Liberating Ministry From the Success Syndrome

Success is something everyone hungers after. And rightly so. The Christian should crave to hear his Master say, 'Well done, good and faithful servant. '\\r\\n\\r\\nHowever, measuring success is tricky because the method by which you measure success differs from one area of life to another. And what ends up happening is that a measure of success in one realm is wrongly used to measure success in another. \\r\\n\\r\\nIn this helpful book the Hughes (a husband and wife team effort) attempt to counter the measurement of pastoral success through numbers - usually numbers of people. In a very honest account of their own experience, the Hughes tell the story of feeling like failures early on in the ministry due to a declining church plant. This despair led them to explore the Biblical model of success which then proved helpful for themselves and also produced this book to try and help others. \\r\\n\\r\\nIn eight easy to read chapters the Hughes teach us that the Bible understands Biblical success as faithfulness, serving, loving, believing, prayer, holiness and attitude. These chapters are then followed by chapters designed to encourage the pastor, the pastor's wife and congregations to be successful. \\r\\n\\r\\nI found this book enormously helpful. Far too often Christians are wrongly interested in counting heads to measure success. This usually results in discouragement for themselves and others because they end up calling work unsuccessful that God would call successful.…