New church leaders unsurprisingly have a lot on their plate. Between overseeing the church's day-to-day activities and mapping the high-level, comprehensive spiritual direction, new pastors certainly have their work cut out for them. Balancing these responsibilities while cultivating a thriving, connected church community can prove overwhelming for even the most experienced pastors.
Fortunately, many spiritual leaders have contributed ministry books to help new pastors build and maintain a healthy parish. In this article, we unpack 7 ministry books that can help new pastors step up as Christian leaders.
1. Strengthening the Soul of Your Leadership
While it may be difficult for an aspiring pastor to imagine getting burned out as a church leader, every new minister should expect to experience some kind of fatigue. Between making difficult decisions regarding the future and direction of the church and motivating followers to serve the church community, pastors undeniably have a lot on their plate. As Ruth Haley Barton offers in Strengthening the Soul of Your Leadership, pastors must engage in consistent faith- and self-discovery to maintain their passion.
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Across a number of points that rely on real-world examples, Barton focuses on how church leaders can keep on track in their spiritual leadership. Some of the subjects covered in the text include:
- How to negotiate the isolation of leadership
- Maintaining the passion of the calling to lead a ministry
- Building and sustaining a community based on faith and spirituality
- Accepting and spreading the vision of the kingdom of God
- Applying authenticity to church leadership
Strengthening the Soul of Your Leadership balances conceptual and practical approaches to maintaining the drive to lead spiritually. At the same time that she paints a compelling portrait of Moses to illustrate how spiritual leaders can respond to the pressures of ministry, Barton also offers assessment tools that leaders can work through individually or in group settings.
2. Spiritual Leadership: Principles of Excellence for Every Believer
One of the most important and recognizable ministry books for church leaders, J. Oswald Sanders’ Spiritual Leadership provides an overview of what pastors need to do to develop effective and adaptive leadership practices. Even though many ministry degree tracks will require Spiritual Leadership to be read and discussed throughout coursework, the text remains relevant to pastors of practically every experience level.
Originally published in 1967, the text has been reprinted several times over the last 50 years because of its ongoing relevance to Christian leaders. Through examples of some of the most significant spiritual leaders throughout history, Sanders highlights how Moses, Christ’s apostle Paul, Charles Spurgeon, and Nehemiah were able to inspire through their spiritual direction. Some of the central leadership principles that Sanders focuses on cover:
- How leadership comes with a price
- The duty and responsibility embedded in spiritual leadership
- The trials and tribulations that spiritual leaders face
- How leaders can and must inspire future leaders
- What traits are necessary for effective spiritual leadership
The tenets that Sanders lays out in Spiritual Leadership chart a path that spiritual leaders can take as they motivate followers in service and worship.
A pivotal and invaluable text, every pastor aiming to understand the qualities behind successful spiritual leadership should tap into Sanders’ directions.
3. Desiring the Kingdom: Worship, Worldview, and Cultural Formation
Theologian and philosopher James K.A. Smith offers a thorough examination of how pastors, as the principal educators and leaders of a church community, should adapt to our current cultural moment. In one of the more intellectually rigorous ministry books, Smith contends that at the same time that our culture has become increasingly secularized, people still embrace liturgy in other, potentially unexpected places. From malls, stadiums, and universities, Smith details that “human beings are ‘desiring agents’; in other words, we are what we love.”
From this perspective, Smith calls for a shift in how pastors teach their congregations. By understanding that Christian education is a gradual, growth-based process that emphasizes the kingdom of God, pastors and other church leaders can better connect with followers through a central “vision of flourishing.”
Desiring the Kingdom should be approached as a philosophical text. Instead of offering explicitly practical advice for new pastors, the work operates more as a conceptual guide for how new liturgical leaders can build a church curriculum that focuses on redirecting “our desire toward God's kingdom and its vision of flourishing.” Importantly, Smith’s work can help new pastors better understand the role of education in community worship and church practice.
4. The Emotionally Healthy Leader: How Transforming Your Inner Life Will Deeply Transform Your Church, Team, and the World
Entering into church leadership as a pastor fresh out of school can be overwhelming. From navigating new responsibilities, balancing a new schedule, and working to instill a promising vision for the church community, new pastors have the unfortunate task of remaining calm and collected while facing a number of new challenges all at once. This kind of transition can take a toll on even the strongest church leaders, which is why ministry books like Peter Scazzero’s The Emotionally Healthy Leader remain so important.
Some of the most pressing topics that Scazzero details include:
- Generating an ongoing life connection with Christ
- Managing stress through healthy spiritual and psychological decision-making
- Creating teams to support church initiatives
- Cultivating an inspiring, healthy, and inviting culture
Scazzero, like Ruth Haley Barton, offers practical assessment material that church leaders and groups can take to identify areas that can be improved. The strategies that Scazzero outlines in the text are important for every pastor regardless of experience because they center on how spiritual leaders can improve their relationship with God – and with themselves.
5. Lasting Impact: 7 Powerful Conversations
Now that a new pastor is fresh into spiritual leadership, it’s time to focus on how to guide and expand the church community. And with this drive to positively impact and grow the reach of the church, it’s necessary to have realistic expectations about the congregation’s future. In Cary Nieuwhof’s Lasting Impact: 7 Powerful Conversations, new church leaders can grapple with the often difficult strategies of raw, honest communication. Nieuwhof identifies that many unhappy, dissatisfied church communities often end up that way because of a communication breakdown.
At every level of leadership all the way down to new followers, communication can make or break how connected and engaged a congregation will be.
In Lasting Impact, Nieuwhof provides church leaders with a framework on how to have necessary, sometimes uncomfortable conversations with church members to ensure the community can manage its expectations successfully, help the community grow, and chart a practical set of objectives. And as church leaders continue to have these important conversations, church communities can connect more meaningfully with their new pastors and each other.
6. The Art of Gathering: How We Meet and Why It Matters
Priya Parker’s The Art of Gathering: How We Meet and Why It Matters isn’t expressly considered among Christian ministry books. Despite its broader applicability, it unpacks just how Christian leaders can improve church gatherings simply on the level of human connection. On the whole, the text offers a comprehensive overview of how leaders across practically every industry and field can facilitate engaging, inviting, and effective gatherings.
When church members can engage with each other and with leaders in meaningful, impactful gathering opportunities, they will be much more likely to channel their passion into serving the church community.
Understanding how to facilitate engaging gatherings is vitally important for new pastors, as they will have the tremendous responsibility of creating a church culture that inspires when people get together. Across examples that center on how humans interact in the courtroom, in the conference room, in summer camp, and in meetings, Parker offers strategies that new pastors can use to guarantee that members get the most out of going to church.
7. Emboldened: A Vision for Empowering Women in Ministry
While Tara Beth Leach’s Emboldened: A Vision for Empowering Women in Ministry details specific ways that women can enter into church leadership successfully, the strategies she provides in the text are applicable to all new pastors. The central tenets in one of the most exciting new ministry books focuses on how vital it is for spiritual leaders to engage all members – particularly women – to employ their God-given talents and abilities to help contribute to a thriving church community.
As Leach lays out clearly and carefully throughout the text, women should be trusted and invited to lead across all levels of the church organization. In Emboldened, she offers how new pastors can manage and overcome imposter syndrome, respond to conflict, and act as a mentor to others in the community. Finally, Leach illustrates how both men and women must share in the responsibility of promoting women leadership in the church.
Begin Your Spiritual Leadership Journey
While the texts outlined here are certainly helpful companions for any new pastor entering the field, it’s still important to understand what pastors do on a foundational level. By engaging fully with the awesome responsibilities found within the job of a pastor, aspiring ministerial leaders can best prepare for a fruitful future as a spiritual guide. Learn more about what it takes to be an engaging pastor today and kickstart your journey into spiritual leadership.
