Picture your church as a place where the priesthood of believers finds its expression in creative and powerful ways. Picture leaders and staff equipping and unleashing people to minister in ways consistent with how God designed them. Think of the effectiveness, vitality, and contentment that come when the body of Christ nurtures itself through the healthy give-and-take of each member. In The Equipping Church, Sue Mallory describes the benefits, the structure, and the culture of an equipping church and shows how your congregation can become one. This book is about limitless possibilities. Think "vision." What might your church look like if its members became vital, fully empowered partners in ministry? How can you help them discover and release their full potential? How would their roles change--and yours? AN EQUIPPING CHURCH IS A CHURCH WHERE: * pastors and leaders enable church members to share in ministry * people’s gifts, talents, and life callings are matched with areas of service * ministry opportunities are recognized and developed * the culture encourages the growth of a broad array of ministries *a well-designed system addresses needs of every kind, both individual and corporate *the pastor doesn’t have to be all things to all people Unpacking insights and principles uncovered by Leadership Training Network over the last several years, Mallory helps you customize an equipping system and culture in your church. You’ll proceed from preparation (what you need to know), to foundations (what you need to change), to construction (what you need to do). In the process, Mallory takes you inside the story of her own church, Brentwood Presbyterian, to observe the different stages of their trial-and-error journey and how it has transformed their approach to "doing church." See how they dealt with various concerns that arose along the way, and meet men and women whose lives have been changed because Brentwood took the ministry road less traveled. Each chapter includes a section of "Equipping Principles," questions for discussion and reflection, and a summary of different equipping churches from around the country. With the accompanying Equipping Church Guidebook, this book will be a mile marker in your church--and the gateway to a more effective and biblical approach to ministry.

The authors draw on their combined experience to create an exciting model of congregational leadership that understands congregations as relational systems. Learn how relational processes can liberate members for ministry and mission in the world and release pastors for appropriate leadership.

In this provocative book, Stevens writes the clergy-laity division has no basis in the New Testament and challenges all Christians to rediscover what it means to live daily as God's people. Exploring the theological, structural and cultural reasons for treating laypeople as the objects of ministry, Stevens argues against the idea of clericalism and in favor of equipping people for ministry in their homes, workplaces and neighborhoods.

With so many broken and hurting people in our congregations and in our communities, how is a church pastor supposed to address so many needs? This second volume in Judson Press¿s new ¿Living Church¿ series explores the nature of pastoral care and invites laity and clergy alike to become partners in this essentially human ministry. Beginning with the traditional core of pastoral care as a critical function of the church pastor, author, professor, and veteran pastor Marvin McMickle expands that core into a second circle of care¿as the pastor equips and empowers church members to partner in caring for one another. Finally, McMickle throws open the doors of the church and challenges pastor, lay leaders, and church members alike to extend their ministries of pastoral care to the local community, through ministries of advocacy, justice, healthcare, education, and service. A richly reflective and utterly practical resource, this volume deepens the church¿s understanding of pastoral care¿and expands that compassionate and priestly ministry in the church and in the world.

Marketplace theology expert R. Paul Stevens revisits more than twenty biblical accounts -- from Genesis to Revelation -- exploring through them the theological meaning of every sort of work, manual or intellectual, domestic or commercial. --from publisher description.

Every workday millions of Christians enter the marketplace. Whether as sales associates or engineers, auto mechanics or executives, Christians are called to serve God in the workplace. But most need help integrating faith and work. How can you be salt and light on the job? Where can you turn for help in developing a biblical and satisfying view ...

Missiologist and church planter JR Woodward offers a blueprint for the missional church--not small adjustments around the periphery of the infrastructure but a radical revisioning of how a church ought to look that entails changing how we think about leadership and what we expect out of discipleship.

Biblically and practically instructs church members in ways they can labor for the health of their church. What Is a Healthy Church Member? takes its cue from Mark Dever's book What Is a Healthy Church?, which offered one definition of what a healthy church looks like biblically and historically. In this new work, pastor Thabiti Anyabwile attempts to answer the natural next question: "What does a healthy church member look like in the light of Scripture?" God intends for us to play an active and vital part in the body of Christ, the local church. He wants us to experience the local church as a home more profoundly wonderful and meaningful than any other place on earth. He intends for his churches to be healthy places and for the members of those churches to be healthy as well. This book explains how membership in the local church can produce spiritual growth in its members and how each member can contribute to the growth and health of the whole.

Guides both pastors and members to recognize key characteristics of a healthy church and then challenge each person to do his or her part in developing those characteristics in the local church body.

Pastors and counselors regularly minister to people whose marriages or families are in crisis. Tempers run high and feelings are brought low when a marriage is hurting or a family is in disarray. Pastors and counselors need practical, biblical help in order to connect their theological training to the reality of modern messy relationships. These how-to training manuals provide relevant, user-friendly equipping for pastors, counselors, lay leaders, educators, and students, enabling them to competently and compassionately relate God's Word to marriage and family life.