Learn the "Big Picture" approach that will aim your congregation at the mission field in your back yard, or around the world.

Many churches want to make the transition from an inward to an outward focus, from catering to the needs of members to reaching out into the world to make disciples of Jesus Christ. Too often they try to accomplish this radical change by taking half steps and partial measures, initiating a new program here or adding a new staff members there.

Yet this kind of change requires more. To succeed in changing its core focus this way, a congregation must learn strategic thinking; it must commit itself to seeing the big picture, and to taking the steps necessary to paint that picture afresh. Everyone, including pastors, lay leaders, key teams and groups, and the congregation as a whole must be involved in a process of transformation. Paul D. Borden, author of Hit the Bullseye and Direct Hit, knows that this transformation will not be easy. But if the target is bringing more people into saving relationship with Jesus Christ, what could be more worthwhile?

This volume walks through the sections of the Bible, gleaning insights from each biblical writer. Every chapter analyzes the original setting of the writing, extrapolates the leadership principles in the text, and provides advice on applying that theology of leadership. Presented in everyday language understandable to both professionals and practitioners, these lessons will equip current and upcoming leaders to make a Christlike impact.

Current approaches to congregational leadership are dominated by a kind of group think. Certain assumptions, ideas, and even phrases appear so often in the literature about church ministry and mission that they have achieved the status of conventional wisdom. For example, how many times in recent years have you read about ministry in the postmodern era?The problem with conventional wisdom, says Dan Dick, is that it sets our thinking down a particular path, blinding us to other possibilities and insights. At its worst, conventional wisdom is a cheap and easy substitute for figuring things out yourself. In this book, Dan Dick both explodes false assumptions about congregational leadership, and offers readers the tools they need to lead congregations in the real world, not the wishful thinking world of conventional wisdom.

Nuggets of conventional wisdom debunked include:
- The modern/postmodern myth
- Contemporary North American culture is highly similar to the culture of the New Testament world
- We live in a period of accelerated change unlike any other before us.