0801091810
Read reviews >> |
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| | More details | Now it its second edition, this helpful guide from planning and leadership expert Aubrey Malphurs offers a nine-step strategic thinking and acting model. You'll find numerous useful ideas for equipping your church to carry out its mission.
Practical. Proven. Indispensable. To be successful in your mission, you need a plan. The methods found in Advanced Strategic Planning have already helped many churches articulate their vision and implement their mission. This updated edition offers you even more helpful advice, answering fundamental ministry questions and focusing on disciplemaking. |
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Almost Christian: What the Faith of Our Teenagers is Telling the American Church
by: Kenda Creasy Dean
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Published: 2010-07-15
ASIN: 0195314840
Read reviews >> |
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| | More details | Based on the National Study of Youth and Religion--the same invaluable data as its predecessor, Soul Searching: The Religious and Spiritual Lives of American Teenagers--Kenda Creasy Dean's compelling new book, Almost Christian, investigates why American teenagers are at once so positive about Christianity and at the same time so apathetic about genuine religious practice.
In Soul Searching, Christian Smith and Melinda Lundquist Denton found that American teenagers have embraced a "Moralistic Therapeutic Deism"--a hodgepodge of banal, self-serving, feel-good beliefs that bears little resemblance to traditional Christianity. But far from faulting teens, Dean places the blame for this theological watering down squarely on the churches themselves. Instead of proclaiming a God who calls believers to lives of love, service and sacrifice, churches offer instead a bargain religion, easy to use, easy to forget, offering little and demanding less. But what is to be done? In order to produce ardent young Christians, Dean argues, churches must rediscover their sense of mission and model an understanding of being Christian as not something you do for yourself, but something that calls you to share God's love, in word and deed, with others. Dean found that the most committed young Christians shared four important traits: they could tell a personal and powerful story about God; they belonged to a significant faith community; they exhibited a sense of vocation; and they possessed a profound sense of hope. Based on these findings, Dean proposes an approach to Christian education that places the idea of mission at its core and offers a wealth of concrete suggestions for inspiring teens to live more authentically engaged Christian lives.
Persuasively and accessibly written, Almost Christian is a wake up call no one concerned about the future of Christianity in America can afford to ignore. |
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AUTHORIZED KING JAMES VERSION HOLY BIBLE
by: KING JAMES
Publisher:
Published: 2011-02-14
ASIN: B004NSV68K
Read reviews >> |
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| | More details | The Authorized King James Version is an English translation by the Church of England of the Christian Bible begun in 1604 and completed in 1611.First printed by the King's Printer, Robert Barker, this was the third such official translation into English; the first having been the Great Bible commissioned by the Church of England in the reign of King Henry VIII, and the second having been the Bishop's Bible of 1568. In January 1604, King James I of England convened the Hampton Court Conference where a new English version was conceived in response to the perceived problems of the earlier translations as detected by the Puritans, a faction within the Church of England.
James gave the translators instructions intended to guarantee that the new version would conform to the ecclesiology and reflect the episcopal structure of the Church of England and its beliefs about an ordained clergy. The translation was by 47 scholars, all of whom were members of the Church of England. In common with most other translations of the period, the New Testament was translated from Greek, the Old Testament was translated from Hebrew text, while the Apocrypha were translated from the Greek and Latin.
In the Book of Common Prayer (1662), the text of the Authorized Version replaced the text of the Great Bible — for Epistle and Gospel readings—and as such was authorized by Act of Parliament. By the first half of the 18th century, the Authorized Version was effectively unchallenged as the English translation used in Anglican and other Protestant churches. Over the course of the 18th century, the Authorized Version supplanted the Latin Vulgate as the standard version of scripture for English speaking scholars. |
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| 10. |
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AUTHORIZED KING JAMES VERSION HOLY BIBLE
by: KING JAMES
Publisher:
Published: 2011-02-14
ASIN: B004NSV68K
Read reviews >> |
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| | More details | The Authorized King James Version is an English translation by the Church of England of the Christian Bible begun in 1604 and completed in 1611.First printed by the King's Printer, Robert Barker, this was the third such official translation into English; the first having been the Great Bible commissioned by the Church of England in the reign of King Henry VIII, and the second having been the Bishop's Bible of 1568. In January 1604, King James I of England convened the Hampton Court Conference where a new English version was conceived in response to the perceived problems of the earlier translations as detected by the Puritans, a faction within the Church of England.
James gave the translators instructions intended to guarantee that the new version would conform to the ecclesiology and reflect the episcopal structure of the Church of England and its beliefs about an ordained clergy. The translation was by 47 scholars, all of whom were members of the Church of England. In common with most other translations of the period, the New Testament was translated from Greek, the Old Testament was translated from Hebrew text, while the Apocrypha were translated from the Greek and Latin.
In the Book of Common Prayer (1662), the text of the Authorized Version replaced the text of the Great Bible — for Epistle and Gospel readings—and as such was authorized by Act of Parliament. By the first half of the 18th century, the Authorized Version was effectively unchallenged as the English translation used in Anglican and other Protestant churches. Over the course of the 18th century, the Authorized Version supplanted the Latin Vulgate as the standard version of scripture for English speaking scholars. |
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| 11. |
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Axiom: Powerful Leadership Proverbs
by: Bill Hybels
Publisher: Zondervan
Published: 2011-03-04
ASIN: B006TQUWRK
Read reviews >> |
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| | More details | | The best leaders not only lead well but also reflect on their leadership long enough and thoughtfully enough to articulate the philosophies that cause them to do so. Whether serving in the marketplace or in ministry, as executives or rank-and-file employees, as salaried staff or volunteer servants, good leaders can pinpoint the rationale for their actions and decisions with the ease of reciting their home address. In Axiom, author Bill Hybels divulges the God-given convictions that have dictated his leadership strategy for more than three decades as senior pastor of Willow Creek Community Church. Oriented toward four key leadership categories ... 1. Vision and strategy ('Promote Shameless Profitability,' 'Take a Flyer') 2. Teamwork and communication ('Obi-Wan Kenobi Isn't for Hire,' 'Disagree without Drawing Blood') 3. Activity and assessment ('Develop a Mole System,' 'Sweat the Small Stuff') 4. Personal integrity ('Admit Mistakes, and Your Stock Goes Up,' 'Fight for Your Family') ... Axiom brokers accessible wisdom from one leader's journey, as well as emboldens you to nail down the reasons why you lead like you lead. |
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Barefoot Church: Serving the Least in a Consumer Culture (Exponential Series)
by: Brandon Hatmaker
Publisher: Zondervan
Published: 2011-10-24
ASIN: 0310492262
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| | More details | | People are hungry to make a difference, yet most don't know where to start. In fact, 'serving the least' is often one of the most neglected mandates of Jesus. Barefoot Church shows readers how today's church can be a catalyst for individual, collective, and social renewal in any context. Whether pastors or laypeople, readers will discover practical ideas that end up being as much about the Gospel and personal transformation as they are about serving the poor. Here they will see how the organizational structure of the church can be created or redesigned for mission in any context. Drawing from his own journey, Brandon Hatmaker proves to readers that serving the least is not a trendy act of benevolence but a lifestyle of authentic community and spiritual transformation. As Hatmaker writes, 'My hope is that God would open our eyes more and more to the needs of our community. And that we would see it as the church's responsibility to lead the charge.' |
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Biblical Eldership
by: Alexander Strauch
Publisher: Lewis and Roth Publishers
Published: 1995-09
ASIN: 0936083115
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| | More details | | With over 150,000 copies sold, this comprehensive look at the role and function of elders brings all the advantages of shared leadership into focus. Beginning with the four broad categories of eldership (leading, feeding, caring, and protecting), Biblical Eldership explores the essential work of elders, their qualifications (including why qualifications are necessary), their relationships with each other, and each of the biblical passages related to eldership. Written for those seeking a clear understanding of the mandate for biblical eldership, this full-length, expository book defines it accurately, practically, and according to Scripture. "Mr. Strauch has made a fine contribution to the subject of eldership. I am confident that it will be helpful to many." — John MacArthur, Jr., Pastor-Teacher, Grace Community Church, Sun Valley, CA "At last, a thorough biblical study on the basis of church government and especially the function and ministry of elders! New churches will find it a valuable guideline to effective functioning and older churches will find it a trustworthy corrective." — Ray Stedman, former pastor and elder, Peninsula Bible Church, Palo Alto, CA "An excellent text for the study of eldership by young and older men interested in the work of an elder. Strauch is a man of gift and experience, and I am grateful for his work." — S. Lewis Johnson, Professor Emeritus of New Testament Studies, Dallas Theological Seminary |
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| 14. |
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Change the World: Recovering the Message and Mission of Jesus
by: Michael Slaughter
Publisher: Abingdon Press
Published: 2010-02
ASIN: 1426702973
Read reviews >> |
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| | More details | Something is not working. Despite the church's place of prominence in American culture and the ubiquity of the church in every American town, misconceptions about the faith of Jesus Christ run rampant today. Christians are known more for exclusivity than for love, more for potlucks than for solving world hunger.
It's time for churches to get over the cruise-ship mentality of being a program provider, and reconnect with the true message and mission of Jesus: to bring good news to the poor, release to the captives, and freedom to the oppressed.Â
Pastor Mike Slaughter challenges church leaders to look at the future of their congregations and make tough but necessary choices. - Will you send the church out into the world?
- Will you focus on building disciples or tallying decisions?
- Will you multiply your impact or expand your facilities?
- Will you step out in courage or comply with the status quo?
The answers to these and other questions determine how your church will focus its time, its energy, and its budget to work for real change in a hurting world.Â
Download Free Study Guide
For more info, visit www.ChangeTheWorld.Cokesbury.com    |
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| 15. |
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Christ Formed in You: The Power of the Gospel for Personal Change
by: Brian G. Hedges
Publisher: Shepherd Press
Published: 2010-11-08
ASIN: 098243877X
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| | More details | | The central claim in Christ Formed in You is that it is God s purpose to change us by progressively making us more like Jesus, and that this happens only as we understand and apply the gospel to our lives. In the pages that follow we will explore the transforming power of the gospel from several angles. Part One focuses on the foundations for personal change. We will look at God s ultimate goal in transforming us (Chapter One); the key to transformation, which is the gospel itself (Chapter Two); and the application of the gospel to our lives in three specific ways (Chapters Three, Four, and Five). Part Two then takes up the pattern of personal change. We will explore the captivating beauty of gospel holiness (Chapter Six); with its demands that we both kill sin (Chapter Seven); and grow in grace by the power of the Spirit (Chapter Eight); and the quest for joy that motivates us in this pursuit and strengthens us in the battle for holiness (Chapter Nine). Part Three of the book focuses on the means of personal change, the tools God uses to transform us. These final three chapters, while building on the foundation of the gospel discussed earlier in the book, are the most practical. We will learn how God uses spiritual disciplines (Chapter Ten); suffering (Chapter Eleven); and personal relationships in the body of Christ (Chapter Twelve) to conform us to the image of Christ. In each of these chapters, my aim has been to connect the dots between the gospel, the goal of Christlikeness, and the specific aspect of spirituality under discussion. |
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| 16. |
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Christless Christianity: The Alternative Gospel of the American Church
by: Michael Horton
Publisher: Baker Books
Published: 2008-11-01
ASIN: 0801013186
Read reviews >> |
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| | More details | | Is it possible that we have left Christ out of Christianity? Is the faith and practice of American Christians today more American than Christian? These are the provocative questions Michael Horton addresses in this thoughtful, insightful book. He argues that while we invoke the name of Christ, too often Christ and the Christ-centered gospel are pushed aside. The result is a message and a faith that are, in Horton's words, "trivial, sentimental, affirming, and irrelevant." This alternative "gospel" is a message of moralism, personal comfort, self-help, self-improvement, and individualistic religion. It trivializes God, making him a means to our selfish ends. Horton skillfully diagnoses the problem and points to the solution: a return to the unadulterated gospel of salvation. |
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| 17. |
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Congregational Leadership in Anxious Times: Being Calm and Courageous No Matter What
by: Peter L. Steinke
Publisher: The Alban Institute
Published: 2006-11-20
ASIN: B001H30S8I
Read reviews >> |
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| | More details | Anxious times call for steady leadership. When tensions emerge in a congregation, its leaders cannot be as anxious as the people they serve. To remain effective, congregational leaders must control their own uneasiness. This takes self-awareness and confidence to manage relationships and influence behaviors. Knowing how to deal with anxiety and how to work through complex challenges can lead a congregation to new insights, growth, and vitality. Anxious times hold not only the potential for loss but also for creation, important learnings, and changes that will strengthen the congregation.
With this book, internationally respected consultant Peter Steinke goes deeper into the requirements of effective congregational leadership. Born from the wisdom of Steinke’s distinguished career, this volume will both enlighten and embolden leaders. Steinke inspires courage in leaders to maintain the course, unearth secrets, resist sabotage, withstand fury, and overcome timidity or doubts. His insights, illustrations, and provocations will carry leaders through rough times, provide clarity during confusing times, and uplift them in joyous times. |
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| 18. |
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Courageous Leadership
by: Bill Hybels
Publisher: Zondervan
Published: 2008-12-16
ASIN: 0310291577
Read reviews >> |
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| | More details | | The book you hold resonates with this conviction: that leaders such as you have the potential to be the most influential forces on planet Earth. Yours is the staggering responsibility and the matchless privilege of rallying believers and mobilizing their spiritual gifts in order to help people who are far from God become fully devoted followers of Christ. Life transformation and the eternal destinies of real people depend on the redemptive message entrusted to the local church. Are you willing to do whatever it takes to lead your church effectively so God's message of hope can change the world? Then this book is for you. Courageous Leadership is Bill Hybels' magnum opus, a book far too important to be written before its time. Only now, after nearly thirty years leading his own church from a handful of people with a burning vision into a globe-spanning kingdom force---only after almost three decades of victories and setbacks, of praying hard and risking big---is Hybels ready at last to share the lessons he has learned, and continues to learn, about Christian leadership. Too much is at stake for you not to maximize your spiritual gift of leadership, insists Hybels. In this passionate, powerful book, he unpacks the tools, tasks, and challenges of your calling. You'll discover the power of vision and how to turn it into action. You'll gain frontline insights for developing a kingdom dream team, discovering your leadership style, developing other leaders, making decisions, walking with God, embracing change, staying your God-given course, and much, much more. Drawing on his own richly varied life experiences, Hybels fleshes out vital principles with riveting firsthand stories. This is far more than another book on leadership strategies and techniques. You'll find those topics in here, to be sure. But beyond them, you'll find the very essence of one of today's foremost Christian leaders---his fervent commitment to evangelism and discipleship and his zeal to inspire fellow church leaders even as he seeks to keep growing as a leader himself. If unchurched people matter to you . . . if you love seeing believers serve passionately with their spiritual gifts . . . if God's heartbeat for the church is your heartbeat as well . . . then this book is a must. Courageous Leadership will convince you to lead with all your might, all your skill, and all your faith. And it will give you the tools to do just that. |
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| 19. |
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Culture of Honor: Sustaining a Supernatural Environment
by: Danny Silk
Publisher: Destiny Image
Published: 2009-12-01
ASIN: 0768431468
Read reviews >> |
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| | More details | An Environment That Sustains Life, Hope, Honor and Destiny!
In this powerful, revelation-packed book, Danny Silk describes the significant paradigm shift in church life, government, and relationships that has created and sustained the revival culture at Bethel Church in Redding, California.
Through many relevant and true-life stories, the church is revealed as a place of freedom, respect, empowerment, and healthy discipline (not punishment). Culture of Honor challenges the status quo of church leadership structure and presents a refreshing view of the five-fold ministry.
Jesus acknowledged this important principle in Matthew 20:25-26:
But Jesus called them to Himself and said, 'You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and those who are great exercise authority over them. Yet it shall not be so among you; but whoever desires to become great among you, let him be your servant.
If those with power learn how to empower those around them, then surely it will come to pass that, Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven.
You can apply-today-the truths revealed in this practical yet supernaturally charged set of principles to relationships in your family, workplace, community, ministry, church-wherever you deal with others. |
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| 20. |
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Elephant Room 2 Companion Guide
| | More details | | Take all of the topics from Elephant Room 2 and combine them with revealing quotes from all seven Elephant Room speakers. Add the pertinent thoughts of church fathers, the leading thinkers of the Reformation, and 18th to 20th century Christian leaders. You will find this collection of quotes helpful, clarifying, insistent, and illuminating in your battle for truth. |
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| 22. |
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Engage: A Guide to Creating Life-Transforming Worship Services
by: Nelson Searcy
Publisher: Baker Books
Published: 2011-10-01
ASIN: 0801072174
Read reviews >> |
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| | More details | No matter how great Sunday's worship service was, there's always another Sunday lurking at the end of the next week that must be planned. Church leaders often fall into ruts, working on automatic pilot just trying to get things together, which does not allow for much creativity or focus on designing services that lead to transformation for those involved in them.
Engage is a step-by-step, stress-free guide to planning worship services that allow for and foster true life change. Comprehensive in scope, Engage provides teaching pastors, worship leaders, and volunteers with the tools they need to work together to develop and implement a worship planning system that improves communication, enhances creativity, and honors Jesus every week. |
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| 23. |
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Exponential: How You and Your Friends Can Start a Missional Church Movement (Exponential Series)
by: Dave Ferguson
Publisher: Zondervan
Published: 2010-05-04
ASIN: B005HKM4MK
Read reviews >> |
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| | More details | | Authors Dave and Jon Ferguson communicate a simple strategy that will engage millions of Christ followers and challenge every church leader to become a reproducing follower and leader. Exponential lays out a brief but solid theology for a reproducing strategy, giving practical 'how-to's' for reproducing Christ followers, leaders, artists, groups/teams, venues, sites, churches, and networks of churches. Weaved throughout this book is the amazing story of Community Christian Church, which was started by five friends who used the reproducing strategies found in Exponential to grow one of the most influential churches in the U.S. and develop a network of reproducing churches. Many of today's Christians consider the missional challenge of Jesus---feed the hungry, comfort the lonely, bring people to God's Word---as inspirational but not something that's achievable. Or, they've heard the challenge of Jesus and are frustrated with how little they've done. Jesus gave his followers this mission because he wants them to hear it, be inspired, and then actually do it ... Exponential will show them how. Exponential is the anchor book in the Exponential Series. |
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| 24. |
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Fatherless
by: Brian J. Gail
Publisher: Human Life International
Published: 2010-06-22
ASIN: 1559220619
Read reviews >> |
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| | More details | | Called a book of the century, powerful, gripping, deeply moving, hauntingly beautiful, masterfully done, a must read and a freight train page turner! An intensely human tour of the great spiritual battles in the US Catholic church during the late 20th century. Brian Gail takes us out into the trenches and shows what life was like for Catholics good and bad during this critical time. This book is a great opportunity for Catholics to take hold of who they really are. Meticulously researched, brilliantly crafted, Fatherless takes the reader on an unforgettable journey inside Fortune 500 boardrooms and Madison Avenue screening rooms, behind one-way mirrors in America's heartland and two-way screens in church confessionals, to the very peak of Ireland's highest mountain and inside the papal dining room of John Paul II in Rome. It is the searing journey to the center of conscience, however, that marks Fatherless as the signature Catholic novel of its generation. In its pages we meet flesh and blood characters - noble and flawed, driven and seeking; each struggling to achieve the American Dream ... discovering instead a uniquely American nightmare. How each confronts the reality of ethical and moral dilemmas - while struggling to balance faith, family, and career - goes to the very heart of the Catholic experience in America in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. This is a tale you will never forget. |
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| 25. |
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Five Practices of Fruitful Congregations (Korean version)
by: Robert Schnase
Publisher: Abingdon Press
Published: 2010-09-01
ASIN: 1426700547
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| | More details | People are searching for a church shaped and sustained by Radical Hospitality, Passionate Worship, Intentional Faith Development, Risk-Taking Mission and Service, and Extravagant Generosity. These fundamental practices are critical to the success of congregations. Their presence and strength demonstrate congregational health, vitality, and fruitfulness. By repeating and improving these practices, churches fulfill their mission to make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.
Robert Schnase astutely weaves theological insight, practical advice, and exemplary stories into an inspiring book for pastors and laity alike.
L. Gregory Jones, Dean and Professor of Theology, Duke Divinity School
Robert Schnase s words are thoughtful, provocative, and challenging. Any congregation will find encouragement and insight to deepen faithfulness and multiply fruitfulness.
Lovett H. Weems, Jr., Distinguished Professor of Church Leadership, Wesley Theological Seminary
Stimulating. Challenging. Uniquely helpful. Bishop Schnase gives us powerful language, rich examples, and practical suggestions for fulfilling the mission God gives us.
Janice Riggle Huie, Bishop of the Texas Conference of The United Methodist Church
Read the Circuit Rider Review of Five Practices of Fruitful Congregations by Kenneth H. Carter, Jr., senior pastor at Providence United Methodist Church in Charlotte, NC.
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