Leadership Network News

Leadership Network Publications Releases The Missional Leader and Practicing Greatness

July 6, 2006

DALLAS, TX—When Leadership Network and Jossey-Bass joined forces in 1996 to create a new book-publishing imprint, the two partners made a big promise. The imprint, dubbed “Leadership Network Publications,” would uncover and present only the most thoroughly researched and innovative concepts from pioneering thinkers, practitioners and churches.

Seventeen notable books later, the imprint is going stronger than ever. And in two just-released titles—The Missional Leader, by Alan J. Roxburgh and Fred Romanuk, and Practicing Greatness, by Reggie McNeal—Leadership Network Publications has once again brought fresh thinking to two topics that are crucial to the future of the church.

In The Missional Leader,Roxburgh and Romanuk provide a challenge and a strategy for forward-thinking churches to reach a rapidly changing world. The two authors have long believed that the church is—or ought to be—defined by the work God has set before it. Their new book explores the crucial role leaders play in shifting a church’s focus from internal to external. Emphasizing spiritual principles over organizational forms, The Missional Leader shows readers how to move away from “church as usual” and toward a new way of more completely spreading God’s Word and demonstrating His love. As Roxburgh and Romanuk so elegantly put it in this excerpt:

“We have forgotten that God’s future often emerges in the most inauspicious places. If we let our imagination be informed by this realization, it will be obvious that we need to lead in ways that are different from those of a CEO, an entrepreneur, a super leader with a wonderful plan for the congregation’s life. Instead, we need leaders with the capacity to cultivate an environment that releases the missional imagination of the people of God.”

The authors are certainly well-equipped to address this subject. Alan J. Roxburgh is a pastor, teacher and consultant with more than 30 years of experience in church leadership, strategic planning and seminary education. He is the director of the Allelon Center for Missional Leadership and has authored several books. Fred Romanuk is an organizational psychologist who has led strategic-planning initiatives for many large national and international organizations.

The second release from Leadership Network Publications addresses an equally important aspect of church leadership. In Practicing Greatness: 7 Disciplines of Extraordinary Spiritual Leaders, popular author Reggie McNeal encourages leaders to escape self-imposed mediocrity and choose instead the path toward greatness. The kind of greatness McNeal advocates flows from a God-cultivated consciousness—one that deepens the leader’s sense of humility, even as it enables more effective service. Leaders can claim this kind of greatness, McNeal says, by consciously and consistently practicing seven crucial personal disciplines—self-awareness, self-development, self-management, clarity of mission, decision-making, belonging and aloneness. In his clear and compelling style, McNeal explains the role each characteristic plays when leaders are truly committed to building the Kingdom of God. Readers will quickly see that God-centered greatness is totally different than that defined by human ambition. In McNeal’s words:

“Genuinely great spiritual leaders do not do what they do for themselves, or even as a way to become recognized as great leaders. The end game for spiritual leaders is about expanding the Kingdom of God. They pursue greatness because they are passionate about God and about helping other people experience the life God intended for them to enjoy. In the end, great spiritual leaders are not interested in calling attention to themselves. They point people to a great God.”

Reggie McNeal has mentored thousands of spiritual leaders in various congregational and denominational positions through his role as director of leadership development for the South Carolina Baptist Convention and as a seminary instructor, coach and consultant. He is the author of Revolution in Leadership (Abingdon Press, 1998), A Work of Heart (Jossey-Bass, 2000), and the best-selling The Present Future: Six Tough Questions for the Church, (Jossey-Bass, 2003).

About Leadership Network: Based in Dallas, Texas, Leadership Network is a non-profit public charity that fosters church innovation and growth through a variety of programs, resources and strategies in furtherance of a far-reaching mission to identify, connect and help high-capacity Christian leaders multiply their impact. The organization’s book-publishing initiatives are an important part of an overall strategy to capture and distribute knowledge to high-impact church leaders—a strategy that also includes e-newsletters, downloadable concept papers, podcasts, videos and other resources. For more about Leadership Network, see www.leadnet.org or contact Rick Long at 1.800.477.6698 x 102 or rlong@sourcepub.com.

return to main News page