Will Mancini

My journey into Frank Viola’s writing began a few months ago when I met Frank at a gathering of authors and thinkers. Today there is a “blog circuit” happening where dozens of thought leaders are posting on his important work, entitled From Eternity to Here

The best thing about Frank’s work is way he both challenges and inspires.  Frank knows how to stretch your mind and poke your heart.  He brought fresh insight in From Eternity to Here that had my spirit buzzing in worship.

He says that this book “embodies the central burden of my life and ministry,” as it looks at the mission of God in four unique ways:

1. It defines the mission of God from God’s eternal purpose
2. It emphasizes the corporate aspect of divine mission over the individualistic
3. It presents a fresh look at the motive and source of Christian service
4. It expands our vision of mission beyond the sense of “voluntary association for the saved”

There is a lot I could say about this work, but for now, I will share some thoughts from other you may know as a way to celebrate this book today.  The first section on the church as the bride of Christ is worth 10 times more than the price of the book.

“Of all the sticks of TNT that Frank Viola has launched into a sleepy, status quo church, this grenade has the most explosive potential to make the church unashamed of the gospel and to release God’s dynamic power for salvation.” Leonard Sweet, Drew University, George Fox University

“Frank continues to challenge the church-at-large with a powerful mind, an impassioned voice, and a love for the Bride of Christ. You need to get this book and wrestle with Frank through the biblical passages regarding our identity in Christ as His body and the mission our God has entrusted to us.” Ed Stetzer, author of Breaking the Missional Code

“As Viola unfolds the glorious story of God’s quest for a bride, readers will find their imaginations inspired and their lives transformed. The sheer beauty of God’s magnificent plan compels our allegiance and revolutionizes our lives. This re-telling of the ‘old, old story’ is a much needed gift to the church today.” Greg Boyd, pastor, theologian, and author of Letters from a Skeptic, Myth of a Christian Nation, and God at War

A few months ago I was in a circle of thought leaders that included Skye Jethani, one of the editors at Christianity Today and author of a recent book called The Divine Commodity.

My friend and kingdom master-mind, Todd Wilson of the Exponential Network, has done leaders a favor by filtering and aggregating the best “nuggets of gold” from the blogs of top thinkers and leaders.

The name of the E-book which is the first of a multi-part project is Leadership Learning from Bloggers.

Contributions are from:

Ben Arment

Mark Batterson

Chris Elrod

Dave Ferguson

Mike Foster

Seth Godin

Craig Groeschel

Alan Hirsch

Scott Hodge

Michael Hyatt

Gary Lamb

Brad Lomenick

Shawn Lovejoy

Will Mancini

Tony Morgan

Perry Noble

Bob Roberts, Jr.

Ed Stetzer

Tim Stevens

Tullian Tchividjian

Jud Wilhite

Jared Wilson

I was excited to see Church Unique listed in Leadership Journal’s “Golden Canon.” The article opening begins with a quote from Spurgeon: “A student will find that his mental constitution is more affected by one good book thoroughly mastered than by twenty books merely skimmed.” Therefore Leadership Journal created a list “presenting the ten books of 2008 deemed most valuable.” Here is the list:

The Leader’s Outer World
The Reason for God, by Tim Keller (Winner)
Culture Making, by Andy Crouch
Axiom, by Bill Hybels
Consuming Jesus, by Paul Louis Metzger
Church Unique, by Will Mancini

The Leader’s Inner World
Surprised by Hope, by N.T. Wright (Winner)
The Jesus Way, by Eugene Peterson
The Attentive Life, by Leighton Ford
Life with God, by Richard Foster
Memoirs of an Ordinary Pastor, by D.A. Carson

Many thanks to Marshall Shelley and all the folks at Leadership Journal who continue to bring a strong kingdom resource to leaders. Their purpose is to serve church leaders by offering spiritual wisdom and practical tools for faithfully proclaiming and effectively living the gospel.

On Wednesday I will be participating in a unique training experience on “The Drucker 5.” In 1993, Peter Drucker wrote about 5 key assessment questions for non-profits. Recently these questions have been republished in an inspiring tool with multiple contributors. There is some additional info here.
Here are the five questions:
1) What is our mission?
2) Who is our customer?
3) What does the customer value?
4) What are our results?
5) What is our plan?

An interesting side note is that although I was unaware of this content at the time I wrote Church Unique, I too ask five questions as the pathway to ultimate clarity. There is an interesting sense of shared “irreducible minimums” between Drucker’s questions and mine, with mine being more fine-tuned for the local church.

My favorite quote from the book:

“Doesn’t logic tell us that the simple questions should also be easiest to answer? No. Simple questions can be profound and answering them requires us to make stark and honest- and sometimes painful- self assessments. “