Author: Administrator
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Congregational Leadership In Anxious Times
Anxious times call for steady leadership. When tensions emerge in a congregation, its leaders cannot be as anxious as the people they serve. To remain effective, congregational leaders must control their own uneasiness. This takes self-awareness and confidence to manage relationships and influence behaviors. Knowing how to deal with anxiety and how to work through…
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Leadership In Congregations
This new book in Alban’s Harvesting the Learnings Series gathers the collected wisdom of over 10 years of Alban research and reflection on what it means to be a leader in a congregation, how our perceptions of leadership are changing, and exciting new directions for leadership in the future. With pieces by such diverse church…
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The Grace Of It All
This is an invitation to a conversation on the pastoral life from one of America’s most respected clergy. Dean Lueking shares the fruits and foibles of his 50 years in parish minstry, 44 of them in the same congregation, Grace Lutheran in River Forest, Illinois. A lively storyteller, Lueking writes as the wise friend and…
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This House We Build
This one-volume guide to a healthy congregation combines the wisdom of a rabbi with the expertise of an organizational development consultant to demonstrate the power of positive relationships and show how to avoid some of the common traps that can lead to serious conflict. Using the life of the synagogue as its central illustration, this…
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The Work Of The People
Worship is the work of the people of God. Patterns of worship shape how we pray and how we live. Despite its centrality to church life, worship is too often taken for granted as something a congregation experiences rather than collectively creates. The Work of the People simply and clearly explains the structure of worship, the actions…
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Winning Grants To Strengthen Your Ministry
Ministry leaders possess the compassion, creativity, and knowledge about community needs that grant funders appreciate. Yet ministry groups are often less experienced than other types of nonprofit organizations in discerning which funding to seek, understanding how to build relationships with funders, and putting together proposals. This book offers a pathway to strengthening new and existing…
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Who Is Our Church?
After congregations have considered their history, added up all the statistics, and tried to be honest about their core values, the question still remains: “Who are we, really?” Author Janet Cawley offers a creative, engaging, and faithful way to answer just that question. Cawley demonstrates how to use a congregation’s knowledge of itself to construct…
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Practicing Right Relationship
In this profound yet practical book, Mary Sellon and Daniel Smith make the case that the health of churches and synagogues depends on congregations learning how to live out love in “right relationships.” The authors distill what they have learned from other researchers as well as their work with dozens of pastors and congregations. This…
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A Praying Congregation
“I believe that God is calling all of us into deeper prayer and is longing for our congregations to become places of prayer,” writes Jane E. Vennard. Pastors and others who want to develop their skills as teachers of prayer and spiritual practices will find in this book not only wisdom for themselves but easily…
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A Generous Presence
A Generous Presence is a collection of story-driven essays about the philosophy, tools, and work of coaching that is designed to support all spiritual leaders in deepening and enriching their personal and professional relationships. By practicing the coaching tools Rochelle Melander offers, spiritual leaders will be better equipped to guide those they work with toward accepting…
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Stilling The Storm
When congregations go through difficult times, worship will both reflect and influence those difficulties. The practice of worship itself can be a key part of the congregation’s healing process. Teacher and consultant Kathleen Smith successfully demonstrates this truth in Stilling the Storm, a book for anyone seeking a deeper understanding of the ways that worship intertwines…
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With All Thy Mind
The worship terrain has changed, but a consensus has yet to emerge even about what worship is, let alone how we should worship. Increasingly, however, people are hungry not just to know about God, but to experience God with all they they are – mind, heart, body, and soul. Worship must engage all of the…