Biblical Leadership in Church Revitalization – CHMN 810

Course Description

This course will address the foundational concepts necessary for church revitalization. It will consider the revitalization themes throughout the Old and New Testaments and the strongest leadership traits of those God used to bring new life to His people.

For information regarding prerequisites for this course, please refer to the Academic Course Catalog.

Rationale

Revitalizing a church generally requires a different perspective, approach, and skill set than other ministry contexts. This course is uniquely designed to reinforce the biblical characteristics and the mindset needed to help the revitalizer shepherd successfully.

Course Assignment

Textbook readings, handouts, and lecture presentations

Course Requirements Checklist

After reading the Course Syllabus and Student Expectations, the student will complete the related checklist found in the Course Overview.

Discussions

Discussions are collaborative learning experiences. Therefore, the student is required to provide a thread in response to the provided prompt for each discussion. Each thread must be 400 words and demonstrate course-related knowledge. In addition to the thread, the student is required to reply to 2 other classmates’ threads. Each reply must be 200 words. (CLOs: A, B)

Annotated Bibliography Assignment

The student will compose a Bibliography of at least 20 scholarly works related to Church Revitalization. Refer to Liberty’s School of Divinity writing guides and Turabian for the formatting required for a bibliography. These academic sources will prove helpful when completing the writing assignments later in the course.

After listing each work, provide a 1–3-sentence description explaining what you perceive to be the general content of the source, and how it might contribute to the conversation regarding the characteristics of a church revitalizer. This annotation will not be provided on the bibliography for future papers in the course. The point here is simply to demonstrate that you have found ample sources for the research needed to complete the assignments later in the term. Please note, you do not have to have read all of these sources; however, you should be generally familiar with them, and should at least scan through portions of them. The goal is to begin to collect and assess the value of potential sources. (CLOs: B, C, D)

Church Revitalizer Characteristics Paper Assignment

The student will write a 1500-3000 word scholarly paper in Turabian format. The purpose of this paper is to provide a detailed biblical sketch of the most critical leadership characteristics for leading church revitalization. This paper is the student’s opportunity to argue what they believe are the essential biblical characteristics for a leader in church revitalization. Do not just copy someone else’s list. The paper should develop a comprehensive list of essential characteristics and argue for them from a theological and functional perspective. In other words, why are these characteristics essential from a biblical perspective (theological) and why are these characteristics essential to the cultural process of revitalization (functional perspective)? While these may at times overlap, they are not always the same; however, the functional aspects must always be built upon the theological aspects. The biblical perspective always comes first and should be included as the foundational aspect of each characteristic discussed. (CLOs: B, C)

Church Revitalizer Assessment Assignment

This assignment builds off of the last assignment: Biblical Characteristics of a Church Revitalizer. Each of those characteristics should be assessed at some point in this assignment. In this assignment, the student is to imagine they are part of a church consulting team. They have been asked by a denominational board to create an assessment the denominational board will use to evaluate prospective pastors going into a church revitalization situation. Using pages 341–344 in Getz’s book Elders and Leaders as a model, the student must develop an assessment for identifying leaders with the greatest potential for leading church revitalization. (CLOs: C)

Revitalization Leadership Map Assignment

Based on a hypothetical scenario, the student will create a personal leadership map that outlines the preparation and initial steps to leading church revitalization. This plan will be revealed in a 2000–3000-word paper. (CLOs: B, D)

Final Quiz Assignment

The final quiz will cover the lecture material for the term. Additionally, the student will give an account of the term’s reading. The quiz will have a 2-hour time limit, be open-book/open-notes, and contain mostly essay questions and some multiple-choice questions. (CLOs: A, B, C, D)