Deepening Your Effectiveness: Restructuring the Local Church for Life Transformation

by Dan Glover

Is your goal to build great churches or make great disciples? Is your congregation full of professing-only Christians? Becoming a Christian disciple is supposed to be life-altering, a process of maturation and transformation. The church is to intentionally support that development - both individually and corporately. Sometimes, though, pitfalls and barriers in life and even within the church itself can damage the committed but unequipped follower. Proposing a ""deep-sea change"" from the typical church plan, Glover and Lavy offer experienced coaching in how to systematize disciple-making in a congregation. ""As people of the Great Commission, we have only one to fill our churches with people who can say... 'I really know Jesus,'"" writes Glover and Lavy. ""When this happens, the world will not be able to contain the church. We will be everywhere, serving everyone and lifting the name of Jesus as our motivation. Jesus, who is Truth, would not have sent us to go and make disciples of all nations if we weren't actually able to accomplish the mission."" Framing their very workable ideas in a seashore analogy, the authors explain how to identify the stages of spiritual development - from skeptical seekers to authentically functional disciples. Each aspect is supported with examples of both ministry successes and failures. Every church understands its mandate to ""Go and make disciples,"" but not every church has a plan to make it happen. Deepening Your Effectiveness is the template you've been looking for to attract new believers and move them toward Christian maturity. With Glover and Lavy as your guides, you'll transform your congregation's mandate to ""Go and make mature and committed disciples!"" A Facilitator's CD is also available for church leaders.

224 pages, Paperback

First published August 1, 2006

Reviews

[Erin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Powerful and challenging look at how the church can and should (and sometimes fails to) work to grow disciples. Highly recommended esp. for UMC personnel.