“Mobilizing the Church” Bookshelf: An Annotated Bibliography

“Mobilizing the Church” Bookshelf: An Annotated Bibliography

(FASTEN, 2007)

Resource Type: brief annotated bibliography

Audience: Church and ministry leaders desiring further information on church mobilization strategies.

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·  Culture Shift:  Transforming Your Church from the Inside Out, Robert Lewis and Wayne Cordeiro (Jossey-Bass, 2005)

This book is designed to help church leadership make changes in their church that are deep, meaningful, lasting, and Biblical.  Too often, churches rely on mimicking what other churches are doing, or try to make changes through programming or other superficial methods.  This book helps churches identify their unique culture, assess it, and make real changes that bring them closer to what God planned for them.  Readers are led away from cookie-cutter, program-driven church structure through practical recommendations, illuminating stories, and Scripture.  The authors provide encouragement, inspiration, motivation, and a compelling challenge for pastors everywhere. 

·  Mobilizing Compassion: Moving People Into Ministry, Robert Logan and Larry Short (Revell, 1994)

This practical guide is for individuals or churches that wish to begin a compassion ministry.  It begins with the Biblical significance of such a ministry and then guides readers through the various stages of considering, planning, implementing and evaluating a compassion ministry.  The authors combine practical guidance with many illustrations from Scripture, history and their own experience.  Included are many charts, sample forms, action task lists and ideas for way to do compassion ministry. 

·  Small Group Outreach:  Turning Groups Inside Out, Jeffrey Arnold.  (InterVarsity Press, 1998).  $9.60.

Small groups have an enormous capacity to make a difference in the Kingdom of God, but many are limited because of their inward focus or because of a lack of resources to teach them about outreach.  Jeffrey Arnold guides small groups in becoming mission-minded in this book.  He teaches groups how be truly supportive and caring as a group and then discusses the many ways small groups can reach out to others – inviting friends, creating support groups, serving the church, support foreign missions, participating in short-term missions, or serving the community.  This simple book is full of practical and Biblical advice and ideas for small groups of all personalities. (FASTEN note: For an instructional story on how one church has turned its small groups “inside out,” read the Profile of Fellowship Bible Church North.) 

·  The Connecting Church, Randy Frazee (Zondervan, 2001)

It used to be that meaningful relationships and a sense of belonging better characterized our churches; these were indeed things central to what it meant to be the church. Today, though, Frazee worries, the church is too often a place of loneliness rather than connection. Church leaders desire to build authentic community in their congregations, but how is this done? The Connecting Church seeks to answer that question. It offers 15 key principles for church leaders to follow to create vital community. This is the “first step” that congregations often have to take before they can be mobilized for significant community action.

·  Turn Your Church Inside Out, Walt Kallestad (Augsburg Fortress Publishers, 2001)

Walt Kallestad guides pastors through the task of creating a church that is focused on welcoming, celebrating, and embracing others.  He argues that being a missional church is just as significant to a church’s function as is caring for its members.  This book is easy to read, and Kallestad’s personal stories and honest reflections on the sin and challenges in his own life are interesting and helpful.  There is a good balance of the narrative and the practical, and all of it is firmly backed by Scripture and good Biblical theology.  The advice is specific enough to actually put into effect – helping pastors and leadership evaluate their own church and take whatever steps necessary to become more like the church God desires.  However, it is also general and open-ended enough to be useful for churches of varying denominations, sizes, styles, and locations.