Becoming a Future-Ready Church: 8 Shifts to Encourage and Empower the Next Generation of Leaders

by Daniel Yang, Adelle M. Banks, Warren Bird

Are Church Leaders Missing the Generational Handoff? There's Still Hope.

Are we building institutions that will meaningfully serve the next generation of believers and their leaders?How does a church thrive in a culture where we have to earn credibility?How do we create a sense of belonging to the body of Christ and a strong sense of identity for the next generation?Becoming a Future-Ready Church is a blueprint to guide you through eight critical shifts to help lead your church into the future with wisdom and hope. It describes several major converging trends that will greatly impact the church in America over the next few the Great Resignation of Boomer leaders from churches, the shrinking percentage of Christians in America, and the change in felt needs among rising generations shaped heavily by anxiety, skepticism, and fragmentation.

Missiologist and pastor Daniel Yang, religion journalist Adelle Banks, and church researcher Warren Bird have come together in Becoming a Future-Ready Church to help church leaders evaluate whether their ministries are entrenched in strategies that worked well in the past but need to be adapted for the future. By helping us ask better questions about the issues and needs facing the church, they reveal practical ways in which the next generation of church leaders can gain a sturdier foothold as they navigate into the future.

244 pages, Kindle Edition

Published October 22, 2024

Reviews

[Zack · Rating 2 out of 5]

While interesting, I cannot recommend this book. There is too much problematic material woven into some good ideas and helpful prompts for thought/discussion. It is most useful for group discussion, and the questions ending every chapter are useful. If you’re going to read it, a skim-reading is sufficient. Some of the case studies are bizarre.

[Horace · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this one as part of a book club. The three authors are from very different backgrounds- a missiologist/church planter, a religion journalist, and a church researcher. They have identified eight shifts they believe require discussion and planning to enable churches to be ready for the future. These eight shifts:
-from attendance to attachment (identity-shaping relationships)
-from nuclear families to forged families (building community)
-from mind to soul (include an apologetic of empathy)
-from church refugees to church as refuge (from happenstance homogeneity to unification through hospitality)
-from silence to righteousness (taking risks to apply the implications of the gospel that speak to justice)
-from racial tensions to community blessing (moving beyond tokenism to genuine diversity)
-from physical only to healthy hybrid (to digital discipleship)
-from numbers to vitality (from one model of church to embrace multiple models of church)

Each chapter includes a brief case study and provocative questions to apply the implications of the identified shifts.

[Scott Bach-Hansen · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is part of our Clergy Summer Reading options in our District. This review might have been impacted by my excitement for content that I believed would be helpful for my specific situation. The range was helpful, and the case studies were interesting, but they also did not connect for me. I listened to the book on Audible and found the accompanying PDF to be helpful.

Overall, this book will likely have a better impact on others, and it does have good information, but it misses some marks for me.

[Nicole DeFalco · Rating 5 out of 5]

“From Handwringing to Hope”

A beautiful blueprint for leaders to imagine the possibilities of how their church can be a place of belonging, transformation, and hope today and into the future.
I am excited to share this book with the current and emerging leaders in our church. It’s time to get the generations talking, dreaming, and collaborating!

[Steve · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some challenging and interesting ideas, especially in light of my role in church leadership. More an idea-igniter and conversation starter than a prescriptive answer manual. That’s a good thing.

[Mark · Rating 5 out of 5]

Becoming a Future-Ready Church is a helpful book with many different topics worthy of exploration and discussion with present and emerging leaders within the local church context (which is how I used it for a few months with my board as a pastor in an aging, primarily Anglo context).

The “dated” versus “better” questions at the beginning of each chapter are excellent. For example, chapter 5 is about why true hospitality is essential for congregations today to thrive. Instead of asking “how can we stay a “big happy family” by reaching more people like us? We should be asking: How can a culture of irresistible hospitality unify our congregation’s increasing diversity?
With regard to rising generations viewing their faith through the lens of justice, we should be asking how we can be more specific in applying a grander vision for what biblical justice is really about.

The discussion about the uses of technology is also helpful. Instead of bemoaning the way the world is going, we should be asking how we can discern how God is working everywhere people spend time, especially in our growing digital world. How and when can we take advantage of developing digital technologies, whether they be online giving mechanisms, AI tools, streaming technology, etc? Both discernment and imagination are needed.

There’s lots of other good stuff for discussion in the book (the emphasis on nuclear versus forged families and “the NONES” was also quite encouraging for me personally). I’m glad I bought my copy as a resource for group discussions.