Warren Bird

Dave Ferguson

In Hero Maker you will learn how to bring real change to your church and community by developing the practical skills to help others reach their leadership potential. Discover how to activate gifts, help others take ownership, and develop a simple scorecard for measuring your kingdom-building progress.

Five Essential Practices for Leaders to Multiply Leaders

Hero Maker

Jon Ferguson

Dave Ferguson and Jon Ferguson challenge you to make a wager with God to show up in your life. This companion guide to the Finding your way back to God book and DVD will help you reconnect with God, even if you feel that you've forgotten him -- or that he's forgotten you. The five sessions explore key ideas from the book and look at the awakenings people typically have on their way back to God...--From publisher.

Five Awakenings to Your New Life

Finding Your Way Back to God Participant's Guide

"God, if you're real, make yourself real to me." Each of us spends our lives on a journey toward God. Yet often our most deeply felt longings--for meaning, for love, for significance--end up leading us away from, instead of toward, our Creator and the person he made us to be. Finding Your Way Back to God shows you how to understand and listen to your longings in a whole new way. It's about waking up to who you really are, and daring to believe that God wants to be found even more than you want to find him. It's about making the biggest wager of your life as you ask God to make himself known to you. And it's about watching what happens next.

Finding Your Way Back to God

This is an inspiring collection of commentaries on overcoming the challenges business owners face every day. It's about conquering fear and celebrating success, written by a small business owner who has helped hundreds of business owners improve their results and rediscover the joy in owning their business. The book provides an opportunity to reflect on what business is and how it needs to work to be successful. Moreover, it helps every business owner to recognize how their business can contribute to their life and not become something that takes it over. It's a reflection on what works and what doesn't, how to recognize opportunity and how to build on success. It's about building a business that gives you income - and joy.Robert Anderson, one reader, commented:"The fact is that your WRITING is more than just inspiring ..... it makes the TRUE READERS have to STOP and THINK about themselves. For much of what has been written pertains not only to the business owner, but to all of us as individuals. IS not our life ....a business? Are we as individuals not challenged in many the same ways the business owner is? RE-READ this book and let your mind be OPEN to not only what it says......but what you can say back to it! Explore yourself.......Operate on FAITH! Thank you for having the desire to write, the time to think things through and the ability to give something to others!"

The Business Owner's Bible - Operating on Faith

I wish I had loved more. I wish I had been smarter about money. I wish I had thought about God more. We all have regrets about the past. Many of them come from our attempts to fulfill unmet longings. Dave and Jon Ferguson call this back and forth between longing and regret the Sorry Cycle—and they want to help us escape it. In Starting Over, Dave and Jon show us how to recognize specific regrets and then release them to God as we learn to see our regrets as opportunities to start over. Finally, we can see God redeem our regrets as he takes the worst things in our lives and uses them for a greater good. In this new edition, Dave and Jon provide an inspiring and never before published case study for achieving real life change. Your regrets don’t need to keep you from the joy God has for your life. As you apply the recognize-release-redeem process to your financial, relational, and personal regrets, you will find new freedom in living out your God-given dreams. Fall in Love with Your Regrets It sounds impossible. How can we learn to love our mistakes and failures? Instead, we go over and over them in our mind. Could they ever bring us—or anyone else—good? Drawing from scientific research and biblical truths, Jon and Dave Ferguson give us tools to redeem our mistakes in five key areas: relationships, health, purpose, finances, and spirituality. Along the way, they teach us lifelong skills for getting unstuck when regret threatens to trap us again. We also learn how to help others escape the Sorry Cycle and experience the Starting Over Loop. It is possible to learn to love our regrets because through them we see God at work. We see that our weakness does not limit what God can do. Whatever regret is trapping you in the Sorry Cycle, God is big enough to redeem it. What could you do with a life beyond regret?

Your Life Beyond Regrets

Starting Over

Sold as a 10-pack Wherever You Are Right Now, You Can Move Toward God Do you believe God exists but struggle to connect with him? Do you feel like you’ve forgotten a God you used to know? Or do you feel that God has forgotten you? Most people say they believe in God, but many don’t feel connected to God. That’s just as real for long-time church attenders as it is for long-time spiritual wanderers. Many times in the course of our lives, we sense a distance between where we are and where we want to be. Dave and Jon Ferguson help you start right where you are and take the first step in finding your way back to God. Go further with the complete book by Dave Ferguson and Jon Ferguson Finding Your Way Back to God:Five Awakenings for Your New Life

(10-PK)

Can I Find My Way Back to God?

Todd Wilson

Becoming a Level Five Multiplying Church continues a conversation started in the Exponential book Spark: Igniting a Culture of Multiplication, drilling down into more detail focusing on how we can each play our part in moving the needle on church multiplication. While Spark introduced these three core elements of culture, in this book Todd and Dave press more deeply into how we live them out. In this expanded version, Alan Hirsch also provides an additional chapter and comments throughout the book. Focusing on the specifics of helping churches identify where they are on the multiplication scale (Levels 1 - 5) and what's needed to become a Level 5 multiplying church, Todd and Dave champion multiplication and equip future church multipliers to move beyond the prevailing addition-growth scorecards. The bottom line, the authors say, is that we need to rethink the operating system that's producing growth but not producing multiplication--and aim for more healthy Kingdom growth that's focused on multiplication.

Becoming a Level Five Multiplying Church

5 Simple Missional Practices to Change Your World

Discover Your Mission Now

The Hero Maker shows how to disciple leaders in a way that leads to leadership multiplication. It shows how to set up or improve intentional leadership development in a church of any size, how to find potential leaders, and how to disciple a church's existing leaders, both volunteer and staff, so catch a vision for their own replication.

Patrick O'Connell

INSIGHTS AND INSPIRATION FOR PURSUING THE GREAT COLLABORATION For more than a generation, the church in the West has looked to the star pastor or the efforts of a fast-growing church to lead the way in helping us accomplish the mission of Jesus. It's not working. We have forgotten God's truth that we are better together. In their new book, Dave Ferguson and Patrick O'Connell identify the critical missing piece, pointing us to Jesus' prayer in John 17. It is the third "Great" command. We are to Go (the Great Commission) in Love (the Great Commandment) Together (the Great Collaboration). It's when we put all three together--and only when we obey all three--that we'll realize the dream of the kingdom of God. Dave and Patrick use their collective experience and tell the stories of others to share how God is working through collaboration--specifically reproducing church networks--to create an infrastructure for kingdom movement. If you've ever asked why you should join a network or wanted to start one, don't miss these insights from these leaders. Together, they remind us, we can change the world. "A strong church planting network will bring the infrastructure that's essential to multiplying churches. It will also provide the equipping, training and care you and your family will need when times get tough. If we're going to see a wave of church planting across North America, it will depend on strong networks that support and produce healthy church plants." --Kevin Ezell, Send Network "Networks allow us to do what we couldn't do on our own. They help create a new reality and being part of a network lets us imagine things that weren't previously possible. Whether you are part of a large resourced church, or a brand-new church plant, networks give you a seat at the table as you pursue God's mission together." --Chad Clarkson, Houston Church Planting Network "Only through collaboration with other churches, church planters, church leaders and Christ followers is there any hope of seeing the Jesus mission accomplished. Together is that watershed book we need to move forward." --Troy McMahon, Kansas City NewThing Network DAVE FERGUSON is an award-winning author and founding and lead pastor of Chicago's Community Christian Church, a missional multisite community considered one of the most influential churches in America. Dave also provides visionary leadership for NewThing, an international church planting movement, and is president of the Exponential conference. Dave is married to Sue, and they have three amazing kids, Amy, Josh and Caleb. PATRICK O'CONNELL is the Global Director of NewThing, a catalyst for movements of reproducing churches. He is passionate about helping people start new things for the kingdom. He's married to Nancy and they have three great kids.

The Great Collaboration

Together

Supplemental Resource to Hero Maker Book by Dave Ferguson and Warren Bird

A Supplemental Resource to the Book Hero Maker

The Legacy of a Hero Maker

Eric Bramlett

Community Christian Church embraced the Big Idea and everything changed. They decided to avoid the common mistake of bombarding people with so many “little ideas” that they suffered overload. They also recognized that leaders often don’t insist that the truth be lived out to accomplish Jesus’ mission. Why? Because people’s heads are swimming with too many little ideas, far more than they can ever apply.The Big Idea can help you creatively present one laser-focused theme each week to be discussed in families and small groups. The Big Idea shows how to engage in a process of creative collaboration that brings people together and maximizes missional impact. The Big Idea can energize a church staff and bring alignment and focus to many diverse church ministries. This book shows how the Big Idea has helped Community Christian Church better accomplish the Jesus mission and reach thousands of people in nine locations and launch a church planting network with partner churches across the country.This book is part of the Leadership Network Innovation Series.

Focus the Message---Multiply the Impact

The Big Idea

Community Christian Church embraced the Big Idea and everything changed. They decided to avoid the common mistake of bombarding people with so many 'little ideas' that they suffered overload. They also recognized that leaders often don't insist that the truth be lived out to accomplish Jesus' mission. Why? Because people's heads are swimming with too many little ideas, far more than they can ever apply. The Big Idea can help you creatively present one laser-focused theme each week to be discussed in families and small groups. The Big Idea shows how to engage in a process of creative collaboration that brings people together and maximizes missional impact. The Big Idea can energize a church staff and bring alignment and focus to many diverse church ministries. This book shows how the Big Idea has helped Community Christian Church better accomplish the Jesus mission and reach thousands of people in nine locations and launch a church planting network with partner churches across the country. This book is part of the Leadership Network Innovation Series.

Focus the Message--Multiply the Impact

I wish I had loved more. I wish I had been smarter about money. I wish I had thought about God more. We all have regrets about the past. Many of them come from our attempts to fulfill unmet longings. Dave and Jon Ferguson call this back and forth between longing and regret the Sorry Cycle—and they want to help us escape it. In Starting Over, Dave and Jon show us how to recognize specific regrets and then release them to God as we learn to see our regrets as opportunities to start over. Finally, we can see God redeem our regrets as he takes the worst things in our lives and uses them for a greater good. Your regrets don’t need to keep you from the joy God has for your life. As you apply the recognize-release-redeem process to your financial, relational, and personal regrets, you will find new freedom in living out your God-given dreams. Fall in Love with Your Regrets It sounds impossible. How can we learn to love our mistakes and failures? Instead, we go over and over them in our mind. Could they ever bring us—or anyone else—good? Drawing from scientific research and biblical truths, Jon and Dave Ferguson give us tools to redeem our mistakes in five key areas: relationships, health, purpose, finances, and spirituality. Along the way, they teach us lifelong skills for getting unstuck when regret threatens to trap us again. We also learn how to help others escape the Sorry Cycle and experience the Starting Over Loop. It is possible to learn to love our regrets because through them we see God at work. We see that our weakness does not limit what God can do. Whatever regret is trapping you in the Sorry Cycle, God is big enough to redeem it. What could you do with a life beyond regret?

Alan Hirsch

The church is on the verge of some tremendous changes. Contemporary church growth, despite its many blessings to believers, has failed to stem the decline of Christianity in the West. These times require a different kind of church—a church where every person is living a mission-sent life.The Bible uses the word apostles for Jesus’ followers—that is, people sent on Jesus’ behalf. In every existing form of the contemporary church—from the mega to the multi to the incarnational—some churches have taken the idea of apostolic mission seriously. Successful church leaders are discovering how to shift their existing resources and church structures into more adaptable forms to reach their communities.In this book, Alan Hirsch and David Ferguson share inspiring stories about leaders who have diagnosed their churches’ failure to embrace a biblical model of mission and have moved toward a fuller expression of the gospel. On the Verge will help pastors and church leaders discover how these forerunners and their insights are launching a new apostolic movement—and how any church can get involved.

A Journey Into the Apostolic Future of the Church

On the Verge

Jesus challenges us to heal the hurting, feed the hungry, include the lonely, and help people find their way back to God. Most people listen to the missional challenge of Jesus as if it were a good motivational talk—something to inspire us, but not something we can actually achieve. Others hear the challenge of Jesus and become frustrated with how little they’ve done. The mission Jesus gave us was not just meant to inspire us, nor was it intended to frustrate us. Jesus gave us this mission because he wants us to actually do it! Within each person lies a potential movement that could change the world. The beginning of such a movement is simple: you living a life as a Christ follower that is worth reproducing. You will reproduce what you say. You will reproduce what you do. You will reproduce what you don’t do. You will reproduce who you are. Each of us has the ability to catalyze a movement that can accomplish the mission of Jesus. Some of us have the ability to impact 10 people; some of us have influence over hundreds, while others have the potential to reach thousands. The Rapidly Reproducing Church will present a Biblical strategy that explains how every Christ follower can successfully “reproduce” himself and maximize his impact for the kingdom of God. The purpose of this book is to communicate a simple strategy that will engage every Christ follower and challenge every leader to become a reproducing leader. Our hope is that every church will become a reproducing church. This book will lay out a brief, but solid theology for a reproducing strategy and then give very practical “how-to’s” for reproducing Christ followers, leaders, artists, groups/teams, venues, sites, churches and networks of churches. Weaved throughout this book will be the amazing story of Community Christian Church, started by five friends who used these reproducing strategies to grow one of the most influential churches in the U.S and develop a network of reproducing churches.

How You and Your Friends Can Start a Missional Church Movement

Exponential

The authors explain that the potential to complete the Jesus mission lies within every Christian as they learn to reproduce their faith as individuals and through church growth.

“God, if you’re real, make yourself real to me.” Each of us spends our lives on a journey toward God. Yet often our most deeply felt longings—for meaning, for love, for significance—end up leading us away from, instead of toward, our Creator and the person he made us to be. Finding Your Way Back to God shows you how to understand and listen to your longings in a whole new way. It’s about waking up to who you really are, and daring to believe that God wants to be found even more than you want to find him. It’s about making the biggest wager of your life as you ask God to make himself known to you. And it’s about watching what happens next.

Take the Next Step Perfect for individual or group study The companion Participant’s Guide explores the idea that we all want to find our way home – and back to God. The participant’s guide offers Bible investigation, life application questions, and prayer exercises help you take positive action on your desire to find God.

Dave Ferguson

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