Tag Archives: Thom Rainer

Sunday Six-Pack (36)

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Saturday escaped me one more time, but here is the latest Six-Pack.

The best ministry-minded or faith-focused articles I could find this week? Here they are, with some grace space for a bit of who-knows-what.

If six options stuns you, start with my two *Picks of the Week*, and pick up steam from there.

For a steady stream of such links, follow me on Twitter ( @JasonBandura ) to the right of this post.  Sharp quotes and solid articles are tweeted 3-4 times daily.

Today’s edition:

1) Autopsy of a Deceased Church (*PICK OF THE WEEK*)
Thom Rainer’s most popular post last week was this piece of post-mortem analysis on a church that he had sadly predicted would die.

2) 42 Leadership Lessons from a Disney Executive
Brian Dodd put together this best-of, point-form review as he listened to Disney’s Brian White (also a church elder) present at the Orange Conference.

3) Fired
In this recent Leadership Journal piece, Nathan Kilgore shares a few lessons he’s learned through an abrupt move from pulpit to pew.

4) Why Traditional Churches Should Stick with Traditional Worship…if They’re Content with Dying a Slow Death
Every church, regardless of heritage or style, will need to figure out how it expresses its corporate worship, and why it chooses that particular expression. Adam Walker Cleaveland interacts with a few recent posts to highlight why he thinks this is so important.

5) The Outside View of a Former Church Insider (*PICK OF THE WEEK*)
Shaun King was wrapped in roles of ministry, serving as pastor and church planter, back into his teenaged years. An unforeseen exit at age 29 put him in the unfamiliar role of church outsider. From there, he’s made at least ten insightful observations.

6) Jerry Seinfeld’s Productivity Secret
Anyone who has ever desired to “get in a groove” will be intrigued by this simple move that kept Seinfeld on track when he was still a struggling-to-make-it comic.

Blessings on you, my friends.  May the week ahead be filled with God in ways that you can sense. Tune yourself in, and walk on!

YOUR TURN: Add a line below to direct other readers to the best stuff above or to highlight the piece that gave you something worth keeping.

Your input makes this post better!

[You can subscribe to this blog via RSS or email, in the upper right corner of this page.]

Saturday Six-Pack (27)

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Another weekend, another Six-Pack of noteworthy pieces recently discovered online.

As usual, these articles are typically ministry-minded or faith-focused, with enough flexibility to toss in the occasional who-knows-what.

With the links more thickly packed than usual today, the six has become four. If a third-dozen options still paralyzes you, begin with my two *Picks of the Week*, and move from there.

For a steady stream of such links, follow me on Twitter ( @JasonBandura ) to the right of this post.  Sharp quotes and solid articles are tweeted 3-4 times daily.

Today’s edition:

1) Louis Giglio… In… Then Out (*PICK OF THE WEEK*)
If you’ve somehow missed it this week, Louis Giglio was selected to publicly pray for the nation and the president at President Obama’s inauguration.  And then he was essentially uninvited. Reason? A sermon he preached 15+ years ago, on the subject of homosexuality, that found its way online.  One of the best summaries I’ve read was from Skye Jethani. Mike Lukaszewski offers this “what I wish Obama had said in response” piece, and Justin Taylor has compiled three sharp bits of commentary from others.

2) Dealing with Demons (*PICK OF THE WEEK*)
A missionary from the same conservative Evangelical heritage as myself describes his experience with the supernatural in Rwanda.  Thanks to Jonathan Storment for the link.

3) Churches and Malls
A recent morning blurb from HBR bounced off of this piece by Thom Rainer gives some food for thought on the future of church facilities.

4) 33 HBR Posts You Should Read Before 2013
So we missed the deadline on this title, BUT there ARE some terrific pieces to be found here.  Among them are The Magic of Doing One Thing at a Time, HBR’s most-read piece of 2012 AND I Won’t Hire People Who Use Poor Grammar. Here’s Why, the most-commented-on piece of the year.

Blessings on you, my friends.  May your weekend be refreshing in rest, play, and worship.

YOUR TURN: Direct other readers to the best stuff above by making a comment below, or weigh in on what you read.  Your input makes this post better!

[You can subscribe to this blog via RSS or email, in the upper right corner of this page.]

Saturday Six-Pack (26)

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Happy New Year, friends!  I hope your 2013 is off to a smashing start.

The end of 2012 saw me doing some digital housekeeping, part of which was sifting through pieces I’d bookmarked over the past months as suitable Six-Pack links.  So here is a smattering of less-recent-than-usual articles that may have been missed in weeks gone by.

As usual, if a half-dozen options paralyzes you, begin with my two *Picks of the Week*, and move from there.

For a steady stream of such links, follow me on Twitter ( @JasonBandura ) to the right of this post.  Sharp quotes and solid articles are tweeted 3-4 times daily.

Today’s edition:

1) Showing Up
When you feel discouraged over a lack of fruit for your efforts, there is a certain measure of pride and satisfaction to be taken in the simple fact that you continue to show up.  So says senior pastor Mike Glenn, in regards to ministry.

2) When Are We Going to Grow Up? The Juvenilization of American Christianity (*PICK OF THE WEEK*)
Christianity Today’s Thomas Bergler considers how the Western world’s changing views on youth and adolescence have impacted, and in some regards stunted, our expressions of Christian faith and community.

3) Pornopoly
The impact of pornography upon society and relationships cannot be over-emphasized.  Dave Dunham, for the Gospel Coalition, makes this compelling case while spelling out some of the impacts that the average mind might not consider.

4) Have the Courage to Be Direct (*PICK OF THE WEEK*)
The call to blunt conversation is particularly piercing to anyone in a leadership position; however, it is equally important to anyone who cares about simply building the life that he/she wishes to live.  This HBR piece will help you to consider what keeps you from more direct interactions, and how you might make such an impacting move more frequently in the days ahead.

5) How to Write a Joke
Jerry Seinfeld muses on how his creative process works in this short video from the New York Times. For anyone whose work involves creativity, this just may resonate. Or it may just highlight the silliness of things you worry about!

6) The Secret Structure of Great Talks
In this TED talk, Nancy Duarte reveals what makes all the difference in the world in the presenting of ideas.  The best idea in the world isn’t worth anything if it stays stuck in one’s own mind.  How to present effectively?  Here’s one woman’s take on it.

Blessings on you, my friends.  May your weekend be refreshing in rest, play, and worship.

YOUR TURN: Direct other readers to the best stuff above by making a comment below, or weigh in on what you read.  Your input makes this post better!

[You can subscribe to this blog via RSS or email, in the upper right corner of this page.]

Saturday Six-Pack (23)

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Imagine: A “Saturday Six-Pack” arriving on… wait for it… Saturday!

After two weeks of lateness and a week of absence, I’ve regained my position on the top of the pile!

Here’s your weekly fodder of faith, ministry, and who-knows-what tossed in!

If you need help starting, begin with my two *Picks of the Week*, and move from there.

For a steady stream of such links, follow me on Twitter ( @JasonBandura ) to the right of this post.  Sharp quotes and solid articles are tweeted 3-4 times daily.

Today’s edition:

1) Why Churches Should Euthanize Small Groups
Being part of a leadership team that has significantly increased our emphasis on Small Groups in recent years, this title grabbed me.  Author and pastor Brian Jones points out a few of the struggles that many of us have experienced…

2) What Legalists and Atheists Cannot Understand (*PICK OF THE WEEK*)
This little piece from the Gospel Coalition revolves around a late night visit between Christian apologist Larry Alex Taunton, Oxford mathematician John Lennox and the late Christopher Hitchens, author of “God is Not Great”.  Throw in some rich references to my favourite portion of Scripture, and I freely recommend this one.

3) Fourteen Indispensable Leadership Quotes from Jim Collins
Jim Collins is recognized across the board as a voice of wisdom on the theme of leadership. Here, Thom Rainer captures a couple touchdowns’ worth of his best bits.

4) Why Women are More Religious than Men
For Psychology Today, Nigel Barber puts forth a theory that I confess to find quite weak. A strand of truth is here, but more than anything, this article served to enlighten me on why people of faith must live out their convictions or else risk observers like Mr. Barber largely missing the whole point.

5) You Are Not a Computer (Try as You May)
Here’s my favourite line from this great piece from the Harvard Business Review is this: “What information consumes is rather obvious. It consumes the attention of its recipients. Hence a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention.”  That opinion was shared in 1970, and it is abundantly on-the-mark today.  Some thought-provoking stuff here on how to live well within the “information age”.  If I had a third *PICK OF THE WEEK*, I’d put it here.

6) The Science of Productivity (*PICK OF THE WEEK*)
I just discovered Gregory Ciotti’s site: SparringMind.  This post features a three-minute video (which I tweeted a link to, earlier today) that breaks down some of the science behind our minds work and how we might better work within that framework to be more efficient in spending our time and energy. Quite fascinating to me!

May your week be full of awareness and enjoyment of the God who already fills it with Himself and every good thing.  Blessings on you, my friends.

YOUR TURN: Direct other readers to the best stuff with a comment below, or weigh in on what you read.  Your input makes this post better!

[You can subscribe to this blog via RSS or email, in the upper right corner of this page.]

Saturday Six-Pack (14)

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Welcome to the weekend, and thanks for spending some time “Wandering & Wondering”.

This weekend’s Six-Pack features a half-dozen online offerings from the past week.  As usual, these articles are mostly faith-focused or ministry-geared, with a bit of disorderly-pile-of-who-knows-what tossed in!

Today’s edition:

1) Cheap Law
In his latest post for Gospel Coalition, Tullian Tchividjian shares this word: “Jesus shows that because God’s demands are unqualified and undiluted, the grace we desperately need must be unqualified and undiluted.”  He warns that the great problem in the church today is the same problem Jesus addressed in Matthew 5–cheap law, not cheap grace.  He then directs us to a very sharp piece by John Dink.

2) When the Church Lost Its Voice
Scot McKnight summarizes a chapter from Ross Douthat’s recent book, “Bad Religion” that sketches five major shifts that have undermined the faithful witness of the church over the past six decades.

3) The Enemy of Innovation and Creativity
That quest that many of us have toward ever higher levels of efficiency?  Patrick Lencioni has a warning about that.

4) Sectarianism Sucks
Frank Viola’s more proper title opens this piece that includes some powerful text from Watchman Nee on this divisive disease that still damagingly infects Christ’s Body.

5) Five Warning Signs of Declining Church Health
From his archives, Thom Rainer shares these five tip-offs for diagnosing un-health within one’s church before it hits dangerous extents.

6) The Moral Importance of the iPhone
This very brief piece from John Pattison provides a few provocative questions for any of us who depends regularly on technology.

Enjoy your weekend, friends, through renewing yourself and reverencing God.