Jim Griffith and Bill Easum draw from decades of personal experience in planting new churches and consulting with supervisors and planters in new church starts. They have condensed their vast experiences down to ten points that account for the great majority of failures among church planters. For each point, the authors provide examples of the particular mistake and ways to avoid it. They speak in special sections to coaches and supervisors, showing them how to work with church planters to...

Prepares Christian congregations to fulfill their basic function - to make disciples who make disciples for Jesus Christ. This book is about helping "stuck" and "unstuck" churches either become unstuck or constantly improve their ministry of making disciples. This book is designed to help church leaders make profound changes in the way they do ministry or constantly practice methodological innovation/improvement to be effective in creating disciples churches.

Reggie McNeal's bestseller The Present Future is the definitive work on the "missional movement," i.e., the widespread movement among Protestant churches to be less inwardly focused and more oriented toward the culture and community around them. In that book he asked the tough questions that churches needed to entertain to begin to think about who they are and what they are doing; in Missional Renaissance, he shows them the three significant shifts in their thinking and behavior that they ...

First published in 1999, Advanced Strategic Planning explains why planning is so important to carrying out the church's mission. Now in its third edition, this classic resource offers•a nine-step strategic thinking and acting model•useful ideas for developing a ministry strategy•diagrams to help illustrate concepts•a new section on spiritual formationThe methods in this book are proven to work, having already helped many churches articulate the...

How are we doing? The church, that is. And how are we doing it? Congregations have long measured success by "bodies, budget, and buildings"--a certain record of attendance, the offering plate, and square footage. But the scorecard can't stop there. When it does, the deeper emphasis on accountability, discipleship, and spiritual maturity is lost. Ignoring those details, we see fewer lives transformed, Christian influence wane, and churches thin out--a situation that is all too familiar acro...

All churches like to think that theirs is the friendliest in town. But do visitors see it that way? Church consultant Gary McIntosh invites readers to take a look at their church through the eyes of visitors and potential visitors. His starting point, grounded in an understanding of God as a "welcomer," is that churches should see those who enter their doors as not merely visitors, but as guests, and themselves as gracious hosts. This practical book offers sound advice on assessing and imp...

All local churches experience a predictable life cycle of growth and decline. But if a church is on a downward trend, how can it turn around? Taking Your Church to the Next Level explains the impact of age and size on churches and outlines the improvements that must be made at each point for a church to remain fruitful and faithful to its mission. McIntosh deftly describes the cycles of fruitfulness and the importance of continual improvement to diminish destructive forces that ke...

Over 90 percent of all Christian churches in the United States have fewer than 200 members. While they vary in shape, size, ethnicity, and denomination, they have one thing in common: the desire to grow. So why is it that some churches fail to grow for years, while other congregations in the same community increase exponentially?The problem, says church marketing authority Richard Reising, is that most churches should not be doing promotion. Instead, they should focus on the prepar...

Presents a portrait of Christian leadership within a biblical framework while comparing and contrasting it to today's hottest leadership models.

Most books on church planting offer a model for churches to replicate--usually one that is tied to a particular style, generation, or demographic. But what churches really need is a process that is flexible, not bound to a particular time or current fad. In The Nuts and Bolts of Church Planting, trusted author and church-planting expert Aubrey Malphurs shares the basic steps any church planter will need, regardless of his or her generation now or in the future. These steps include...

Passionate about church growth, Michael Fletcher understands the obstacles pastors and church leaders face as they reach 100/200 and 700/800-member barriers. In clear language he lays out practical steps churches can follow to achieve the growth they desire. His strategies have proved effective not only in his church, which has grown dramatically, but also in the churches of Grace Churches International, a worldwide network of 315-plus churches that he leads.

Pastoral ministry is challenging work, especially when a pastor ignores the church's "congregational culture" when seeking to minister to church members or implement changes. Just as a pastor studies to interpret the Scriptures in order to understand and preach the Bible, he or she must interpret the local church culture to better understand and move it toward accomplishing its mission and vision.In Look Before You Lead, trusted church leadership expert Aubrey Malphurs sho...