The Monkey and the Fish: Liquid Leadership for a Third-Culture Church (Leadership Network Innovation Series) (Paperback)

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Editorial Reviews

Review

Can we really make a difference in today's culture? In The Monkey and the Fish, Dave Gibbons inspires Christ-followers to get outside their self-absorbed bubble and break the box of conformity. His challenging writing will move you to passionately seek opportunities to love God's people in an innovative way. --Craig Groeschel, Pastor, LifeChurch.tv, and author, It

Can we really make a difference in today's culture? In The Monkey and the Fish, Dave Gibbons inspires Christ-followers to get outside their self-absorbed bubble and break the box of conformity. His challenging writing will move you to passionately seek opportunities to love God's people in an innovative way. --Craig Groeschel, Pastor, LifeChurch.tv, and author, It --Craig Groeschel, Pastor, LifeChurch.tv, and author, It

Review

In The Monkey and the Fish, Dave Gibbons give us some practical steps for us to take to begin to develop a new outlook he calls "third culture". He challenges us to live out this "third culture" by being Jesus to people who are not like us which will allow us to stay relevant in this ever changing world where the cultural lines intersect near and far. This book will help us all be more culturally relevant and a must read.

In Monkey and the Fish, Dave Gibbons give us some practical steps for us to take to begin to develop a new outlook he calls "third culture". He challenges us to live out this "third culture" by being Jesus to people who are not like us which will allow us to stay relevant in this ever changing world where the cultural lines intersect near and far. This book will help us all be more culturally relevant and a must read. -- Dave Ferguson, Lead Pastor, /Spiritual Entrepreneur, Community Christian Church/NewThing Network

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Product Details

• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: Zondervan (February 1, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0310276020
• ISBN-13: 978-0310276029
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.3 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #36,988 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Be Liquid, My Friend, March 16, 2009

By	Andrew McCullough "globalandy.com" (Lafayette, CO United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Dave Gibbons begins the Monkey and the Fish: Liquid Leadership for a Third-Culture Church with an eastern parable. A well-meaning monkey sees a fish struggling in the water after a typhoon. Having a kind heart, the monkey with considerable risk to himself reaches down precariously from a limb of a tree to save the fish snatching him up from the water. The monkey lies the fish on dry land. For a few minutes the fish showed excitement but soon it settled into a peaceful sleep.

Translation: it died. Relevance to the 21st Century church: everything.

Gibbons is the founding pastor of Newsong, a multi-site international third-culture church. Years ago, Gibbons was building his megachurch and was struck with the thought of building a big box that would not be used most of the week to entertain people who for the most part would not change the world. He was a well-meaning monkey thinking he was saving a fish.

God took Dave Gibbons down a journey that has huge implications for us today. What he came to embrace is that the world is changing to a third-culture were we need to be willing to cross lines to reach people where they are.

Love your neighbor
If we take the parable of the Good Samaritan to heart, we see that our neighbor is someone not like us. It is someone of a different race. Someone who with different beliefs. We are called to love, to act, to serve. To be Christ rather than just talk about Him.

Be Liquid
When you pour water into a glass, it takes the shape of the glass. Pour it into a teapot and it takes the shape of the teapot. Water can flow. Be water. Be Liquid.

Our message remains the same but our forms must change. And our conflicts should not be about forms. it's a waste of energy. Third-culture is about being water to a thirsty world. It's being adaptive. It's being willing to change. It's reading the culture. It's being a Jew to reach Jews. It's being poor to reach the poor. It's being liquid

Three questions

1. Where is Nazareth? Who are the people on the margins of life? Who are the outsiders? Who are suffering the most? Instead of looking for the leaders who can offer the most to our churches/movements/organizations/own kingdoms, Gibbons teaches us to look for who are the most in need. It is the model of Christ. It is how God operates. God's power is most perfected in weakness.

2. What is my pain? Instead of always looking for our own spiritual gifts/talents/resources, Gibbons encourages us to identify with our greatest pain. It is through our pain that the world can relate to. It is our pain that shows the power of Christ.

3. What is in my hand? What has God given me? Use that. Stop focusing on what we do not have or comparing ourselves to some myth. Stop trying to become something we are not.

I highly recommend this book! it spoke to my soul. It gave me hope and that we can adapt to help change the world.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars fluid and insightful, February 25, 2009

By	Mark Oestreicher (El Cajon, CA USA) - See all my reviews

the book is about church leadership in a global culture, on the surface. but, really, it's about living christianly, in any cultural context, and in any time. because, at its core, the monkey and the fish is about the values of jesus, and how we can embody them (specifically as churches, and more broadly as "the church"). it's a quick read, and very accessible. full of great stories from real-life attempts, successes and failures. it's an honest book, revealing some of the author's own failures and short-comings. parts of it are almost a spiritual memoir, as dave shares intimate struggles and personal context.

but what i liked most about the book is that the very form of the flow was reflective of the book's points. in other words: it wasn't linear and full of how-to's. dave refers a few times to bruce lee's suggestion that we become like water; and this book itself is fluid. this will likely frustrate some readers. it actually started to frustrate me, until i realized what was going on -- then i sat back and enjoyed the ride!

i had a couple minor gripes with the book:
- i think it's a sexy but week title, and the opening illustrations it refers to doesn't play a significant role in the book
- i wished dave would give us a clearer explanation of "third culture" from the start (and, while i think i "got it" as i read on, i wasn't sure about the earliest definition)
- there were times when i wasn't sure if dave was writing to church leaders (as the subtitle would imply) or a general christian audience.

but those were minor, as i said. and overall, i think this is a stellar book, by a brilliant outside-the-box pastor who is doing seriously innovative stuff around the world. i'm stoked about more interactions with him, and about whatever books he'll write in the future.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Needed Discussion for the Church, March 16, 2009

By	K. Martinez "Kim Martinez" (Seattle, WA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This isn't your average leadership book written for the tired executive. This book is written for the searching Christian leader who desperately wants to know what God is up to and how to help the church be the church today.

You might have noticed that culturally, we tend to be 30 to 50 years behind everybody else. We can't afford to do that. We need to do the unexpected - the God thing - and be third-culture.

To be first culture is to embrace one culture. To be second culture is to embrace the other. To be third culture is to not embrace either/or, but to embrace both/and. In former years, our Christian kids had to embrace one culture at home, and then either accept or reject the culture at school - accepting the culture at school meant leading two lives. There is another way. The third culture way. Living a life that is Christlike and culturally significant at the same time.

(There is another new book that is also part of this discussion, called The Fine Line by Kary Oberbrunner. These two books together would make an interesting discussion.)

Living third culturally means living in the points of transition. William Bridges says that transitions have three parts - the second part is the nebula, the part that feels like a ship at sea, at night, in a fog, without instruments. It is in this nebula that we define who we are. It is in this nebula that God meets people. Nebulae are painful places to be. Only the called and the brave will go there willingly.

[...]

Kim Martinez
kimmartinezstayingfocused.wordpress.com