Church Ministry

The Church Commissioned delivers a resounding yes. This powerful and practical book is a call to arms — not to fight culture, but to fulfill the high calling Jesus placed on every believer: to carry His name, His hope, and His message into the world. You weren’t rescued to be passive. You were redeemed to be commissioned.

We live in a season when church attendance is still building back to what it was before the pandemic. Many Christians have been separated from their church communities. How do we resume and re-prioritize church life and join back together? Why do we even need to—especially when online church fits so neatly around our schedules? Gathered for Good addresses this felt need with empathy and authority and encourage believers to commit to their local church community as a way to deepen their spiritual growth and invest in treasure that will last.

Pastors and ministry leaders are some of the hardest-working people in the world—and they have the high rate of burnout to prove it. As a leader, if you aren't operating at peak efficiency and taking care of yourself, it is bound to catch up with you in a big way. So few in ministry feel they have the time to take a sabbatical or tend to their own physical, emotional, and spiritual needs. But healthy rhythms of work and rest are the key to a thriving, long-term ministry.

Following the example of John the Baptist and with a careful look at the teaching of Scripture, Tim Suttle dares church leaders to risk failure by chasing the vision God has given them - no matter how small it might seem - instead of pursuing the broad path of pragmatism that leads to fame and numerical success.

Many new believers have questions about what it means to live as a Christian in the context of a local church, and pastors are looking for resources to pass along to their congregations to help them think biblically about the Christian life. Church Questions is a series by 9Marks that seeks to provide Christians with sound and accessible biblical teaching by answering common questions about church life. Each booklet offers biblical answers and practical applications with the goal of nurturing healthy church practice and commitment.

The year 2017 is the 500th-year anniversary of Martin Luther nailing his Ninety-Five Theses to the door of Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany - the event that marked the beginning of the Reformation and the end of unified Christianity. For Catholics, it was an unjustified rebellion by the heterodox; for Protestants, the release of true and purified Christianity from centuries-old enslavement to corruption, idolatry, and error. Benjamin Wiker's account rejects the common distortions of Catholic, Protestant, Marxist, Freudian, or secularist retellings of this world-changing event.

Move over boomers, Xers, and millennials; there's a new generation - making up more than 25 percent of the US population - that represents a seismic cultural shift. Born approximately between 1993 and 2012, generation Z is the first truly post-Christian generation, and they are poised to challenge every church to rethink its role in light of a rapidly changing culture.

Is successful leadership measured simply by the outcomes a leader achieves, or is there another—more essential—yardstick for measuring success? In Redefining Leadership, author, pastor, and college president Joe Stowell shows us that the best leaders are driven by Christ-formed character...

Jesus commands his disciples to love one another and promises that “by this everyone will know that you are my disciples” (John 13:35). But what does genuine care for those in our church family look like? This warm, practical book by Dwayne Bond goes beyond specific pastoral-care roles and responsibilities and explores how all church members can love and care for one another in the rhythms of ordinary life.

Nearly all churches and ministries consider themselves dedicated to evangelism, and many explicitly include outreach in their mission statements. But few are actually bearing fruit. Kevin Harney diagnoses this problem and offers guidance for multiplying the outreach impact of churches. Organic...

As Catholic theologian, historian, and papal biographer George Weigel notes, the next pope will probably have been a teenager or a very young man during the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965); he may even have been a child during those years. Thus the next pope will not have been shaped by the experience of the Council and the immediate debates over its meaning and reception like Pope John Paul II, Pope Benedict XVI, and Pope Francis.

“A deeply felt meditation on the vital role of passion in good teaching”—with useful samples, interviews, and advice (Anthony Rotundo, The Washington Post) Every teacher can be a passionate teacher—one who engages young people in the excitement of learning and ideas—if teaching is...

In The Man for the Day, J. Josh Smith walks through the life of Elijah to reveal ten qualities needed in the pursuit of a life that matters. Smith invites men to boldly lead their families, churches, and communities, to meet the needs of the day for the glory of God.

Protecting the Sacred: A Church Officer’s Guide to Effective Risk Management is the ultimate playbook for pastors, church administrators, and ministry leaders seeking to fortify their ministries against unseen dangers. This essential guide doesn’t just highlight risks—it equips you with proven strategies to safeguard what matters most: your people, your property, and your church’s reputation.

Is gospel Christianity dead? Pundits are writing the obituary of historic, orthodox Christianity, but pastor and author J. D. Greear (Gospel, Stop Asking Jesus into Your Heart) believes the postmortems are premature. Jesus promised to build his church. He said that the gates of hell would not prevail against it. The church is not going away. Along with this promise, Jesus gave clear instructions for how the church would prevail. He promised to build it on the rock of the gospel.

How Leaders Lose Their Way is a powerful and reflective exploration of the pitfalls that can send leaders off course―drawing lessons from the life of King Solomon and the timeless wisdom of Ecclesiastes. This book serves as a cautionary tale, equipping leaders to recognize personal and spiritual drift while providing actionable steps to maintain their mission-focused leadership.

In all areas of life and leadership, we create very new ways of being with self and others. This book is full of leadership materials from my lifetime of various sources, including Healthy Congregations, Inc., an organization whose focus is around growing thoughtful leaders. A congregation, though commonly referred to as a spiritual group, is actually any group that is interacting and united in a common purpose, including relationships and families.

Este libro es una crónica sobre el Grupo Pequeño o Movimiento Celular, partiendo de la época de Jesús hasta llegar a la explosión celular en los tiempos modernos. Comiskey destaca las fortalezas y debilidades de estos movimientos históricos de grupos pequeños, y aplica estos principios a la iglesia actual. Crecerás en gratitud y en entendimiento de los valores clave de las células a causa de aquellos pioneros que allanaron el camino.

What if I told you that you were only one step away from unlocking new levels of maturity and growth in your church? The myth of the silver bullet still exists because we desperately want it to. We all prefer quick fixes and bandage solutions to the long, hard, slow work that produces real change. 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 microshifts...leading to macrochanges?

The tragic death of 13-year-old Danny Croteau in 1972 faded from headlines and memories for 20 years until the Boston abuse scandal - a string of assaults taking place within the Catholic Church - exploded in the early 2000s. Despite numerous indications, including 40 claims of sexual misconduct with minors, pointing to him as Croteau's killer, Reverend Richard R. Lavigne remains "innocent." Drawing on more than ten thousand pages of police and court findings and interviews with Danny's friends and family, fellow abuse victims, and church officials, the author uncovers the truth.