But Jesus showed the way to live faithfully before an unbelieving world.As the greatest evangelist, Jesus exemplified how to attract people to the gospel. He modeled how to initiate spiritual conversations full of grace and truth. Christian evangelism, then, both in theory and practice, must be shaped by his pattern.Seeking to articulate the passions and principles present in Christ's life and words, longtime L'Abri staff member Jerram Barrs has studied Jesus' diverse encounters with people throughout the Gospels. Each chapter of Learning Evangelism from Jesus recounts one of those stories, draws useful lessons for readers' lives and communication of the gospel, and concludes with questions for further reflection and application. This highly practical book will guide Christians in how to live before unbelievers and how to love them into the kingdom, just as Jesus did.

    For some, it’s a warm-up for the sermon. For others, it’s a “me-and-Jesus” moment. What is the biblically informed way to view corporate worship?In this book, Matt Merker shows that corporate worship is the gathering of God’s people by his grace, for his glory, for their good, and before a watching world. He offers biblical insights and practical suggestions for making worship what it truly is meant to be: a foretaste of God’s people worshiping together for eternity in the new creation.

    Wayne Grudem's bestselling Systematic Theology has several distinctive features:A strong emphasis on the scriptural basis for each doctrineClear writing, with technical terms kept to a minimumA contemporary approach, treating subjects of special interest to the church todayA friendly tone, appealing to the emotions and the spirit as well as the intellectFrequent application to lifeResources for worship within each chapter Bibliographies in each chapter that cross-reference subjects to a wide range of other systematic theologies.

    In fact, prayer in the church often gets subtly pushed to the side in favor of pragmatic practices that promise tangible results. Rather than being a hallmark of churches, dependence on prayer is usually emphasized only in times of major crisis--if at all. The latest book in the 9Marks: Building Healthy Churches series focuses on the necessity of regular prayer as a central practice in the local church. Examining what Jesus taught about prayer, how the first Christians approached prayer in the early church, and what steps can be taken to prioritize prayer in churches, this book is intended to awaken readers to the need and blessing of prayer in their personal lives and in the life of their local church.

    In recent years, Christian ministries have increasingly prioritized urban areas. Big cities and suburbs are considered more strategic, more influential, and more desirable places to live and work. After all, they're the centers for culture, arts, and education. More and more people are leaving small places and moving to big ones. As a ministry strategy, focusing on big places makes sense. But the gospel of Jesus is often unstrategic. In this book, pastor Stephen Witmer lays out an integrated theological vision for small-place ministry. Filled with helpful information about small places and with stories and practical advice from his own ministry, Witmer's book offers a compelling, comprehensive vision for small-place ministry today. Jesus loves small places, and when we care deeply about them and invest in them over time, our ministry becomes a unique picture of the gospel--one that the world badly needs to see.

    Wayne McDill draws on decades of experience as a preacher and homiletics professor to inspire other preachers to live up to their God-given potential.Here are twelve proven ways to pack more content and effectiveness into every sermon, covering all of the bases from general preparation to the end result of increasing each listener’s faith. Recent seminary graduates and seasoned pastors alike will identify skills that need personal improvement, and McDill encourages them to strengthen such areas at their own pace and in whatever order they feel is best.Every chapter in this new edition has been revised and updated. Also included are additional worksheet helps and sermon examples.

    We all prefer quick fixes and bandage solutions to the long, hard, slow work that produces real change. So the moment we learn about a new ministry or strategy and see its effect in another church, we run to implement it in our own. Unfortunately, this impulse is usually met by opposition, skepticism, and ultimately, rejection.What if the solution isn't a new model or a complicated strategy, but a shift in perspective? What if you could keep your church's current vision, values, and model, and simply make a few micro-shifts...leading to macro-changes?This book explores five micro-shifts that have the potential to produce macro-changes in your church. As you read, you will discover how to integrate these micro-shifts into the life of your church, starting with the way you disciple. You will finish by developing a plan to structure, communicate, and evaluate these changes to ensure that they take root and pave the way for lasting change and kingdom impact.

    But the potential to complete the Jesus mission lies within each of us, as we learn to reproduce our faith as individuals and as reproducing churches.

    But what does it actually mean? What does a missional church look like and how does it function? Two leading voices in the missional movement here provide an accessible introduction, showing readers how the movement developed, why it's important, and how churches can become more missional. Introducing the Missional Church demonstrates that ours is a post-Christian culture, making it necessary for church leaders to think like missionaries right here at home. Focusing on a process that allows a church to discern its unique way of being missional, it guides readers on a journey that will lead them to implement a new set of missional practices in their churches. The authors demonstrate that living missionally is about discerning and joining God's work in the world in order to be a witness to God's kingdom on earth.

    But what about organizing the other side of our lives—the spiritual side?One of the great battlegrounds of the new century is within the private world of the individual.The values of our Western culture incline us to believe that the busy, publicly active person in ministry  is also the most spiritual.Tempted to give imbalanced attention to the public world at the expense of the private, we become involved in more programs, more meetings. Our massive responsibilities at home, work, and church have resulted in a lot of good people on the verge of collapse.In this timely update of his classic Ordering Your Private World, Gordon MacDonald equips a new generation to live life from the inside out, cultivating the inner victory necessary for public effectiveness.

    Too often, however, pastors feel unprepared to effectively shepherd their people through difficult circumstances such as depression, adultery, eating disorders, and suicidal thinking. Written to help pastors and church leaders understand the basics of biblical counseling, this book provides an overview of the counseling process from the initial meeting to the final session. It also includes suggestions for cultivating a culture of discipleship within a church and four appendixes featuring a quick checklist, tips for taking notes, and more.

    A true underdog story. Journey with these young leaders as they do church their way. A diner, driving school and an odd jobs company are just some of the ways this group used to build a thriving church. In "How to Knock Over a 7-Eleven and Other Ministry Training," author and senior pastor Michael Cheshire brings real-life stories to out of the box church work. His humor is unmatched and the insights you get will cut to the core as you journey with him and his team as they build a church from scratch. This book takes you behind the scenes of a radically different way to build a church. It's a valuable resource for those planning to launch a new ministry or for leaders wanting to be more innovative in their community. This is not a story of the traditional church. Michael and his team sacrifice more than a few sacred cows in their pursuit of God's calling. If you're determined to pursue a calling in any type of ministry, this book will only make your fire grow.

    And, like all of his work, this one illustrates the very simplicity he commends to others. Here indeed is a work whose value and usefulness is out of all proportion to its length.

    Each chapter spotlights a common mistake, gives real-life examples, uses a generous dose of humor, and provides a practical course of action to recover from the error. The book draws from the experience of Seacoast Church as well as pastors such as Craig Groeschel, Chris Hodges, Perry Nobel, Mark Batterson, Dave Ferguson, Scott Chapman, Dino Rizzo, Ron Hamilton, and Dave Browning, Church leaders will be encouraged to realize that they are not the only ones who struggle, and that turning their situation around may not be as daunting a task as they think. This is a field guide for the common pastor based on actual churches of all sizes.

    He assesses the strengths and weaknesses of the evangelistic approaches used by the earliest Christians, and he also considers the obstacles to evangelism, using outreach to Gentiles and to Jews as examples of differing contexts for proclamation. Carefully researched and frequently quoting primary sources from the early church, this book will both show contemporary readers what can be learned from the past and help renew their own evangelistic vision.