If you haven’t read Will Mancini’s book, Church Unique, go and buy it now! If you’re a leader than even the subtitle should get you going a bit, “How Missional Leaders Cast Vision, Capture Culture, and Create Movement.” In it he does a masterful job of reframing the conversation about vision that has been so overcooked in “Church-World.” Instead of selling everyone on a secret method, philosophy, or model that we should all adopt he lays out a roadmap to a journey that will lead you, and those you lead with, to discover the unique part that God has created your local church to express and play. The conversation goes far beyond simply coming up with mission, vision, and values statements to build an organization around and instead discusses, in a totally integrated fashion, the underpinnings of building a culture that frees the Church up to be the movement that it was intended to be from the beginning. In it you’ll find helpful tables that simplify the takeaways and the right kind of questions and exercises for you and your team to wrestle through and discover your uniqueness together! In the Author’s own words, he lays the book out in four major parts:
Part 1: Recasting Vision
This first section discusses issues associated with the sin of sameness and, “exposes the nature of the vision vacuum in churches today.” It answers questions such as, “Where have two decades of the conference-craze era left us?” “Part One explains how churches have lost their way and are in need of finding their unique Vision Pathyway.”
Part 2: Clarifying Vision
This section, “shifts decisively to the essential nature of clarity for church leaders today. Where does clarity come from? How can leaders better ascertain the future? How can the leader have 100 percent confidence in articulating the identity and direction of the church? Part Two supplies a perspective that pushes you to solidify and mature the movement you are already leading as you discover your “Kingdom Concept,” the simple, clear, “big idea” that defines how your church will glorify Goad and make disciples.”
Part 3: Articulating Vision
This section, “presents a model for articulating missional vision that includes developing your Vision Frame. The Vision Frame contains five components that define your church’s DNA and creates the platform for all vision casting.”
Part 4: Advancing Vision
This section, “introduces you to a Vision Integration Model that helps you deliver vision daily. What practical steps help visionary leaders go to the next level? How can leaders raise up and align more stakeholders in the congregation? What do you do with those preciously frustrating saints who are anchored to yesterday? Is there a model for a central vision that redefines how the various departments and staff people can work together? Behind the Vision Integration Model is perhaps one of the most important assumptions of the book: the success of advancing the vision is directly proportional to the degree to which the vision is first aligned and integrated.”
I loved the shift in the conversation away from tired language such as, organizational vision to, building a culture and creating a movement. It may seem subtle, but it changes everything! A big thanks to the Author and everyone at Leadership Network for breathing freshness into a stale conversation!
Posted in Leadership, Spiritual Formation
