Books @ Leadership Network

Don't Let This Book Cover Fool You!

I was asked to write an endorsement to Ralph Moore's just-released How to Multiply Your Church: The Most Effective Way to Grow God's Kingdom.  Since I missed his deadline (oops), I'm writing my endorsement here. In a word: Ralph will fire you with both a sense of urgency and a vision for doing ministry by "multiplication" rather than "addition." You won't agree with everything he says, but you'll be very glad you read it.
 
The artwork on the book cover looks like addition, but in reality Ralph's passion is out-of-control multiplication. His life models it too. He became a pastor in 1971, largely pastoring two churches. But he's helped birth 700 new churches during that time, churches all around the world. That's because he focuses on multiplication, not addition.
 
He offers lots of analogies with history, such as the way the United States changed in response to World War II, but all his illustrations and statistics lead to one place: he believes the New Testament norm is for you and me to multiply our congregations. He starts with Jesus's model: Jesus duplicated himself in his disciples and gave them his authority to do the things he did. Jesus had three close disciples. He asks, shouldn't we? He makes more insightful observations from the models seen in Luke 10 and the Book of Acts.
 
Why is this important? Church multiplication carries the potential for exponential growth of the gospel. Whenever the church has prevailed in history, according to Ralph, it has been on the heels of a church planting movement.
 
Ralph suggests a different way of thinking: “stop counting converts and begin counting congregations.” He also says, "It is doable and it’s easier than you think."

What does it look like for Ralph at the level of the church he leads?

It is pretty simple. In our situation, I disciple my staff. We read books in synch then discuss them in our staff meeting. We pray and minister to each other in the same meeting—it usually lasts a couple of hours on Tuesdays. And that is before we do our business. I think discipling the staff is as important as preparing a message and certainly more important than any day to day planning.

The staff, in turn, are discipling leaders of our “MiniChurches.” We either do this by reading books together or by operating as a MiniChurch made up of leaders. The MiniChurch leaders all have apprentice leaders who they disciple. Together they disciple the members of their MiniChurch. A MiniChurch being a dozen people who gather weekly to share what the Spirit said to them during the weekend sermon, to share life experiences and pray for each other. They also eat lots of sweets!

The MiniChurch discipleship chain produces nearly all of our staff pastors. Each year, it also produces one or two pastors capable of planting a new church. It is all pretty simple. It should look a little different in every congregation. But, it is biblical and necessary to a church that wants to multiply on multiple occasions.
    

Warren Bird, Ph.D., is Research Director at Leadership Network, and co-author of 21 books on various aspects of church health and innovation.

Turning Your Idea into a Book

A lot of church leaders have a story to tell but don't know how to get it from brain and heart to paper. They wonder whether anyone would be interested in reading it. And they don’t know how to contact publishers – or whether to go the self publishing route.

To address those issues, I wrote an article for the August 2009 issue of Church Executive magazine titled, "Suggestions for Publishing Your First Book." It's available online as part of their "web exclusive" add-on features. Here are the questions I'm often asked that I try to answer:

o Do I need an agent?

o Do I need someone to help me write the book?

o If I write a book, how many people will read it?

o Should I write my book before thinking about publishers?

o What about self-publishing?

o What about making a book into an audio book, whether for download or CD or Kindle?

o What’s a good royalty advance for a first-time author?

If you're curious about any of these topics, you can read my article here.

Also, the blog world has a lot of other helpful advice. Here are just a few suggestions:

 
o Mark Batterson offers "Seven Writing Tips" at http://evotional.com/2009/07/7-writing-lessons.html
o Tony Morgan says "Don't Write a Book -- Start with a Journal" at http://tonymorganlive.com/2009/07/31/do-not-write-a-book/
o Thomas Nelson publisher Michael Hyatt advises "How Not to Pitch Your Book" (and at bottom offers several related posts) at http://michaelhyatt.com/2009/05/how-not-to-pitch-your-book-proposal.html#more-2212

o "The Ugly Truth about Book Publishing"

Warren Bird, Ph.D., is Research Director at Leadership Network, and co-author of 21 books on various aspects of church health and innovation.

Experiencing LEADERSHIFT

The sub-tile of this book is provocative... "Letting Go of Leadership Heresies." 

In Experiencing Leadershift Don Cousins looks at how the church has departed from the truth and he identifies consequences such as: The Success Heresy, The Credit Heresy, The Organizational Heresy, and others. 

He then invites us to return to the truth as we: Let go of leadership heresies, learn to bless, live in the "Zone of God's blessing," and call consumers to become contributors.

I spent five years studying the biblical call to build the local church around the gifts and ministry of God's people, not the charisma and strength of a pastor.  This book gives an amazing, practical, and biblical road map of exactly how we can do this.  Leaders are not called to do all the work of the church.  They are to recruit, train, bless, support, and release God's people for ministry.  This has always been God's plan and design.

Along the way, this vision has been lost. 

Greg Ogden, in his book, The New Reformation, did an amazing job of investigating the biblical underpinnings of this idea.  Don Cousins, along with Bruce Bugbee (authors of the Networking Curriculum used by so many churches), have offered more than just a book on this topic.  They have created all the resources a church needs to train staff, leaders, and a whole congregation to make a LeaderShift and regain a biblical pattern of church life.

Recently I consulted a church that was struggling because they had to let almost half of their staff go due to new financial realities.  They were mourning the shift they were "forced to make."  I was rejoicing!  They were being pressed to recapture the God-ordained way of doing leadership and church.  I came in to train them on how to build a church around the gifts of God's people (volunteers) and not on the paid labor of a staff team.  After our time of training I said, "If the economy recovers and you can afford to hire people for everything that needs to be done in the church, DON'T DO IT." 

I invited them to see this as a divine moment when God was leading them back to a biblical model of leadership and church-strengthening time. 

If you desire to lead your church toward a biblical model of ministry that calls every believer to engage in ministry and serve according to God's call, check out this ministry resource.  If you feel a call to rediscover God's plan for leaders to mobilize an army of servants rather than grow weary doing everything for the consumers who come to church, this book (and the related resources) are a great starting place!

Kevin G. Harney

Reading List: John Bishop

(This is a new feature at the Books @ Leadership Network blog -- what innovative leaders are reading, which we've titled, "Reading List.")

John Bishop is Senior Pastor of Living Hope Church in Vancouver, Washington. Living Hope Church is a multi-site church with 11 locations currently. John Bishop blogs at www.johnbishop.tv and twitter @john_bishop. John shares his current reading list below:

The Bible  - I know it sounds cliché but I want to make Gods word the first thing in my life, to read and to live.

Mad Church Disease by Anne Jackson.  It’s such a good book, I have a hard time putting it down. Reading it while on vacation.

Our board of directors is reading The Unity Factor by Larry Osborne on church government and structure.  It addresses issues that we are currently dealing with.  I find that as we continue to grow, our structure continually needs to change, so I’m working on that.

I haven’t started yet but plan on reading ‘IT’ by Craig Groeschel.   I’ve heard so many good things about it.

In-N-Out Burger by Stacey Purman.  I began reading it this week.  I love a story of simplicity in our culture of complexity.  I’m reading this to try and understand the dynamics of this American success story.

Also I love Ted Dekker books.  I bought ‘Obsessed’.

Have you read any of these? What's been your takeaway?

The Last Lecture...simple thoughts and ideas

What do you say, what do you write, what do you communicate when you know your life is coming to an end? 

When Randy Pausch learned that he had Pancreatic Cancer he faced these and many other questions.  He records his final reflections in a little book simply titled, The Last Lecture. 

His Lecture focused on acheiving your childhood dreams.  Here are a few helpful ideas I gleaned from a man seeking to speak to the world, his three little children, and his wife.

Self-Esteem is not given.  It is built and developed over time,

If pop gets spilled in the car ... don't worry about it. People matter more than stuff,

Be like Captin Kirk, don't believe in a no-win scenario,

Send hand-written, thoughtful thank you notes,

Pursue your childhood dreams...even when you are a grown up,

Disneyland is open until 8:00 tonight! (not, the park closes at eight) think and speak positive,

Be a life-long student, learn from others, you are not as smart as you (or others) think you are,

There were many brief and pithy insights in this book.  More important, it reminded me that my life will end some day and I want to be sure I communicate what is important to those I love...sooner than later.

Kevin G. Harney

Outliers Blog #3- Marita's Bargin

In the South Bronx only 16 percent of middle school students perform at or above their grade level in math.  But, at a special school (KIPP) for randomly chosen lower income kids from this same neighborhood, 84 percent perform at or above their grade level.  After reading this chapter in Gladwell's book, Outliers, the Story of Success, the reason for this distinction became crystal clear.  It is all about expectations. 

 

At the KIPP school, these young students begin at 7:25 am (many of them are up before 6:00 am to get ready for school and to travel there). A normal day at school includes ninety minutes of English and ninety minutes of Math.  It also includes a full hour of science and social science.  There is also mandatory orchestra and two days of band.  Their school day goes from 7:25 am to after 5:00 pm.  After that there are homework clubs and sports.  The normal day concludes at about 7:00.  many of the students head home from school so they can make time for more study and homework.  

This is not some torture for children.  It is a setting where expectations are exceedingly high and the students respond.  They thrive.  They succeed.  

O, sure, there may not be time for three hours of video games each day, two hours of TV, and two more hours on-line and texting.  But, these kids rise to the challenge and discover a whole new life.

Do you see any spiritual connection?  I do.  It might be that we in church leadership shoot too low.  In our efforts to make everything safe, easy, and to be sensitive at all times, we might be missing the chance to call people to sacrifice, hard work, and spiritual greatness.  When people wanted to follow Jesus, he called them to do things like: deny themselves, take up a cross, and die for Him.  Maybe our focus should move from making sure everyone feels comfortable to calling them to lay down their lives... the way Jesus did.

Kevin G. Harney

My Business, My Mission

Lloyd Reeb in his book Success to Significance writes about the 4 stages of the Halftime Journey.  At each stage the Halftimer is asking different questions and requires different tools and resources to answer those questions.  In the first stage of the Halftime journey, Lloyd tells us that the Halftimer needs to hear of other people like him or herself who have traveled down the road beforehand.  They need to hear stories that will not only inspire, but engage the Halftimer to want to take the first step.  There heart is stirring for something different and they need to know that there are other options than golf for their second half.  Doug Seebeck and Timothy Stoner have developed a great tool for innovative ministry leaders to use in order to help their business leaders who are in the first stage of the journey.

 

As I read My Business My Mission cover to cover, I did feel a little bit like I was reading the same chapter over and over again, however, the stories were compelling enough to still want to continue on to the next chapter.  For a Halftimer who is looking to be inspired, thumbing through this book and picking out two or three stories that resonates with his/her heart would be a perfect on-ramp to a conversation about how they might begin to use their marketplace skills for the Kingdom.  It takes an innovative minister to dare to inspire a business leader to do something other than serve on the elder board or write a big check, but a conversation with a business leader to help them use their marketplace skills for a global impact might just be what the world needs.  My Business My Mission is a great catalyst for this type of conversation. 

My Business, My Mission: Fighting Poverty Through Relationships by Doug Seebeck and Timothy Stoner.

Available here.

Reviewed by Mike Hall, Director of Engagement for Halftime, an initiative of Leadership Network

Bloggers Bookstudy with Flamingo Road

The leadership team at Flamingo Road Church is hosting a Bloggers Bookstudy this summer. That's 12 leaders blogging about 6 books in 9 weeks.

Join the discussion on these 6 books:

• Courageous Leadership by Bill Hybels
• Crazy Love by Francis Chan
• Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity by David Allen
• Fresh Wind, Fresh Fire by Jim Cymbala
• How the Mighty Fall by Jim Collins
• Axiom: Powerful Leadership Proverbs by Bill Hybels

As they enter into week #2 of the book study, they're finishing up their blog discussion about Courageous Leadership by Bill Hybels. Today's discussion on Chapter 9, the Art of Self-Leadership, is over at Matt Miller's blog.

See the full schedule at www.flamingoroadchurch.com/bloggersbookstudy. The 12 bloggers hosting the discussions are:

1. Heredes Ribeiro
2. Barby Ward
3. Mauricio Tinoco
4. Heather Palacios
5. Miguel Umanzor
6. Stacie Gonzalez
7. Matt Miller
8. Marcella Ribeiro
9. Lilibeth Rivera
10. Troy Gramling
11. Genie Mokher
12. Yoel Torres

See you over there! Add a comment here if you've already read one of these books, and what your takeaway is.

// DJ CHUANG, Director at Leadership Network

The Age of the Unthinkable

The Age of the Unthinkable: Why the New World Disorder Constantly Surprises Us And What We Can Do About It by Joshua Cooper Ramo

If you’re ready to stretch your brain and learn from a wide variety of disciplines then this is the one book you need to read this week. If you want to have insight into why few organizations or governments or churches or denominations don’t work anymore, this is a must read. And it is a fascinating read. So fascinating that you might be tempted to read it just for the pure pleasure of what it contains and miss the implications for your ministry.

Of course, to see the implications for your ministry, you must be willing to read between the lines. But that’s not hard if you’re looking.

The theme of the book is simple – in revolutionary times like today we need to learn to think and act like a revolutionary. The author’s goal is to explore a new way to think about problems as they arise and to develop new instincts.

The first half of the book explains what is happening today in regard to world power and why the world has been turned upside down.

The second half of the book offers what the author calls “Deep Security.” Deep Security involves

• Learning to view life differently
• Empathy toward our enemies
• Becoming resilient rather than defensive
• A will to innovate and improvise and anticipate
• Willing to share power, something he calls “swarming and “peer production”

This was one of the most fascinating books I’ve read this year. It’s not about ministry and yet it could have a profound impact on your ministry if you could incorporate some of his ideas.

Bill Easum
www.21stcenturystrategiesinc.com
www.BillEasum.com

Organic Outreach for Ordinary People

By Kevin Harney

The title is misleading. When I first saw it I thought this was another book on some new kind of program to help a church reach out.  A better title is Natural Faith Sharing: One to one evangelism.

Harney takes the position that every person is an evangelist of some sort- baseball, football, a dress, a pair of shoes. He then contends that every Christian should play some part in evangelism at some level. What causes us to participate in evangelism begins in our hearts as we begin to love others. As we become more aware of the depth of love God has for us and the cost of God’s grace to us we naturally begin to love others more.  He shows us how to raise our spiritual temperature by praying for and with lost people as well as spending time with them.

This is an excellent book for both individual and small group study. Each chapter provides personal tools to help in the process of growing ones evangelism spirit.

I like two things about the book

·         It isn’t another 1, 2, 3 program.

·         Harney starts with the heart rather than the head.