To correspond with our Spring Books issue, we asked our bloggers to share books that have influenced their ministry.
The first time I heard Andy Stanley speak was (I am fairly certain) in the fall of 2002 at the National Youthworkers Convention in Nashville, Tennessee. I had no idea at the time that he was the pastor of Northpoint Church in Atlanta, one of the fastest growing churches in America. I also had no idea that he was the son of Charles Stanley, a well-known pastor and author who reached millions of people through his television ministries.
All I knew is that he said one of the most amazing things I had ever heard about leadership in the church. Stanley boldly asserted during his talk that sometimes the pastor of a church may not be the best person to stand up in front of the congregation to preach. Churches that wanted to grow and thrive, he told us, put the best people for a task in charge of doing the said task, especially if said task is communicating and leading. He also added that if church leaders want to create the kind of church that unchurched people want to attend, they have to be willing to admit their weaknesses and learn to play to their strengths.
I never forgot that message, and I began reading Andy Stanley’s books, listening to his sermons and following his ministry from that moment forward. Northpoint Church is now one of the largest churches in the country, and Stanley, like his father, is reaching millions of people through television, online and through satellite and partner churches all around the world.
A couple of years ago, Stanley wrote a book entitled “Deep & Wide: Creating Churches Unchurched Love to Attend.” “Deep & Wide”was the first time that Stanley had shared in writing the most important lessons that he and his church leaders had learned over the past several years. It was also the first time in writing that Stanley shared the painful story of how he left a successful position in his father’s church to launch Northpoint and the implications of that move on their relationship.
“Deep & Wide”also contains Stanley’s biblical “justification” for Northpoint’s approach in reaching unchurched people, and detailed descriptions of the spiritual formation model that he and his leaders used from the beginning of their ministry together. Stanley also provides what he calls the “rules of engagement” when it comes to creating “irresistible environments” for unchurched people, including an entire chapter on how to preach with the mindset that there are unchurched people listening. Finally, Stanley provides church leaders and pastors with some tips on leading a local church through the changes that it takes to become the kind of church that unchurched people love to attend.
I’ve read a lot of books on church transformation over the past 16 years of ministry. “Deep & Wide” is without the doubt the most impactful book on the subject that I have ever read. It challenged me to rethink a great deal of how I was approaching leadership, and helped me to focus on evangelism in ways that I had not thought possible as the pastor of a 130 year-old Presbyterian church. Many of the changes that were effected because some key staff members and I read “Deep & Wide” have resulted in significant growth in our church. We have more unchurched, de-churched and church-hurt people attending worship and getting involved than ever before. And we’ve only just begun. I highly recommend pastors and church leaders study “Deep & Wide”together, especially if you want to find ways to grow your church other than merely “sheep-swapping” churched people with other churches.
Leon Bloder is a preacher, a poet, a would-be writer, a husband, a father, a son, a dreamer, a sinner, a pastor, a fellow-traveler and a failed artist. He is talentless, but well-connected. He stumbles after Jesus, but hopes beyond hope that he is stumbling in the right direction. Leon has been married to Merideth for 22 years, is the father of three awesome boys, and serves in ministry at the First Presbyterian Church of Eustis in Eustis, Florida.
