Books

We’re overwhelmed. Everyone I meet is drowning in “their thing.” It doesn’t matter if “your thing” is an artistic endeavor, profit margins, wining and dining clients, or raising children. We can’t see past “our thing” because “our thing” (whatever it happens to be) is all-consuming.

By reconnecting with your neighbors, you will bring the church back to the forefront of what has been missing--a deep community connection.

“We need to build relational capital. These guys need to enjoy gathering together. They need to love one another. They need to really practice the ‘one anothers’ that we see in Scripture. So, that was our primary goal for that fall season.” The groups took off and thrived.

“We want believers to feel more equipped in the Word and prepared to engage the culture,” explains Amanda Barr, director of the school.

First and throughout the process, becoming a belonging culture requires that we see the image of God in each other. Men need to see and recognize that God made women in his image and for his purposes and gifted them for that calling. Those gifts include leadership, preaching, and teaching.

For some leaders, listening to another person talk about their problems is like fingernails on a chalkboard. While other leaders embrace the conversations as they gain a high conversing with others.

The message of assimilation makes me uncomfortable because it requires me to celebrate the loss of other people’s culture, traditions, and languages in order to alleviate the fears that white people, including Christians, might have about a diverse society where their position as power brokers of society may be threatened.

Becoming a better shepherd or a better leader never happens by accident, and it doesn’t simply happen over time. Men and women who improve...