Book Review: Creating a Missional Culture

There is a movement at hand. It has been moving for a while under the surface but is starting to become well known. This movement has come from different countries, continents, and cities. It is a movement that captures the imaginations of a generation that is not willing to simply “go to church”, they want to “be the church”. It is sometimes called the “Missional Movement”.

As with any effective movement, there are doers and there are thinkers. There are conceptual leaders and practical leaders. And then there are some leaders who are both.

JR Woodward has written Creating a Missional Culture: Equipping the Church for the Sake of the World to share a conceptual organization of Missional church around 5 equippers. However, he has also invested the years of practice in making shared leadership the central force of unleashing Missional movement that is an extension of Missional culture. So Woodward has written to show how to identify, train, encourage, and unleash the 5-fold ministry in order to create and maintain a Missional culture.

Woodward moves through 4 parts in this book:

In Part 1 he deals with the “Power of Culture”. Here he shows the bare bones of culture, its power, and how it can be a powerful help or hindrance to the church.

In Part 2 he deals with “A Missional Imagination that Shapes Missional Culture”. Here Woodward challenges the leader to share the role of leadership. To try to be all things to your church can kill the Missional culture and deeply injure the pastor.

In Part 3 Woodward presents “The Five Culture Creators”. Woodward puts a different spin on the 5-fold ministry pattern as he identifies them as:

Dream Awakeners (Apostle)

Heart Revealers (Prophet)

Story Tellers (Evangelist)

Soul Healers (Pastor)

Light Givers (Teacher)

Finally in Part 4 he pulls of these together as he presents “Embodying a Missional Culture”. Here he explains from his experiences and praxis how unleashing leadership in this way can impact the culture of the church in order to change the world around them.

There are a lot of books written about the 5-fold ministry pattern and the theological and biblical defense for adhering to them today. Woodward is more concerned with showing how this methodology can impact how you do leadership and how you do church. Because of this, this book is simply indispensable. Every pastor of a Missional community (mid-size group) should read and implement JR Woodward’s suggestions. Every pastor of traditional (attractional) church should read and think deeply about how they can share leadership in order to better be the church that Christ has called them to be.

Buy this book, the appendices alone are worth the price.

Book Review: Return of the Kosher Pig

Was Jesus who he really said he was? This is a question that has been answered since the time of his ministry on earth. The Gospel writers and his earliest followers wrote to answer this very question. Still today there is a need to discuss this question and present thoughtful answers that quell the doubts of those that would seek to know Jesus Christ.

Rabbi Itzhak Shapira has written to answer this question once more. In his book, The Return of the Kosher Pig: The Divine Messiah in Jewish Thought, Shapira seeks to delve into the teachings of the Jewish rabbinical historical writings to show evidence that the Messiah was expected to be divine and that Jesus was this divine Messiah.

Shapira does this by showing the reader how the Jewish rabbis went about reading the scriptures and each other’s writings. Shapira forms his book by following a legal argument and presenting evidence in a logical and compelling manner. He has five sections to his book and in each he shows the scriptures and the historical Jewish understanding of these scriptures.  His final conclusion is that the Jewish people expected a Messiah and many expected a divine Messiah. Although Jesus broke many expectations as a leader, teacher, and savior the expectation of divinity was not one of them. The divine nature of Jesus should then frame his leadership and teaching.

Shapira has done a marvelous job introducing into the way that the Jewish scholar works through a text and argues logically. He presents a Jewish method of hermeneutics that is enlightening and interesting. He also serves as a reminder that the questions about Jesus have not been answered for the final time but that all believers need to be answering the doubts of those that are seeking to know Jesus more.

The one criticism that I have about this book is that it is not for everyone. There are very difficult readings and a lot of Hebrew to read. Even as someone with multiple years of training in Hebrew it becomes confusing. However, no one should expect that every book appeal to every audience.