The Mentoring Church: How Pastors and Congregations Cultivate Leaders

by Phil A. Newton

Ministry Book of the Year--The Gospel Coalition 2017 Book Awards

The critical missing element in Christian mentoring today: the congregation

"Bringing up future leaders isn't just the job of the pastor but of the whole congregation. This is an urgently needed book in churches today."
--R. Albert Mohler Jr., president of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary

Young, emerging leaders of the church, many of whom have gone through leadership training and traditional mentorship programs, still too often find themselves unprepared for the realities of ministry. Many leave the ministry altogether, overwhelmed.

Phil Newton reveals a critical gap: single-source mentorship is incomplete. Mentoring must involve the congregation, not just senior pastors, in order to bring forth mature, resilient leaders prepared for all that ministry entails.

The solid, practical solutions in The Mentoring Church offer churches of any size both the vision for mentoring future leaders and a workable template to follow. With insightful consideration of theological, historical, and contemporary training models for pastor/church partnerships, Newton is a reliable guide to developing a church culture that equips fully prepared leaders.

Genres: Leadership, Nonfiction, Discipleship, Church

242 pages, Kindle Edition

Published May 27, 2017

About the author

Phil A. Newton (PhD, Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary; DMin, Fuller Theological Seminary) is senior pastor at South Woods Baptist Church in Memphis. In pastoral ministry for over thirty-five years, he also serves as an adjunct professor at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary’s Equip Center.

Reviews

[Colby Reese · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 stars. Honestly a really helpful book, especially if you’re trying to think through how your church should disciple and raise up leaders. The book was likely a little too long for what it accomplished, which is why I knocked it down half a star. However, it is well-researched and well-organized, and the book accomplishes arguing for and specifically presenting how a church community should be instrumental in the training and mentoring of church leaders.

[Eric Durso · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent book. Going to go back to this one a lot.

[Kyle Grindberg · Rating 3 out of 5]

Overall good, a few irritating things here and there.

[Dan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Finding leaders is a tremendously hard, almost impossible, hair-pulling Adventure. Do you like me that sentence has been your mantra for many years. Prior to reading the mentoring Church by Phil a. Newton I thought that if I could not find previously trained leader in my congregation then I would be at a loss for sustainable leadership. After reading this work Newton has revolutionized my view on how a pastor and that of a congregation must cultivate leaders.

In his relatively short, just over 225 pages, work Newton explains all about leadership in the church. He specifically focuses on how to create a leader by mentoring him. Mentoring is something that the secular world has used for many years but the church has largely neglected it. This is not to say that discipleship does not use certain qualities of mentoring but rather that they are two sides of the same coin. Mentoring focuses on developing a person outwardly wow discipling focuses on the inner self.

As a person who was mentored throughout his teenage years and discipled concurrently I feel that a combination of both is needed. That is why it is refreshing that Newton does not Bash one to support the other. Rather in this work lays out a training methodology, using support from history as far back as Paul on through the 16th and 20th centuries. Furthermore in his methodology he lays Out 3 distinct models which can be used in the context of the church. Each of these methods may not be helpful or useful to every church but the cheap points he makes in each one of these models will be helpful regardless of the church size, denomination, or type of leadership.

I recommend this work to pastors who are looking to seek out people to Mentor into leaders rather than those so we looking for those who already are leaders.

This book was provided to me free of charge from Kregel Publications in exchange for an unbiased, honest review.



The Mentoring Church: How Pastors and Congregations Cultivate Leaders

© 2017 by Phil A. Newton

Publisher: Kregel Publications

Page Count: 240 Pages

ISBN: 978-0825444647

[Anthony Rodriguez · Rating 3 out of 5]

Call it 3.5 stars. It’s a helpful and surprisingly detailed survey of various mentoring models that provided a lot to chew on. I have two complaints:

1. This was a book that advertised itself as a stud of cultivating “leaders.” However, it’s pretty clear that Newton means “pastors.” This was very disappointing to me as I am a pastor and my church needs input on raising up lay leaders. Principles apply but much time was spent on things that really do not apply.

2. Because this was written by a Baptist pastor about raising up pastors, and not leaders generally, women are entirely written out of this book. Complementarianism does not necessitate that women be sidelined or untrained or left without mentors. But this book does not address women at all and goes out of its way to specify, in every circumstance, that men are in view. What about women? Are women never leaders? Surely any job that is not an elder’s is available to a woman?

[Hopson · Rating 4 out of 5]

How should Christian leaders be trained? Should the next generation of pastors be trained by seminaries, Bible colleges, or other parachurch ministries? Phil Newton presents a compelling case for leadership training to occur within the context of a local church. Newton carefully mounts a biblically-grounded and historically-proven case for the essential nature of church-based mentoring. I especially appreciate Newton’s care to present several contemporary models of church-based pastoral training without promoting one as superior to the others. This is a very helpful book for all pastors desiring to raise up leaders within the context of a healthy local church.

[Seth Channell · Rating 3 out of 5]

What it says is spot on counsel. Thankful Pastor Newton wrote this book.

Thoughts on improvement: The book claims to answer how to cultivate leaders, but it focuses almost exclusively on men pursing pastoral ministry as a vocation. I was looking for help more on raising up leaders who would serve the church in a non-compensated role.

Also, while I appreciated the theological, biblical, and historical foundation the book provides, I need more practical instruction. I need answers to how not why. Again, the book provides some of this, but I was left wanting more.

[Wes F · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very practical & insightful book on how an appropriate church context with a well-designed mentoring program is the best one for most effectively cultivating leaders. Phil Newton uses his own personal example (of a lack of such mentoring as he moved into church leadership), his own church's mentoring program, as well as several other very insightful examples of purposeful churches with well-designed mentoring programs (e.g. The Summit, Capital Hill Baptist).

[Pete Williamson · Rating 5 out of 5]

For any church looking to begin or strengthen a process of developing leaders, this is a eminently valuable resource. Newton spends the first two-thirds of the book surveying the Bible as well as church history in an attempt to capture consistent elements in leadership development. The final third focuses on a number of current practices and concludes with a healthy bibliography on a variety of topics to help anyone begin crafting a process of their own.

[Ryan · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was an excellent book in thinking through how to potentially shape a church based internship for pastoral ministry. Biblical, historical, and contemporary models are examined for ideas and basic principles for mentoring men for pastoral ministry. I will likely be referring back to it often in the months to come as we start this up at our church.

[Alastair Gooderham · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars overall for this book. A helpful examination of biblical and historical and contemporary patterns of discipleship. Very practical in terms of encouraging pastors and churches to think through how it can disciple its members.

[Hunter Hanson · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was a dry read at times, but it was very helpful to consider different models for raising pastors within the church. It provides lots of practical suggestions for mentoring future leaders and pastors within the church. I plan to return to it in the future.

[Brian Virtue · Rating 4 out of 5]

There are some 5 star chapters and there are some 3 star chapters, but a lot of rich contributions to the discussion. Was probably a bit more focused on the development of pastors and church planters rather than general discipleship and leadership development among all in the church.

[Noah Buresh · Rating 4 out of 5]

For a church leadership development book, I was pleasantly surprised by the sheer amount of dialogue partners he engages with. Definitely geared toward developing future pastors rather than ministry leaders in general, but still has good insights for overall leadership development.

[Matt Francisco · Rating 4 out of 5]

A thoughtful challenge to pastors to do the hard work of cultivating future ministers through intentional mentorship within the context of the local church.

[Mike Conroy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loved the overall point of needing to involve the whole church in raising up leaders. The examples from the 16th - 20th century churches was helpful. I appreciated the modern examples, as well.

[Manuel Alfredo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Muy buen libro que incluye una revisión del Nuevo Testamento y la historia de la iglesia de como los líderes forman a nuevos líderes.