If you are looking for a leadership book for youth pastors, A New Kind of Leader: What You Believe Can Open a Door for a Kid or Teenager’s Future, is for you!
This might be one of the simplest and best book on leadership for church leaders ever. That is why we love it. Are you looking for a short book (less than a 120 pages) to read on leadership? This could be the book for you.
Reggie Joiner breaks this book up into 7 chapters or sections. Here they are.
- Kids Matter
- A Strategy Matters
- The Church Matters
- Every Family Matters
- The Truth Matters
- Doing Good Matters
- This Week Matters
The best part of, A New Kind of Leader, is that at the end of every chapter there is a page or two to write down some thoughts or a strategy. So, not only are you learning about being a leader, you are implementing it.
I talk to a ton of youth pastors who have absolutely no plan for reaching people in their community. Actually, it’s quite disturbing when I go to a youth pastor meeting and all we talk about is getting more church students to church events. We don’t talk about reaching unchurched students.
It breaks my heart that we don’t care more about unchurched students. Every time I pull up to the school and I don’t know a students name, I am heart broken. They need the church, they need Jesus. Reggie Joiner cares enough to write A New Kind of Leader. This is the manifesto our church needs today. It’s simple, blunt and straight forward. That is what new leaders need today.
Another thing we absolutely loved about the book was the writing style. It’s written in a blog format style that is really easy to read. You could easily read this book in under an hour. You could also spend 30 minutes each week working on a section and make your ministry one that reaches students and their families.
One quote that should haunt youth workers is, “Okay, Maybe there are better reasons why your church matters. But there is a sobering thought: you are surrounded by people in your community who don’t think your church matters at all.
How do I know? Because nearly 75 percent of them don’t go to church. Not because they are anti-your church, but because they are truly oblivious to your church’s existence. They don’t hate your church. They just don’t think about your church.” That quote should rattle youth workers. It should drive us to have a strategy that reaches students and their families. When you reach a student it doesn’t just stop there, you actually impact the whole family.
We loved Reggie Joiner‘s book, A New Kind of Leader. Go and pick up a few copies today!
Quotes we loved:
“What you do for a kid is more important than what you do for them later as an adult.”
“The early years shape so much of an individual’s sense of purpose, belonging, and identity.”
“No one can volunteer for anything until we have enough leaders for kids and teenagers.”
“It’s your strategy, not your mission, that determines your success.”
“Here’s The point. It’s important to thing about church as a place simply because kids need a place. Before they can wrestle with abstract concepts like grace, hope, and forgiveness, kids need a place where they can connect with people who are the church.”
“Just remember, there is nothing in culture that can compare to what you can do for a family if you show up consistently to care about a kid’s faith and future.”
“When you are relevant, you don’t compromise the integrity of truth, you elevate the value of a truth. Irrelevance, on the other hand, paralyzes truth.”
“Teenagers are especially drawn to anywhere they can find adventure and significance. So, if you want to engage a teenager, give them somewhere to serve.”
