Book Review: Impact! Reclaiming the Call of Lay Ministry

Information about the book

Impact! Reclaiming the Call of Lay Ministry  by Kay Kotan and Blake Bradford.  Market Square Books, Knoxville, 2018.  (Cokesbury Link)

Summary

To quote the introduction, "We, the authors, believe in the power of laity in the local churches.  The church likely rises and falls with the missional investment of the laity....Our hope for this resource is to rekindle the spark and set the laity on fire - on fire for Christ....It is our core belief is that a church who demonstrates ministry with IMPACT is a church that has a strong movement for the Christ-centered laity.  This lay movement understands the purpose of the church and what it means to be a fully committee follower of Jesus Christ who transforms the world

Impressions

Overall, I thought it was a good book.  There were several moments of ah-hah and highlighting.  I purchased the book because I'm leading a Certified Lay Ministry course in our conference and thought it would be a help as I prepare a session around the call of the laity.  It didn't provide the material I hoped for, but I do see how it will be applicable to other sessions in our course, including the purpose of the church, worship, intentional discipleship, and relationships.

I am confused that almost the entire Impact focused lay leadership centers around the transition of a new pastor into a United Methodist church - how do accomplish that successfully.  It's excellent material, but it is about 20% of the book, and doesn't seem to relate to the main theme.  I was hoping for something else in a chapter with that name.

I purchased the Kindle version of the book - and this is only a small criticism - but the Kindle version could use formatting and editing.  There are Title words missing in the sections, and its difficult to see where chapters begin.  It didn't impact (haha) my reading of the book, but the manuscript did seem unfinished because of the editing issues.

Posts about Book
Posts on my blog that reference this book can be found here.