Customer Reviews

Go BIG: Lead Your Church to Explosive Growth

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I just finished reading this book and all I can say is WOW! (I posted this on my blog but I wanted to post it here too.)

I first came across Bil Cornelius (Yes, he spells his first name with one "L") at the ChurchPlanters.com conference last year. He taught a break out session on creative service planning that was absolutely filled with great thoughts and ideas. Truthfully, the session was more about how to lead and grow your church than planning a service and I took a lot of notes. I also took note of Bil himself. He seemed down to earth and it was readily apparent that he just wanted to help other church planters. He had his wife with him that day too and you could tell that they have a wonderful relationship. I was truly impressed with this dude.

I simply can't stress how great this little book (129 pages) is. I started highlighting important stuff in yellow in chapter one and now almost my entire copy is dripping yellow ink. The book is filled with so much wisdom and direction. The pull quotes alone would be worth the price of the book IMHO.

I like practical books and this one is just that. It's written by two men that have obviously seen it all, or at least most of it, and they shoot straight throughout the book. It's like some incredible church growth and leadership conference in a book format.

The Bill's don't pull any punches. I found myself convicted and challenged. I felt like those two guys "lovingly" kicked me in the seat of my pants. They inspired me and helped increase my vision for what my church could and should be.

Again, two thumbs up for this book. I wish every pastor I knew had a copy.

In the last chapter they mention that they plan to release a series of books like this one. They say that the next three are going to cover small groups, children's ministry and worship. I can't wait. I want to pre-order mind today!

All across the U.S. there are 10s of thousands of churches in decline or dying, many of which are in growing population areas. Easum and Cornelius put forth a clear, concise, and unmistakeable call to action, to reach out and bring people to Christ and the Church.

This book is worth the price if all it does is shatter the self-imposed limitations that clergy and churches place around themselves in terms of the potential for making disciples in most locations. But there are also many practical suggestions to consider and apply.

The book is written in easy to understand language and a no-nonsense approach. It's short enought to read and start putting into practice, rather than try to decipher what it means. I personally appreciate the direct approach.

Highly recommended.

As a leader in my church, I found this book to be a great tool for providing insight and direction into ways to grow your ministry. It is easy to read (I finished it in 3 days) and can be used as the focal point for a series of discussions amongst the chuch leadership.

I love the ideas in this book.

As a missionary for many years, I have seen church pastors, leaders, and members with very little Bible training put together wonderful churches. Now that I am a pastor in the US I am amazed at how tenaciously people hold to the ideas that more Biblical training or a deeper devotional life will produce a bigger, stronger church.

It isn't always Bible training or deeper devotion that grows a church. Often what is needed is just a new set of ideas to help navigate a paradigm shift or to see perhaps for the first time what is being done poorly. Our church is probably not alone in being able to say, "We have found the enemy, and it is us."

This book offers fresh perspectives, and I look forward to implementing as much of it as I can.

This was one of the most practical and challenging books on church leadership that I have read in many years. As a pastor with 36 years of ministry experience, I found it inspiring as it challenged my thinking in so many areas.

I bought a number of copies and have been passing them on to friends in ministry. Every church leader and aspiring church leader should digest Go Big.

Definitley my top book of 2006.

A decent church leadership/church growth book. Some things raised my eyebrows in a, "Huh, I should try that," kinda way. Others raised my eyebrows in a, "Hmm, not sure about that," kinda way.

Lotta people poo-poo on anything church growth related, but those people typically aren't pastors (in my limited experience). Like every other book, church growth books should be read critically. This book is worth checking out, particularly by church leaders.

Our church hired a professional church growth coach to assist us to reach more people for Christ and to improve our ministry.

The coach recommended this book to our pastor and we have been reading it as a staff.

It has been helpful to present things we have never thought about. Sometimes ministry can be a routine and this book assist in breaking the routine.

The chapters are...

1. The Difference is in the Zeroes

2. A Wild and Crazy God

3. Structuring Your Church for Growth

4. It's Time to Lead, Pastor!

5. Double Your Vision

6. Preparing to Break Church Growth Barriers

7. The Growth Barriers

8. Staffing the Church for Explosive Growth

9. Saved to Serve

10. Make a Big "Ask" of Yourself

11. Handling Problem People

12. Positoning Ourselves for Explosive Growth

This book will challenge what you do and what you believe. You will be joyful, excited, and sometimes frustrated while reading it.

This book is filled with tough advice. One of the toughest concepts for me is that the pastor should be making all the decisions, including the hiring and firing of all staff. Also, that after a staff member is hired, he has a year or maybe two to bring in enough people that he has paid his own way. I noticed that one other reviewer counted these things to arrogance, but I really don't think that is the case. I haven't met Easum, but I have met Cornelius and found him to be anything but arrogant. He is, however, very passionate about growing the kingdom of God. This is the way that has worked for him, and it definitely has worked. Either I haven't had the vision focused intently enough to do these things, or perhaps their is more than one way to get things done. The overarching concepts of the book, however, I found indisputable, there must be vision or a church will never be what God wants it to be and the church must be single-minded in its desire to win a lost and dying world. One of the best chapters was on using different forms of media to get the church moving past various numerical barriers. Overall, it's not a book whose concepts I could embrace entirely, but it one forces one to examine one's own ideas for achieving the Great Commission.

This was a good read letting people in (a little bit) on the story of Bay Area Fellowship. There were a few good chapters like the one on breaking the growth barriers, the section regarding staff (good challenge to let go of people when you know you should), and the pastor's role is raising funds.

One of the problems I had with this book was that one could easily tell when Bill Easum was writing as opposed to Bil Cornelius. Bil's sections seemed very scatter-brained and would jump from point to point without much depth or explanation. Bill's sections were more methodical and drawn out. Due to that fact alone, I felt like I was reading a bipolar book. The other major problem I had was that there really wasn't much new in the book (in the way of leading a church) and the things that were introduced for the first time weren't really explained in enough detail (but that could be because I am a "tell me, then show me" type of person).

I didn't think it was a waste of a read, but I also didn't find it to be my book of 2010.

I read, on the average, one book per week. This is one that should be read all the way through over and over. Anyone planting a new church should be required to read this because of the valuable instructions found within its pages. There are so many challenges and "power struggles" that could be avoided by applying the guidelines offered by the authors. Our goal is to reach the world for Christ, so this is not a book for pastors who feel that ministry is just a profession. This is a book for those who have a true calling from God, and who feel that ministry is their passion. I, for one, intend to follow the biblical principles taught in this book, and I intend to "Go Big" for God's glory!