Some famous and important person once said: “leaders are readers”. Or was it, “readers are leaders.” Whatever. The 
point is that if we want to be good leaders, then we probably should read more than the sports page and the dessert menu.
Here are the top 5 books that have shaped the way I do church. I have read and re-read all five to the point where they are falling apart – nothing a little duct tape can’t fix.
1. The Church on the Way by Jack Hayford
Lesson: you don’t have to compromise to grow. I read this book while leading a campus church with less than 50 members, and it blew up my small thinking. The ministry I was in at the time (the now defunct Maranatha) had an unwritten, but often repeated mantra that went like this: “I would rather have 12 radical disciples than 1200 lukewarm compromisers.” Pastor Jack convinced me that there was a 3rd option. Why not have 1200 (or 12,000 or 120,000. . .) real disciples of Christ?
2. The Church in the New Testament by Kevin J. Conner
Lesson: I need to spend my life planting, establishing and growing churches, not just doing random acts of ministry. Kevin is an amazing man. I hope I when I am sixty, I have the energy and passion he has at eighty. He is one of the finest Christians I have ever met. As great as he is at teaching the Bible, he is even greater at living it. I want to be like him when I grow up.
3. Where Do We Go From Here? By Ralph Neighbor
Lesson: The small group model is a good way to reach the lost, and a healthy way to grow a big church. I read and re-read this book from 1989–1991 while we transitioned to a discipleship-based church model. While we do small groups almost the exact opposite on every point from the way Neighbor teaches, still, his book convinced me to transition to small group ministry.
[I had an interesting conversation while being interviewed by one of Neighbor’s staff during their cell conference in Manila in the mid-90s. This guy—I forgot his name—claimed that we were the “best example of a ‘cell church’ in the Philippines.” I told him we were not a cell church. He insisted that we were a cell church and cited a long list of cell church characteristics to prove our cell-ness. I explained that we were a “disciple-making church” not a cell church, that to him the model or the means (cells) was the defining issue, but to us the end (disciples) was all that mattered. I told 
him, “We simple use a cell model because we think it is a good way to make disciples. If we find a more effective way to make disciples, then we will toss the cell model and never look back.” I don’t think I convinced him, because as he left my office, his last words were, “you are a cell church.” To which I smiled and said, “We may USE a cell model, but we ARE a disciple-making church.”]
4. Rediscovering Church by Bill & Lynne Hybels
Lesson: Lost people matter to God, and we should do church as if they matter to us. It makes no difference what topic Hybels claims to write or talk about, his one passion—compassion for the lost—always comes out. He is truly a “Contagious Christian”, and I think I caught what he has. Sometimes I get well, then I have to listen to a Willow podcast or read a Hybels book to get re-infected with compassion for the lost.
5. Purpose Driven Church by Rick Warren
Lesson: It is a good idea to re-think why we do the things we do and figure out if they actually help or hinder our purpose. We read and discussed our way through this book as a staff for several months in the mid-90’s. The result was that we eliminated a lot of meaningless religious tradition. We are not a “Purpose Driven Church” but we did learn a lot from the pope of purpose.
In the next episode of the reluctant leader. . . “Leadership is Serving: What I Learned about Leadership from the Barista”
