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Pursuing God's Will Together: A Discernment Practice for Leadership Groups (Transforming Center Set), by Ruth Haley Barton
Download Pursuing God's Will Together: A Discernment Practice for Leadership Groups (Transforming Center Set), by Ruth Haley Barton
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Review
"Ruth Haley Barton is a gifted distiller of historic best practices for community discernment and direction. Exercising her counsel on the rare 'vow of stability' would by itself rescue multiple organizations from broken strategic trajectories. I highly recommend Pursuing God's Will Together for leaders, teams and organizations." (Dr. Bruce McNicol, president, Truefaced Inc.)"Pursuing God's Will Together is a much-needed corrective to our headstrong individualism today. It drills down deep into rock-bed practicalities for any community seeking to discern the will of God together. I recommend it highly." (Richard J. Foster, author of Celebration of Discipline and Sanctuary of the Soul)"Fabulous! I look forward to giving copies to our staff and elders. Ruth provides a practical, powerful road map so we can discern the most important question as a leadership team: What is God's will for us on a particular issue?" (Pete Scazzero, pastor of New Life Fellowship Church and author of The Emotionally Healthy Church)"While there has been a revival of interest in spiritual disciplines for some time, there is precious little available about how to practice them in community. More specifically, there is almost nothing about helping Christian leaders discern God's presence and activities together. That is, until now. With Pursuing God's Will Together, Ruth Haley Barton―a recognized leader in spiritual formation―fills this need admirably. This is an important, unique book that will be sure to transform Christian corporate leadership from a pure business model to a more spiritually integrated approach. I highly recommend it." (J. P. Moreland, professor of philosophy, Talbot School of Theology, Biola University, and author of The God Question)"I have been grateful for Ruth Haley Barton's wisdom in the past on spiritual disciplines so crucial for the soul of a leader. I am sure her latest work will be of great benefit to those who seek the grace of discernment in their work and ministries." (Gary Haugen, president and CEO, International Justice Mission)"Pursuing God's Will Together is a powerfully convicting and timely book for those of us who are fully aware that we are incapable of effective leadership apart from God's wisdom and direction. How to discern God's purposes individually and as a dynamic team is the genius of this compellingly creative call to kingdom movement. Ruth Haley Barton presents us with a proven―if at times painful―practice that can ultimately take our finite efforts to where our infinite God wants them to go." (Harold B. Smith, president and CEO, Christianity Today International)"I like this book. It is wise, thoughtful, gracious and a little bit disturbing―Ruth will surely upset some of your preconceived notions. If you are like me, you believe in the guidance of the Holy Spirit, but you want to be wise and not presumptuous about knowing God's will for your group. This book is a real gift to folks like us. It provides us with much more than simply a plan of action. You can use it yourself, but it will also be quite useful to you with your fellow decision makers, so that discerning God's will together becomes an experience in spiritual growth for the whole team." (John Yates, rector, The Falls Church)"In Pursuing God's Will Together [Ruth Haley Barton] weaves her own wisdom with others in bringing forth a beautiful tapestry of spirituality in community." (Chuck Olsen, founder, Worshipful-Work, and author of Transforming Church Boards)"It's impossible to overstate how needed, valuable, timely and timeless this book is. It is as wise as Methuselah and as practical as a slingshot. Ruth has rendered a massive service to church leaders everywhere, and to all the churches they lead. Herein lies the remedy for the sad but common malady we see today: otherwise godly men and women pursuing God's kingdom with worldly navigational equipment. I plan to buy a case of Pursuing God's Will Together upon its release and make it mandatory reading for all of our leaders. It can hardly come soon enough." (Mark Buchanan, pastor, New Life Community Baptist Church, author of Spiritual Rhythm and Your Church Is Too Safe)"This book needs a warning label: 'Content may be disruptive to your understanding of Christian life, leadership and community.' Ruth Haley Barton has provided every Christian with an invaluable resource for discerning and fulfilling the purposes of God. In a world where Christians and Christian leadership and communities have largely succumbed to secular processes for decision making, Barton brings a clear, challenging and compelling call for a radical alternative. This book is not the product of a 'theorist,' but the mature distillation of Barton's own journey into a life hid with Christ in God for the sake of others. This is a must-read for every Christian leader and leadership group, and a primer for every Christian." (M. Robert Mulholland Jr., professor emeritus, Asbury Theological Seminary, and author of Invitation to a Journey and The Deeper Journey)
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About the Author
Ruth Haley Barton (DD, Northern Seminary) is founding president of the Transforming Center, a spiritual formation ministry to pastors and Christian leaders. A trained spiritual director (Shalem Institute for Spiritual Formation), teacher and retreat leader, she has served on the pastoral staff of several churches, including Willow Creek Community Church. A sought-after teacher, preacher and consultant to leadership teams, she is currently adjunct professor of spiritual transformation at Northern Seminary. Educated at Wheaton College, Northern Seminary and Loyola University Chicago Institute for Pastoral Studies, Ruth is the author of numerous books and resources on the spiritual life, including Invitation to Solitude and Silence, Sacred Rhythms, Longing for More and Strengthening the Soul of Your Leadership. She is also the author of an online resource titled eReflections, spiritual guidance via e-mail. She contributes regularly to Conversations: A Forum for Authentic Transformation.
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Product details
Series: Transforming Center Set
Hardcover: 256 pages
Publisher: IVP Books; First Ed 1st Printing edition (June 18, 2012)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0830835660
ISBN-13: 978-0830835669
Product Dimensions:
5.5 x 1 x 8.2 inches
Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review:
4.7 out of 5 stars
57 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank:
#34,048 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
Most Christian leaders have a vague sense that our approach to decision making should be different from secular models, but we are not quite sure what that difference is, according to Ruth Haley Barton in this book. Spiritual discernment requires us to move beyond reliance on human thinking and strategizing to a place of deep listening and response to the Spirit of God within and among us.A problem with spiritual discernment is that it seems subjective and mystical, whereas typical leaders are more drawn to objective and pragmatic decision-making techniques. Many poor church decisions have been made by leaders who thought God was telling them to move in one direction when the objective evidence indicated that the wise course of action was in a different direction. So how does the author recommend proceeding?Before even starting on discernment, the author recommends that each member of the leadership team go through a spiritual transformation process involving adopting a number of spiritual practices, and that the team as a whole agree on values that will undergird their community. The recommended discernment process itself involves the following steps:* Preparation: clarify the question, gather the community for discernment, affirm guiding values and principles* Seeking leading: pray for indifference (i.e. absence of any personal bias), test for indifference, pray for wisdom, prayer of quiet trust* Discerning God's will: listen to the question, listen to each other, listen to pertinent information, listen to inner dynamics, create silent space for God, reconvene and listen again, select and weigh the options, agree together, seek inner confirmation* Act: communication with those who need to know, make plans to do God's will as you have come to understand itThe last chapter is entitled "But Does It Work?", and while some readers will enthusiastically embrace the author's advice, others may be left wondering. The recommendations concerning the use of liturgical prayers and other practices based on monastic and Quaker traditions may not appeal to everyone. Nevertheless, anyone who is tired of church leadership meetings which seem to ignore God's leading will find some useful ideas to consider inside this book.
I am in the process of transitioning our church leadership teams and committees into spiritual communities of practice. In other words, I am seeking to have each team and committee (eventually) not just be a group of people that seeks to do business, but a small group that has a particular ministry and learning focus. The idea is that leadership within the church will be a growing and learning process, and not just another meeting I have to show up to. The teams will become life-giving communities instead of simply obligations. That is the goal.I was in the process of introducing this paradigm shift when I discovered this book. This book calls leadership teams in congregations and other Christ-centered organizations to become communities of spiritual discernment. The first three quarters of the book teaches the readers how to establish a discernment culture within the organization. The final quarter of the book unveils a clear, practical methodology for practicing discernment in leadership gatherings and communities.I have enjoyed this book so much that I am in the process of buying the book for each member of the leadership board of our church with my own money. It is a suburb introduction to doing ministry in a different way. It is going to be a great tool for moving us away from a purely business model of church leadership, and moving toward being a wisdom-seeking leadership team. I love it.
There is something to be said when people commit to seeking God’s face in a communal setting. Barton’s book addresses this idea as she walks the reader through twelve chapters of what it will take for a group to move from non-community to community, from non-discernment to discerning God’s direction together. The key issue for leaders that Barton hits on again and again is the need to seek and ask God for wisdom and discernment. There is a spiritual ingredient here, as the group gets more real and open with each other and as they together learn to discern God’s voice, amazing things can happen. The author does not mince words here, as she also declares that we cannot discern and hear God’s voice and direction if we are not also doing this very same thing on an individual level. Part of living in a covenant community as a leader, one must also press into seeking God on a personal level. These two go hand in hand. Leadership community and discernment are not just going to happen. There must be commitment from the group to pursue God. This book will challenge your individual times with God and build the bridge to do this effectively in a group context. If you want to make a true heart commitment to join God in what He desires to do through you, then this book is a must read. But, read with caution, as you will be challenged, convicted and changed.
Once I decided to get past the borderline psychobabble (i.e. "false-self pattern" - a phrase never defined in this book), I think the book has merit. One challenge faced by our board of Elders must be met - the temptation to implement the discernment process in chapters 9-12 without doing the hard, individual/group work in chapters 1-8. We went from "let's do the process" to "let's summarize the first 8 chapters" to "let's do what's in the first 8 chapters, then try the process".This is not a quick-fix book. If you have to make a big decision this month (that's where we started), look elsewhere. The virtue of Barton's approach is that if focuses on transforming the individuals first, operating on the premise that if I can't truly discern God's will in my own life, I am unlikely to successfully discern it for my church or ministry when working with a group of similarly ill-equipped leaders. This is a journey, not a technique. I don't know if we'll make it to our intended destination, but those of us who work at it should experience some transformation in our own lives, which alone would make the effort worthwhile.
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