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BOOK REVIEWS
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People | Principle Centred Leadership | How To Reach Your Life Goals | The Testament | Over The Top | You Need More Money | Rich Dad's Guide To Investing | Magnify Your Vision For The Small Church | Developing The Leader Within You | Developing The Leaders Around You | The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership |
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
While Stephen Covey may be a Mormon, his books are readily accepted by Christians as helpful for personal development. This book is a must read for those seeking to stretch beyond where they're at. One of the major premises of this book that highly effective people understand how to prioritise in a people centred way, and also know how to achieve "Win-Win" outcomes when dealing with people. He regularly cites the teaching of Christ and gives no reference that I could detect to any Mormon writings. This book would really challenge those who are by nature very individualistic, competitive and task driven.
Principled Centered Leadership
This book builds upon the 7 Habits that Dr Covey also wrote. It highlights the difference between management and leadership, and directives versus principles. His argument is that strong leadership is not necessarily directive, but principled. By this he means that when a leader imparts principles to their followers, the leader becomes far more effective. This book is readily applicable into business, sport, and church life. I highly recommend it.
How To Reach Your Life Goals
Businessman and motivational speaker, Peter Daniels, from South Australia, has written this little book to help people put some direction in their life. Peter Daniels doesn't write with the flair of a professional writer but still is passion for life is umistakable. This book reflects many of the popular time management principles prevalent through the 1980s. It centres on a person finding Christ's purpose for their life.
The Testament
This was the first John Grisham novel that I had read. I was immediately impressed with his very skilled writing style. He manages to grip the reader from the first pages and then develop the plot in an intriguing manner. It clearly has a strong Christian message, and I couldn't help but be impressed with the level of research that Grisham had undertaken. I highly commend this book.
Over The Top
What an excellent book! This is one of the most inspirational and motivational books I have read. Zig Ziglar has put together some excellent stories of real people that will motivate the reader to go "over the top".
You Need More Money
Brian Houston has put some Biblical principles on how to be a financial blessing to others in a very simple little book. I was so impressed with this book I bought six copies of it and gave them away. This book would encourage anyone who has money problems to see the possiblities that God has for them.
Rich Dad's Guide To Investing
I've read all of Robert Kiyosaki's books. They changed my mind set about the way I handle money. The content of this book repeats much of what his other books contain. It also appeared to me that it was rushed out due to the many typographical errors it contains. This was a shame since the thrust of the content was so good. In essence Robert Kiyosaki points out the difference between the way the poor, the middle-class, and the rich, handle their money. The poor spend 100% of their income. The middle class spend 120% of their income. The rich spend 70% of their income. The amounts of money they earn is not the point. Kiyosaki shows that someone could be earning big money, yet be living a poor lifestyle. The secret to becoming rich is learning to handle what you get, developing an investment plan, and learning to live generously.
Magnify Your Vision For The Small Church
If the average size church in the USA is 70 people, and the average size church congregation throughout the globe is just 40, what does this tell us about the sovereign mind of God for His Church? Only 6% of churches around the entire world are over 350 members! Yet most of the things written on how to do church is written for the 6%! This leads to many small church pastors or leaders feeling frustrated that they can't emulate the big churches. This book is written to the 94% of churches that average between 40 - 70 people. It contains excellent material especially in regard to the possibilities for overseas Mission involvement.
Developing the Leader Within You
I'm a big fan of John Maxwell. This is one of his earliest books. It explores the principles required to develop yourself as a leader. Maxwell argues that leadership can be learned, and every leader can improve their leadership skills.
Developing Leaders Around You
This is the follow-on from Developing the Leader Within you. Maxwell's catchcry is "There's no success without a successor". This book contains some practical tips for developing leaders.
The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership
Maxwell says that there are 21 laws that every successful leader knows intuitively, yet they have often taken years to understand. Maxwell says that he has discerned these laws from over 30 years of leadership. He draws on both his successes and his failures to validate his laws. He also has a complimentary video series which is a great way to provide some group training. John Maxwell is the undeniable master of leadership teaching. There is always tremendous value in reading anything that he has written on the subject of leadership. These 21 Laws are very helpful and the student of leadership could only benefit from applying them.
The Apostolic Revolution
David Cartledge outlines the story of the Australian Assemblies of God. The thrust of his book is that when the Australian AOG transitioned in 1977 from a democratic leadership to a more authoritative apostolic form of government and leadership, growth was the result. David Cartledge also shares his opinions about the role of apostles in the church today.
AquaChurch
This
was the first Leonard Sweet book that I had read and I was more than a little
impressed! Extremely well written. Extremely well thought out. And extremely
well presented with a creative format, illustrating stories, and sound theology.
The crux of the book is how the church needs to change its approach to "Post-Moderns".
Sweet draws analogies throughout the book from the journey of an old sailing
boat travelling the high seas. While the beginning and end points remain the
same, the journey is always different. So it is for church leaders. We can
not impersonate or exactly replicate another leader's journey. In this sense,
Sweet calls church leaders to be 'aqua-leaders', flexible enough to adapt
to the times and culture in which they are ministering. He has a lot to say
about the church going 'digital' in its efforts to advance its mission.
Authentic Apostolic Leadership
This
is my book which is the result of 6 years of doctoral research with Cambridge
Graduate School. It has been two years in revision with over a dozen revisers
contributing to this final edition. It is a pre-publication coil bound edition.
It establishes the Biblical basis for God ordained leadership, the history
of the apostle's ministry proving that there was at least a second generation
of apostles beyond the original apostles which therefore forms the basis for
accepting the continuation of the apostolic ministry throughout the existence
of the Church. It then seeks to demonstrate this by surveying Christian leaders
who demonstrated apostolic leadership. It then exegetes the Scriptures to
establish what the authentic ministry of the apostle is, and is not. This
is one of the most comprehensive works written on the history and minsitry
of the apostle. [MORE].