Kicking Habits Korean Version: Welcome Relief for Addicted Churches Korean Version (Korean Edition) [Paperback]

Thomas G Bandy (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 2003

Written in Korean, this is the ground-breaking book that has shown thousands of congregations how to overcome the destructive attitudes and systems that prevent them from focusing on their true mission: making disciples of Jesus Christ.In this upgraded edition, Bandy continues to explore the meaning of walking with Jesus in the 21st century. Drawing on the stories of exciting new congregations that have arisen within the last few years, he sharpens his portrayal of the thriving church system, demonstrating its essential concern for savvy awareness of the larger culture and fidelity to the core of the gospel.

Editorial Reviews

Review

Existing congregations and denominations can become so addicted to self-destructive practices that they cannot change until they admit their bondage. These practices include a hunt for doctrinal purity on the theological right, and a desire for political justice on the theological left. The answer is a complete systemic transformation of congregation or denomination. Kicking Habits offers twenty shocking truths that thriving churches have discovered. Every church leader will wince over the declining church system that is St. Friendly-on-the-Hill, where intimacy in worship and personal healing are suffocated by activity and program. Kicking Habits is highly motivating reading for anyone whose congregation has stagnated, or is caught up in a seemingly irreversible decline. Indeed, Kicking Habits will come as a much needed early warning that, if heeded, can avoid a great deal of disappointment, frustration, and pain when the pressures on a weakening and vulnerable Christian community become overwhelming. -- Midwest Book Review --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

Tom Bandy is President of Easum, Bandy and Associates, a leading church consulting firm. He is the author of several books on congregational leadership, including Kicking Habits.

 

--This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Paperback: 276 pages
• Publisher: Abingdon Press (September 2003)
• Language: Korean
• ISBN-10: 068702577X
• ISBN-13: 978-0687025770
• Product Dimensions: 6 x 9 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,231,640 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Vital for catching a new vision, December 23, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Kicking Habits: Welcome Relief for Addicted Churches (Paperback)

This book is invaluable for anyone in leadership in the established institutional churches. It made me squirm more than once, but it also gave me the clearest picture of why the mainline churches are in decline I've gotten from any source. Bandy uses a narrative of a young couple who are church shopping to illustrate his points, and it hits very close to home. You'll recognize it all.

The title, incidentally, is a bit too narrow for the topic -- this is a work about change in every system of church life.

Everyone who wonders what the heck has happened to make churches that used to work in the 50s fall into irrelevance and decline should read this book.

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Don't read it... You may leave your "churchness"..., August 22, 1998

By 

Wainer Guimaraes (Riverbank, California) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Kicking Habits: Welcome Relief for Addicted Churches (Paperback)

This book is a must for any believer, but specially leaders. You will see, in a very compeling and "oiled" way the reality of the pathetic present system of "church as usual". You will see that we, the church at large, are designed as a franchise of boredom and institutionalism. It is not a book for those who love the "status quo" and are controling freaks. Is not a book for people who seek accomodations and think that being a good christian means going to Sunday school for a thousand years and never graduating. It is a great book and everyone in the new church we are starting is reading it. The book, above all, calls you to be true and vibrant with the message of Jesus and not with the carpet in the fellowship-hall.

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Where's the "Relief"? The Book Misses the Point, November 9, 2007

By 

Thomas Luttrell "M.S. MFT Intern, Theology & ... (Loma Linda, CA, USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Kicking Habits Upgrade Edition: Welcome Relief For Addicted Churches (Paperback)

I have spent the last 4+ years researching addictive church family sytems, in addition to studying my own church where I serve as a pastor, and working on a masters degree which is built on family systems theory. So, I can probably say that I'm an expert on the subject. Yet, I was surprised that I hadn't seen this book before, so I ordered it immediately. I thought, maybe I don't need to write my book after all!

I did like Bandy's clever analogy for a declining church, that it is like a baby that "fails to thrive." Unfortunately, I was a bit disappointed with the book. It's very easy to see that churches can be thriving or declining systems. However, it's also too easy to blame particular symptoms as if they are the problems.

Bandy picks on his particular pet peaves and calls them "addictive," but watch out, because if you disagree, that's because you're stuck in the addictive system. Well, I disagree and it's not because I'm in the addictive system, but rather because I know enough about addictive systems to know that he blames the wrong things.

For example, Bandy blames the addiction to "vision by committee", addiction to strategic planning, committees, accountability through management, acceptable mediocrity (which Bandy also forgets has the flipside of change for the sake of change), addiction to debt freedom, worship as an informational event, expository preaching, unpopular music, burdening the youth with the future of the church, and the attitude that the church should focus on nourishing its own. Any of these CAN be stifling, but they do not necessarily spell an addictive church. We must ask the "Why" question to get at the root.

Also, Bandy seems to believe that seeking consensus in a church goes against the way the Spirit works who may only reveal His will to one person. While he makes a good argument, it fails to meet the Bible standards which suggests that the Spirit reveals itself to more than one person and that we are to "test all things" and move in unity. While Bandy makes a valid observation that organization and consensus CAN stifle the Spirit, his statements need to be balanced out. The flipside is that they can also be used effectively for good. We have to be careful about drawing BROAD conclusions, without looking at the "why" of what he's saying.

According to other family systems experts (see Edwin Friedman and Murray Bowen's research on family systems), addiction impacts a family system through the spread of anxiety like wildfire among people with low self-differentiation. From a Christian perspective, the underlying problem has to do with fear/anxiety versus Faith. Any of the things Bandy mentioned CAN be done anxiously, but they can ALSO be used effectively and non-anxiously (or in Faith). That's why I don't put any stock in Bandy's lists as long as he fails to address the reasons. Unfortunately, Bandy focuses too much on the externals without giving much of his reasoning as to how these changes would be helpful. If he had, then we might get a clearer picture of what he's looking at.

Unfortunately, Bandy violates his own belief that the spirit works differently for each church and that we should avoid prescriptive thinking. Bandy's book provides a "prescriptive" step-by-step one-size-fits-all plan for churches. While he's against linear strategic planning, his book is basically a linear strategic plan. Because of this, I believe Bandy's book MUST be missing the point.

Nevertheless, the 260 pages is not *completely* wasted as he does have some creative suggestions and some new ideas for re-thinking church. He at least outlines an intervention strategy for addictive churches, though I'm not sure what the rationale for how his intervention strategy would be effective in changing an addictive culture...does he realize how difficult it is to change a church culture? Not to mention, an addictive system? I just wish he didn't focus too much on his own pet peeves and the prescriptive details which fail to adequately address the problem of addictive churches.

Finally, while the book claims to be a "welcome relief" there is only 1.5 pages dealing with it, suggesting that the welcome relief is the changing theologies and changing attitudes towards the gospel. Where does God and His Higher Power factor into the strategy? How does non-anxious faith in God, demonstrated in transformational leadership, make any difference?