Leadership in the Wesleyan Spirit


Book Description

Presents a guide to church leadership based on the principles and practices of the Wesleyan movement.




Grace to Lead


Book Description

Wesleyan leadership is about character. This book is designed specifically for Christian leaders and teachers. The revised edition expands includes more illustrations and models of leadership. Greater attention is given to congregations and institutions.




Leadership the Wesleyan Way


Book Description

"A comprehensive, readable book, yet with excellent research, on shaping leaders both in thought and practice from a Wesleyan perspective...a culture-changing book on leadership that transcends the business model to a theological foundation." - Jo Anne Lyon, former General Superintendent; Ambassador, The Wesleyan Church




Transforming Evangelism


Book Description

Because of the more aggressive and confrontational tactics we hear about, evangelism has developed a bad connotation. Doors are shut hurriedly, phone calls end abruptly, and e-mails left unanswered. After all, isn't this a task better handled by the pastor? Perhaps it's time to reexamine John Wesley's model of evangelism as a full, natural circle—where it's a communal beginning point rather than a solitary end. The central motive of authentic evangelism is: Having received a message that's made all the difference in our lives, we desire to share that message with others in the hope that it will transform their lives as well. Wesley models an evangelism that reaches out and welcomes, invites, and nurtures, and speaks to both head and heart. "Evangelism is about relationship," the authors write. "How we are in relationship to God, who is able to transform us into new beings. How we are in relationship to our neighbor, whom we must love like ourselves." As one reviewer says, "Knight and Powe have given us a relational book. They describe the deep connection between John Wesley's thoughts, Charles Wesley's hymns, scholarly thinking about evangelism and biblical understandings of the gospel—all in relation to the needs, concerns, and hopes of everyday people." Learn on your own or as a congregational group from this practical study on living an evangelistic life that demonstrates the transforming power of loving God and neighbor.




Class Leaders


Book Description

In 1988, The General Conference of the United Methodist Church restored class leaders and class meetings to the Book of Discipline after an absence of fifty years. In this volume, David Lowes Watson explains what the recovery of this tradition can mean for congregations, and offers some guidelines for the revitalized office of class leader. Adapting the later Methodist class meeting as a pastoral subdivision of the congregation, Watson shows how class leaders, under the supervision of the pastor, can nurture the discipline of other church members in light of a ÒGeneral Rule of DisciplineÓ derived from the early Methodist societies: ÒTo witness to Jesus Christ in the world, and to follow his teachings through acts of compassion, justice, worship, and devotion, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit.Ó This volume is the second in a trilogy : Covenant Discipleship, Class Leaders, and Forming Christian Disciples.




Evangelism & Theology in the Wesleyan Spirit


Book Description

We must focus on the spiritual quest of persons and create the spaces/places where they can encounter God, practice the spiritual disciplines, and grow in discipleship.




Pastoral Leadership Is...


Book Description

Dozens of brief yet powerful entries for pastors about what it really means to be on-mission, spiritual warriors who lead the local church from a biblical point of view instead of a modern traditional one.




Marks of a Movement


Book Description

Marks of a Movement calls us back to the disciple-making mandate of the church through the timeless wisdom of John Wesley and the Methodist movement. With a love for history and a passion for today’s church, Winfield helps us reimagine church multiplication in a way that focuses on making and multiplying disciples for the twenty-first century. Winfield Bevins reminds us of the vital multiplication lessons from the Wesleyan movement, one of the greatest missional movements the world has ever known. He highlights the necessity of discipleship as the starting point and the abiding strategic practice that is key to all lasting missional impact in and through movements. The Methodist movement is an example of the power of multiplying movements that utilize the strategy of discipleship. Within a generation, one in thirty people who were living in Britain had become Methodists, and the movement soon became a worldwide phenomenon. We in the Western Church need a movement of historic proportions once again. What would such a multiplication movement look like for us today? We must look to the past to gain wisdom for the future. And as we look at the pages of church history, there is no better example of a multiplication movement in the West than the Methodist movement of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Marks of a Movement highlights the lessons and key insights that enable us to learn from the past and reapply this timeless, biblical wisdom for today.




Organix


Book Description

Does your leadership style fit new ways of doing church--leadership that is organic and elastic and that finds ways to seize God-given opportunities? Looking back and drawing on the ancient Christian tradition, Bob Whitesel describes seven traitsfor successful leadership, which he characterizes by seven symbols: O (the Greek symbol theta) - the first letter of the Greek word theos stresses that God is the source of the burden for others and provides the power to help them. Rx (the medical prescription symbol) - an emphasis on addressing the spiritual and physical health of leaders. G (a stylized "G" for "graffiti")- the edgy, colorful, and artful collages that help define contemporary organizations. A (inspired by the recycle symbol) - the idea of recycling places, experiences and people rather than discarding them. N - emerging networks that connect people more quickly, efficiently, precisely and continuously. I - an emphasis on "incarnation", a going "in the flesh" to serve others rather than sending surrogates. X (the Jerusalem cross with a number in each quadrant) - four types of measurement observed in Jerusalem (Acts 2:42-47), which at their core point to Christ's work on the cross. Taken together, thesesymbols spell out the word "organix" and represent a fundamentally new way tothink about your church and how you can best lead.




Basic Christian Leadership


Book Description

Leadership today is no easy task. Too often our models of leadership are shaped more by culture than by Christ. John Stott rejects popular models of leadership and holds up instead the servant leadership exemplified by Paul in his ministry to the church in Corinth. Stott reassures us that God is at work even in the midst of human weakness.