A growing number of churches are being served by bivocational pastors. Unfortunately, there is a lack of training resources available to help bivocational pastors be more effective. The materials that do exist are often a decade or more old and do not reflect the latest trends affecting small churches. As most of my regular blog readers know, I wrote a book entitled, Developing Leadership Teams in the Bivocational Church, specifically to fill this gap.
In an effort to reach out to students in Bible colleges and seminaries, several donors have made it possible to purchase a copy of the book for every Christian college and seminary in the United States. It is my hope that students will read this book and consider serving small churches when they graduate. One of the donors for the project recently said, “Thank you for letting us invest in students and in small churches, which is where our heart has always been.” A number of librarians from around the country have written to express their sincere appreciation for a copy of the book. One librarian wrote, “We are committed to training students who will serve small churches. But with the economy the way it is, our budget has been tight and we have not been able to purchase as many new books as we would have liked. Your gift to the library helped us have the latest book in a much needed area of study.”
To help keep the cost of the project as low as possible, I purchased the books in bulk using my author’s discount and volunteers from Faith Community Church in Barre, VT, helped prepare and package the books for shipping.
Now that every Christian college and seminary in the United States has received a copy, we are targeting Christian colleges and seminaries in Canada. It costs $20 to provide a copy of the book to a library, which includes packaging and shipping. Anyone interested in donating to this project can send a tax deductible gift to:
Next Generation Evangelistic Network
30 Jones Brothers Way
Barre, VT 05641
Please write “Canada Project” on the memo line of your check.
Note: We also have ongoing projects to provide books for a church planting missionary in Scotland and for Korean church planters in urban areas. Contact me for more details on those projects.
Now that is a cool project!!!
ReplyDeleteThere is a rumor floating around that you are also going to give a free copy of the book to all the students at Fruitland Bible College when you speak there in February. Any truth to that????
ReplyDeleteHaha, Mr. Hopeful Student, I cannot verify nor deny that rumor. But let's just say that you shouldn't miss chapel that day! (And I'm guessing that your first name starts with M.)
ReplyDeleteDr. T
I just stumbled across your blog and plan to spend some time checking it out. I expect to see in the coming years a rise in small churches, even house churches here in the USA.
ReplyDeleteKen,
ReplyDeleteI agree. Small churches are growing in number. The mega-church has it's place, but many people just do not fit into that type of church. Therefore the small church will always exist and perhaps even have a resurgance in years to come. Hope the site is a blessing to you.
Happy New Year Dr. T !!!
ReplyDeleteUPDATE: We have now covered the accredited schools in Canada. Therefore, we are now working on distributing copies of the book to libraries of smaller Bible institutes and training centers. Though many of them are not accredited, it appears from our research that they train the majority of pastors that end up in small churches. Therefore, it is vital that these small schools get the latest materials to train their students. If you would like to place a copy of DLTBC in a small Bible institute or training center, use the address in the blog post above.
ReplyDeleteUPDATE: We still have 80 smaller Bible colleges and training institutes that we would like to place a copy of the book in. If you would like to help place a copy in a library, send your gift of $20 to Next Generation Evangelistic Network, 30 Jones Brothers Way, Barre, VT 05641.
ReplyDelete