How Your Congregation Learns: The Learning Journey from Challenge to Achievement - Softcover

Shapiro President, Rev. Tim Rev.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1566997445 ISBN 13: 9781566997447

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2017

Synopsis

Change isn’t always easy or intuitive. How Your Congregation Learns introduces churches and leaders—both lay and ordained—to the process of the learning journey. By understanding learning dynamics and working to become a learning community, the congregation will be able to move more purposefully to achieve its goals.

Congregations face many kinds of challenges. Some are mundane: the roof leaks; the parking lot needs repaving; the microphones don’t work well. Some tests are transcendent: How should lives be honored? What is God calling the congregation to do and be? How can generosity be taught? Throughout life people face challenges for which they are not prepared—the death of a parent, a new job offer, making a decision about where to live. So it goes that congregational leaders face challenges that are just beyond the grasp of their abilities. This book addresses the just-beyond-the-grasp challenges and shows how real congregations can learn from them.

About this title

About the Author

Tim Shapiro is president of the Indianapolis Center for Congregations. He is a Presbyterian Church (USA) minister who has served congregations in Indiana and Ohio. He is the co-author of Holy Places: Matching Sacred Space with Mission and Message.

Review

If you are looking for a way to engage your congregation in living its mission and addressing ever-increasing demands, then How Your Congregation Learns is the resource you need. Tim Shapiro provides a unique and much-needed understanding of how to transform the congregation into a learning community ready to take on new initiatives. How Your Congregation Learns provides a practical process—with lots of congregational examples—that will give you the knowledge and confidence to facilitate change and create innovation. (John Roberto, president, LifelongFaith Associates)

In many congregations, the best ideas die on the vine or fizzle after the first try, because they exceed current capacity. But what if the daunting goal is to actually generate new capacity for effective mission, today and tomorrow? “Learning to learn” is the key to unlocking new strengths in congregations—even the smallest ones—and this book reveals how this powerful and sacred process actually works. (Alice Mann, Congregational Consulting Group)

Edition details

• Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
• Publication date: 2017
• ISBN 10: 1566997445
• ISBN 13: 9781566997447
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 184