My 2017 One Hundred Book Challenge – UPDATE

Reading-books I’ve been asked by many of my friends about my progress toward 100 Books for 2017 and I’ve finally compiled a list compliments of an awesome site I’ve been using to track my challenge called Goodreads. Feel free to friend me on there for an up-to-date list of my current and past reads.

I’m not sure how this will format to my website, but the important thing is I’m ahead of schedule (57 to date) by only a couple of books thanks in part to some shorter ones I’m sure. As you’ll be able to see some of my favorite subjects are prayer, leadership, communication, ministry, and self-help.

I started out thinking I could write reviews of each of these books but between all of the reading, sermon prep, a full-time job, and the many hats I wear as a leader, it’s just not practical at this time. Suffice it to say however, I’ve gained a ton of wisdom and implemented, not all of this, but a great deal into my life and have found this journey so far very challenging, but extremely rewarding as well.

Thanks for all the support and encouragement, and for the recommendations. – Rodger

Title	Author	Date
Leaders Made Here: Building a Leadership Culture	Miller, Mark *	12-Jul-17
The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do to Get More of It	McGonigal, Kelly *	12-Jul-17
David and Goliath: Underdogs, Misfits, and the Art of Battling Giants	Gladwell, Malcolm	2-Jul-17
The Barbarian Way: Unleash the Untamed Faith Within	McManus, Erwin Raphael	1-Jul-17
Moving Mountains: How You, God, and Prayer Can Change Things for Good	Eldredge, John	27-Jun-17
Leaders Eat Last	Sinek, Simon *	23-Jun-17
Ego Is the Enemy	Holiday, Ryan *	21-Jun-17
Rising Above a Toxic Workplace: Taking Care of Yourself in an Unhealthy Environment	Chapman, Gary	19-Jun-17
How Good is Good Enough?	Stanley, Andy	16-Jun-17
Good or God?: Why Good Without God Isn’t Enough	Bevere, John	13-Jun-17
Take the Stairs: 7 Steps to Achieving True Success	Vaden, Rory	29-May-17
Necessary Endings: The Employees, Businesses, and Relationships That All of Us Have to Give Up in Order to Move Forward	Cloud, Henry *	19-May-17
Becoming a Contagious Christian	Hybels, Bill	11-May-17
The Principle of Path: How to Get from Where You Are to Where You Want to Be	Stanley, Andy	2-May-17
Play the Man: Becoming the Man God Created You to Be	Batterson, Mark	27-Apr-17
The Little Things: Why You Really Should Sweat the Small Stuff	Andrews, Andy *	26-Apr-17
A Tale of Three Kings	Edwards, Gene *	24-Apr-17
The Christian Atheist: Believing in God but Living As If He Doesn’t Exist	Groeschel, Craig	21-Apr-17
The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference	Gladwell, Malcolm	20-Apr-17
Crash the Chatterbox: Hearing God’s Voice Above All Others	Furtick, Steven	13-Apr-17
The School of Greatness: A Real-World Guide to Living Bigger, Loving Deeper, and Leaving a Legacy	Howes, Lewis	11-Apr-17
The Lost Art of Spiritual Disciplines	Whitley, Nathan	10-Apr-17
Prayer	Bean, Verbal	3-Apr-17
The Now Habit: A Strategic Program for Overcoming Procrastination and Enjoying Guilt-Free Play	Fiore, Neil A.	2-Apr-17
Procrastinate on Purpose: 5 Permissions to Multiply Your Time	Vaden, Rory	2-Apr-17
StrengthsFinder 2.0	Rath, Tom *	30-Mar-17
Divine Direction: 7 Decisions That Will Change Your Life	Groeschel, Craig	28-Mar-17
Wild at Heart: Discovering the Secret of a Man’s Soul	Eldredge, John	21-Mar-17
The Grave Robber: How Jesus Can Make Your Impossible Possible	Batterson, Mark	21-Mar-17
Soul Detox: Clean Living in a Contaminated World	Groeschel, Craig	16-Mar-17
Start with Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action	Sinek, Simon *	15-Mar-17
Surprise the World: The Five Habits of Highly Missional People	Frost, Michael	7-Mar-17
Seven-Mile Miracle: Journey Into the Presence of God Through the Last Words of Jesus	Furtick, Steven	7-Mar-17
It’s My Pleasure: The Impact of Extraordinary Talent and a Compelling Culture	Turner, Dee Ann	6-Mar-17
Wild Goose Chase: Reclaim the Adventure of Pursuing God	Batterson, Mark	3-Mar-17
Prayer: Experiencing Awe and Intimacy with God	Keller, Timothy J.	25-Feb-17
Chase the Lion: If Your Dream Doesn’t Scare You, It’s Too Small	Batterson, Mark	25-Feb-17
Seven Practices of Effective Ministry	Stanley, Andy	19-Feb-17
In a Pit with a Lion on a Snowy Day: How to Survive and Thrive When Opportunity Roars	Batterson, Mark	17-Feb-17
Essential Church?: Reclaiming a Generation of Dropouts	Rainer, Thom S.	13-Feb-17
Shaken: Discovering Your True Identity in the Midst of Life’s Storms	Tebow, Tim	7-Feb-17
With Christ in the School of Prayer	Murray, Andrew	6-Feb-17
The Bait Of Satan: Living Free from the Deadly Trap of Offense	Bevere, John	6-Feb-17
Visioneering: God’s Blueprint for Developing and Maintaining Personal Vision	Stanley, Andy	6-Feb-17
QBQ! The Question Behind the Question: Practicing Personal Accountability at Work and in Life	Miller, John G.	6-Feb-17
The Battle Plan for Prayer: Attacking Life’s Struggles Through Prayer	Kendrick, Stephen	6-Feb-17
Influencer : The Power to Change Anything	Patterson, Kerry	6-Feb-17
H3 Leadership: Be Humble. Stay Hungry. Always Hustle.	Lomenick, Brad	6-Feb-17
Uncommon: Finding Your Path to Significance	Dungy, Tony	6-Feb-17
Draw the Circle: The 40 Day Prayer Challenge	Batterson, Mark	6-Feb-17
Creating Community: Five Keys to Building a Small Group Culture	Stanley, Andy	6-Feb-17
Worth Dying For: A Navy Seal’s Call to a Nation	Denver, Rorke *	6-Feb-17
Deep and Wide: Creating Churches Unchurched People Love to Attend	Stanley, Andy	6-Feb-17
If: Trading Your If Only Regrets for God’s What If Possibilities	Batterson, Mark	20-Jan-17
The Coaching Habit: Say Less, Ask More & Change the Way You Lead Forever	Stanier, Michael Bungay *	13-Jan-17
Praying Hyde	Carre, E.G.	2-Jan-17

100 Book Challenge Week 4 Progress – 8 & 9 of 100 (Plus 1 Bonus)

The exciting aspects of this wisdom quest unfolded tremendously this week for me. One of my favor authors and non-denominational speakers is Andy Stanley, pastor of North Point Church just outside of Atlanta, GA. His writing and speaking have a credibility and consistency that seems to be lacking in many mainstream religious leaders and communicators. He’s well respected not just in religious circles but in the circles of business and leadership too. For these reasons I have begun to build a collection of his works.

My current collection includes:

Next Generation Leader
7 Practices of Effective Ministry (and Reggie Joiner & Lane Jones)
Deep and Wide
Creating Community (and Bill Willits)

I will be adding soon

Visioneering
Communicating for Change
Choosing to Cheat
Ask It
Best Question Ever

8. Deep and Wide by Andy Stanley – By far my favorite book to date by Andy Stanley and 1460489103227 the most exhaustive of his works regarding planting a church, designing environments to attract unchurched people, crafting messages for unchurched people and church people alike. Andy’s approach is very methodical and intentional.

Chapter 6 gives great insight into North Point’s concept of Spiritual Formation, which they use to quantify spiritual growth as follows –

They describe it as 5 Faith Catalysts which are 5 things God uses to grow your faith.

Practical Teaching
Private Discipline
Personal Ministry
Providential Relationships
Pivotal Circumstances

Chapter 7 Describes these in detail and provide excellent leadership advice on how best to position people based on one of these 5 catalysts.

One of the major moments for me stood out in Chapter 13…

“Marry your mission.

Date your model.

Fall in love with your vision.

Stay mildly infatuated with your approach.”

Andy does a wonderful job at mapping the mission to the programming as follows –

MISSION —VISION—MODEL—PROGRAMMING (see page. 286)

This skims the surface of this excellent book which reads like a manual on the North Point Systems Based approach to church leadership.

9. Creating Community by Andy Stanley and Bill Willits – I am investigating the feasibility of small groups for our church. I have surveyed a half dozen pastors and have received opinions in every direction. This book cleared up a great deal. I’m not 100% sold on the idea…yet.

51obh1fz6ql-_sx336_bo1204203200_ Much of the first few chapters were spent convincing the reader of the importance of community. The authors state God literally created us for community. In fact, they use Creation when God said, “It is not good that man should be alone,” as evidence God wants us to have companionship. While I agree companionship is wonderful and beneficial, I personally felt that readers who may be single, and may have resigned themselves to that fact, may be out of line their opinion of God’s view on being alone. Many biblical leaders, even Jesus was never married, so this comparison should be drawn very carefully.

I did however like the way they correlated the Starbucks Business model to community. They’re not just in the business of selling coffee, they’re in the business of creating community. And, if you think about it, that’s so true. Their environments are conducive to conversation and connection which go great with coffee.

Now, from a church standpoint, I am a strong proponent of community. I can see the benefits of doing life together. Great examples were given in the book of how small groups impacted the lives of people who would have otherwise fallen between the proverbial cracks.

This book was filled with practical reasons on why, and a little on the how, as it applies to small groups, but left me wanting more in the way of a formal process. It could be done using the book, but would involve a great deal more trial and error, and would require high degree of tolerance on behalf of the people you would be asking to sign up for these groups.

Bonus Book(s): Finished Leviticus and began the Book of Numbers. I was so enamored with the Deep and Wide book I re-read several chapters several times. Once I cracked these books open by Andy Stanley, it reminded me of 7 Practices of Effective Ministry by Andy Stanley and Reggie Joiner, and I dug up a few chapters from there because they were reference by Andy in Deep and Wide.

100 Book Challenge Week 3 Progress – 6 & 7 of 100 (Plus 2 Bonus)

This week was a tricky week for keeping on target with my goal of a minimum of 2 books per week. In fact, I blogged about how I set goals in a separate post entitled, “100 Book Challenge – Setting Yourself up for Setbacks.” This is no easy undertaking. I read on average maybe 20 books a year and to increase it to 100 will require dipping into the reserves of my tenacity and grit!

The challenges, if I’m being transparent, arise when my routines get disrupted. I’m a pretty regimented guy and when that happens I have to have a contingency plan. With a 2-week margin for catch up out of the 52-week year of hitting 2 books a week minimum, I do not want to have to dip into that reserve if I can avoid it. I’d like to actually use those 2 weeks to get ahead of my goal so I can crush it!

6. The Battle Plan for Prayer by Stephen and Alex Kendrick – Once I recovered from the minor setback of taking one day off, and another one being too busy to crank out so much as a chapter or two, I dialed in and finished up a great book I had started toward the end of last year called “The Battle Plan for Prayer” by Stephen and Alex Kendrick.

battle-plan-for-prayer

From the creators of the famed movie, War Room, and authors of The Love Dare, the Kendrick brothers have written a masterpiece of practical and theoretical wisdom on prayer. Prayer, the most powerful communication tool between us on earth and God in Heaven, is the sadly under utilized. This book is a must have for any Christian library.

If I could make a suggestion, plan on reading a chapter a day. I plan on using this to teach future studies on prayer and to implement its practices in my personal prayer life as well. We owe the authors a debt of gratitude for penning these words. There’s no way they could have written them without having practiced them, and without the guidance of the Holy Ghost.

As of this post I have not seen War Room, but I will soon. For other resources for using this book as a teaching tool visit the book’s website at LifeWay.com

7. “If – Trading Your If Only Regrets for God’s What If Possibilities” by Mark Batterson – I have come to be a fan of Mark’s work. From the gifted writer of The Circle Maker and all of its resources, Mark again expounds upon one of the most unsuspecting 2-let if-book tered words of the English Language I-F. There is so much possibility packed within this word and Mark takes us on a journey weaving in characters like Winston Churchill, Helen Keller, and of course a host of biblical characters as well.

As a pastor, I appreciate the accounts Mark shares with the reader about the journey of National Community Church (NCC). I take inspiration from his writing because having started a church with little more than he did, I’m only 5 years into my pastorship, while he’s well past that. God has opened great doors in his ministry and he attributes it all to faith in God and a solid prayer life. This inspires me to keep believing and trusting God for greater things in our church.

I might add here too that Mark states in the book he read over 3000 books before he ever attempted to write one. That’s huge. He mentions also, Teddy Roosevelt, one of his all-time favorite presidents, made habit of reading 500 books a year…and I think 100 is a “challenge!”

With 31 chapters, Mark recommends you read this book, one chapter a day as well. In my quest for wisdom, I will admit, I did this in just a couple of days, but can see the value in taking the time to both read, and journal thoughts and impressions of the book as you go through it.

One of the biggest messages of the book “If” by Mark Batterson is, at the end of our lives, it won’t be the things we did that we regret. We will regret the things we did not do, and wished we had.

Bonus Reading: When I started I anticipated getting criticism for reading books other than the Bible. I committed from the onset that I would attempt to maintain my Bible reading in addition to these 100 books. This week I made good on this BONUS Goal by reading Genesis (started last week) and Exodus. And, since Exodus blended right into Leviticus, I continued and have gotten a good start on it.

I am enjoying this journey overall. It is stretching me. I have a difficult time focusing on such diverse reading materials and going through them thoroughly and thoughtfully, but the more I do it, the more I hunger for it.

A good key if you’re going to do a challenge like this is to find someone to do it with you. I have had a couple people link up with me on this journey wanting to know which books I’m going to read next. If you’re so inclined, feel free to let me know by leaving a comment below, and I’ll let you know which books I’m reading next.

Here’s to 93 more!

Setting Yourself up for Setbacks – My 100 Book Challenge

Not trying to start with the excuses this early on, but had a rough week fitting in the minimum 2 books per week on my 100 Book Challenge, but had a breakthrough this week and made some great progress. See, that’s the thing with ambitious goals; you need to account for what you’re going to do when you do have set backs. With 100 books, my average of course has to be roughly 2 books every week with a 2-week margin for catching up if I miss that target. When the week started to get away from me I thought about what I would do if I ever did get behind.

What do you do when you get behind on your goals? Do you immediately throw in the towel? Do you punish yourself with negative self-talk? Do you see one setback as an overall failure, and toss the entire goal aside? Do you say, “What’s the use, and go back to your mundane, empty, and listless life?

I’ve learned personally, and experts and research have proven, those who naively set ambitious goals without taking into account the almost inevitable setback will likely not succeed. They almost go as far as to think they’ll “automatically” be a success and can be positive enough to overcome discouragement. They set lofty goals and think only about the achievement without considering the potential for discouraging obstacles. Sadly, the science says, those are the ones that fail.

However, those who anticipate they’ll run into obstacles can, in my own words, brace themselves for impact. You know you’re going to hit a wall sometime. This isn’t self-fulfilling prophecy mumbo-jumbo, but it is taking into account the occasional curve-ball life inevitably throws your way. Good hitters know how to hit a fast-ball. Great hitters learn how to CRUSH a curve-ball.

Now, these thoughts are overly simplified, but the principles were the mode of survival for Admiral James Stockdale. He spent 8 years as a POW in Vietnam and was tortured 15 times. In his book, “Thoughts of a Philosophical Fighter Pilot” he provides readers with a gritty account of his imprisonment and subsequent release.

From Wikipedia:

“In a business book by James C. Collins called Good to Great, Collins writes about a conversation he had with Stockdale regarding his coping strategy during his period in the Vietnamese POW camp.^[16]

When Collins asked who didn’t make it out of Vietnam, Stockdale replied:

Oh, that’s easy, the optimists. Oh, they were the ones who said, ‘We’re going to be out by Christmas.’ And Christmas would come, and Christmas would go. Then they’d say, ‘We’re going to be out by Easter.’ And Easter would come, and Easter would go. And then Thanksgiving, and then it would be Christmas again. And they died of a broken heart.^[17]

Stockdale then added:

This is a very important lesson. You must never confuse faith that you will prevail in the end—which you can never afford to lose—with the discipline to confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be.^[17]

Witnessing this philosophy of duality, Collins went on to describe it as the Stockdale Paradox.”

Try not to fall into the trap of being so focused on your goal you don’t take into account the resistance you will face. The attainment of the goal is great and will say a great deal about your grit, but the wisdom you gain along that journey is, in my estimation, just as valuable as the attainment of a goal.

In short, set yourself up for setbacks. Anticipate there will be challenges along the way. If it were easy everyone would be doing it. No matter the goal you set for yourself, don’t lose sight of the lessons to be learned along the journey; they’re often just as important as the goal itself.

Feel free to leave me comments on your best kept secret for achieving your goals when the temptation to give up strikes!

100 Book Challenge Week 2 Progress – 5 of 100

I’d like to start this post with a caveat; my motives for this quest and even chronicling it on my blog are simply for archival purposes. A goal of this magnitude, at least for me, is daunting, and trying to capture which books I read and when is daunting as well. So I apologize if my posts, or even sharing this journey comes across like grandstanding. This is certainly not my goal.

I get asked a lot in my ministry about which books to read and to turn to for wisdom or advice, honestly, it just makes sense having this blog to point them to, not out of need for clicks, but more out of need for convenience and archival purposes.

So, I hope the spirit and sincerity behind these posts is felt and that in some small way, if you happen to stumble upon this blog and like it, that you’ll be blessed as well.

Week 2 of my 100 Book Wisdom Quest Challenge brings 2 interesting titles to the mix and both related to coaching.

1. “Uncommon – Finding Your Path to Significance” by Tony Dungy with Nathan Whitaker – With the distinction of only 1 of 3 players to win a Super Bowl both as a player and a coach, Tony Dungy (with Nathan Whitaker) delivers a book jammed pack with wisdom from a player’s perspective and a coach based on his Christian values. You can tell he truly put his heart and soul into this book being at times very transparent about some of the challenges of maintaining his Christian faith through some serious hardships, not the least of which was the suicide by his 18-year-old son Jamie.

Tony’s integrity and sportsmanship shine through this book and reads like one huge book packed with advice for teenagers to adult men, from professionals to those just striving to be good, upstanding Christians. I have a great appreciation for men like Tony who can survive the world of professional sports with his integrity still intact. This book was extremely encouraging and insightful and would be an excellent read for fathers AND sons to read to emphasize how vital it is we live an “uncommon” life of honor and integrity in a world where it appears they’re in short supply.

2. The Coaching Habit – Say Less, Ask More Questions & Change the Way You Lead Forever by Michael Bungay Stanier – From the “Box of Crayons” Coaching and Consultant Firm’s founder comes this timely, concise, yet simple way to effectively coach in a variety of settings; from bosses and CEO’s to sports, to even your children, this book is both theoretical and practical. Michael’s clever style and wit brings culminates into the most valuable coaching question in the world; the AWE question…”And, what else?”

From this very memorable acrostic AWE, Michael expands his all-important question to include variations on the question to avoid sounding too mechanical and repetitious, and follows this up with a total of 7 important questions keying into such questions such as, “What’s the biggest challenge you see?” Or, driving it even closer to home, “What’s the biggest challenge FOR YOU here?”

Easily one of my favorite books so far, I will personally be drawing from this wisdom for many years to come. The major theme throughout is helping people discover solutions to their own situations while also guiding them to do so without dismissing your leadership.

Rodger's Rants, Writings, and Rambles

Spiritual and Mental Pursuits of a Mangold

Tag: 100 Book Challenge