How can the local church empower people to live faithfully and fruitfully for Christ in their Monday-to-Saturday lives? How can what happens on Sundays and in midweek groups equip and sustain God’s people for the opportunities and challenges that present themselves in the places where they are each day? What does it mean to be a disciple of Jesus? What sort of churches grow these sort of disciples? What sort of leaders serve these sort of churches? These are challenges that LICC (London Institute of Contemporary Christianity) have been successfully helping churches address with training events, resources and tools. Scattered and Gathered is the follow-up book to Imagine Church (2012). This new book will enable church leaders to grow churches that help people know what it means to serve the purposes of God on their front-lines. It's a book that is based on the latest of LICC's thinking and methods of supporting churches with their practice of ministry. Each chapter will help church leaders to move past good intentions into knowing how the practices of their church will lead to the development of confident front-line-focused disciples. Providing a resource that leaders can use with wider church leadership teams, small group leaders and pastoral workers. It will ensure that local churches are able to keep the contexts of their church communities central to their mission planning and practice. Scattered and Gathered offers a clear vision of what it means to be the people of God, guides in reflecting on the shape and culture of church life, and then explores what that means for the leadership styles and expectations of those who have that responsibility. This is a book that will further develop the conversation about churches being communities that shape us for our scattered living.
