FRUITFUL LEADERS
How to make, grow, love and keep them
By Marcus Honeysett. IVP. 204 pages. £8.99
ISBN 978 1 844 745 449
This is a lovely book that would encourage anyone in leadership, and also encourages church members to care about their existing leaders and training them for the future. The author sets out a threefold vision for leadership that I would summarise as ‘find, train, sustain’. This largely shapes the book.
Central to the author’s heart is his definition of spiritual leadership as ‘working with people for their progress and joy in the faith’. In truth, I felt that this admirable summary was never really defined with clarity and could mean a number of different things to different people. However, the great strength of this definition is its emphasis upon the character of the leader and the quality of their walk with God. That may sound obvious, but it is this area where the book is particularly helpful. It may not be as practical or deliberate as, say, The Trellis and the Vine, but is a heart-warming plea to those in leadership to maintain a close walk with the Lord and have that as central in leadership training.
Its other great strength is its emphasis that believers are all called to be disciple-making disciples. The author is very keen that every leader of any group or ministry is always looking to train up someone to replace or duplicate his or her ministry. There is great encouragement to let people ‘have a go’, accepting that they will sometimes fail, but with helpful feedback will make progress over time. There are useful question boxes twice a chapter to help you be honest about your own training and the place that it has in your church.
Overall, I was grateful for the questions the author asked of me, and his encouragement to work hard at training up other leaders.
