Reviews for Church Planting Is for Wimps: How God Uses Messed-Up People to Plant Ordinary Churches That Do Extraordinary Things

The average rating for Church Planting Is for Wimps: How God Uses Messed-Up People to Plant Ordinary Churches That Do Extraordinary Things based on 2 reviews is 3.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2018-09-10 00:00:00 Steven Tiger McKinley uses an easy-to-read, anecdotal style in the book, and much of the book is built on his personal experience revitalizing a church in Sterling, VA. He's open and honest with the reader and talks plainly about his mistakes that he made along the way. The use of sarcasm at some points was helpful/funny and felt harsh at others, not sure what about it I didn't like. In my opinion the book's biggest drawback was the specificity of the book's context. Clearly written about and for suburban America and often wondered while reading how the book would apply elsewhere. My edition was from 2010, 5 years after their revitalization began. I would be curious to know how McKinley's thoughts then compare to now (13 years later). Good, thought-provoking book. Plan to reread in the future.

Review # 2 was written on 2020-12-21 00:00:00 Kirk Marshall Overall, a simple yet helpful book. As I'm soon about to be going to a small church and trying to revitalize and grow, this was encouraging, it got me thinking in a bunch of different ways, and it provided a few insights that I think will be invaluable. For this, I'm very glad this book exists and I'd recommend it to anyone. However, the reason it is only 4 stars is for a two reasons that couldn't be ignored. First, his example of church revitalization seemed so extreme that it almost wasn't relatable (the way the church was, how he found it, etc.). Second, a few times in the book he puts important life-changes on his wife's hearing from God (not audibly, but still hearing). He says it almost in a joking manner, but still, a couple big decisions in their life came because his wife just knew because God had told her. Seems this shouldn't be in a book about church planting, especially coming from a solid publisher like 9 Marks. But besides these two problems, the emphasis on Scripture and preaching, on God building his church, on loving people, and on raising leaders were all excellent. I'll definitely be reading it again soon.