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BOOK RESOURCES
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The unique characteristics of small member congregations pose blessings and challenges to congregational leaders. Learn how many leaders work with congregational responses to growth, stewardship, and mission in small membership settings.
CONGREGATIONAL VITALITY : Small Membership Congregations
Help for the Small Church Pastor: Unlocking the Potential of Your Congregation (Book)
Steve R. Bierly, Author. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1995.
Bierly, an experienced small church pastor, offers counsel and encouragement to small-church pastors, often with great warmth and humor.
The Little Church That Could: Raising Small Church Esteem (Book)
Steven E. Burt, Hazel A. Roper, Authors. Valley Forge, PA: Judson Press, 2000.
Small churches can counteract the low-self esteem that sometimes surfaces when they try to live up to "big church" standards. Raising self-awareness can help small churches achieve constructive change in situations such as declining membership.
More Than Numbers: The Ways Churches Grow (Book)
Loren B. Mead, Author. Bethesda, MD: The Alban Institute, 1993.
Author Loren Mead presents four types of church growth: growth of members; growth by members; growth as a church's reordering of the way it works; and growth as a church’s enhanced impact on the local community.
Small, Strong Congregations: Creating Strengths and Health for Your Congregation (Book)
Kennon L. Callahan, Author. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 2000.
Callahan counters the conventional wisdom that bigger is better and that the future belongs to the megachurch with this celebration of small, strong congregations.
Turnaround Strategies for the Small Church (Book)
Ronald K. Crandall, Author. Herb Miller, Editor. Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 1995.
Arguing that small churches can grow and flourish, the author discusses the pastor's crucial role and explores those attitudes and behaviors that inhibit growth and those that can lead to revitalization.
Western Seminary Institute for Small Church Health (Web Resource)
This web site of the Institute for Small Church Health lists books and related sources, seminars and credit courses, and past newsletter issues to help leaders of small rural churches function more effectively.
Effective Approaches to Growth and Stewardship in the Small Church (Article)
Perry Bell, Author. Congregations. September/October 1994. Vol. XX, No. 5, pp. 9. Bethesda, MD: The Alban Institute.
What makes small churches unique? And what special approaches to growth and stewardship are most effective in the small church?
The Five Stones: A Newsletter for Small Churches (Periodical)
Dedham, MA: T.A.B.C.O.M.
This quarterly newsletter offers thought-provoking perspectives on ministry in small congregations.
How to Thrive as a Small-Church Pastor: A Guide to Spiritual and Emotional Well-Being (Book)
Steve R. Bierly, Author. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1998.
For pastors who serve small churches, How to Thrive as a Small-Church Pastor provides down-to-earth counsel on surviving, and perhaps even thriving, in a small-church environment.
Inside the Small Church (Book)
Anthony G. Pappas, Author. Bethesda, MD: The Alban Institute, 2002.
This is an indispensable resource for small-church leaders to learn to stimulate ‘leading, loving, largening, and leaving’ in their congregations.
Learning to Pastor a Small Congregation (Article)
Andrew D. Hagen, Author. Congregations. January/February 1998. Vol. XXIV, No. 1, pp. 14-15. Bethesda, MD: The Alban Institute.
Small Churches Can Make a Big Difference (Media)
Distributed by Discipleship Resources.
Youth Ministry in Small Churches (Book)
Rick Chromey, Author. Loveland, CO: Group Publishing, Inc., 1990.
Author and youth minister Rick Chromey has created a practical collection of ideas to help volunteers, pastors, and youth ministers design, build, and evaluate a healthy ministry for the small church.
(reprinted from "Congregational Resource Guide")
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