Encouraging Words from Cary Schmidt » book review

Christmas is a Gift—Dr. Chappell’s New Book

caryschmidt — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 16:32:03 +0000

This week, Striving Together Publications introduced a new, hardback, full-color, mini-book from Dr. Paul Chappell. Christmas is a Gift—Unwrap the Significance of the Season is just over 130 pages, and is filled with encouraging insights from the Christmas story, as well as a clear salvation message. It makes a perfect gift for a Christian friend or a tool for sharing the gospel with someone that is lost. The book is available now, and significant quantity discounts are available.

To find out more about Christmas is a Gift, or to order a copy today, visit www.strivingtogether.com!

We pray that this resource will help you encourage others and share the gospel this Christmas!

More Christian Books for Kindle

caryschmidt — Wed, 05 Oct 2011 23:20:21 +0000

Our team here at Striving Together Publications has been quietly and aggressively working to bring the full Striving Together book library to the Kindle format! I’m pleased to announce that almost the entire Striving Together Publications book library is now available through Amazon.com for the Kindle.

To see the entire Striving Together selection of books available for the Kindle, simply click here.

Also, when visiting Strivingtogether.com you will find a kindle symbol on the product page of books that are available digitally.

We have also begun migrating content onto Apple’s iBookstore as well—The Choice is Yours, In Desert Places, A Daily Word, and more soon! Also, DONE is presently available on iBookstore, and it’s available for FREE!

Digital reading is a rapidly growing niche. I admit, I was slow to join the transition, but once I did—there was no turning back. Now, my first thought on every book I want to read is, “I hope this is available for the Kindle.” There’s a great benefit to having a large library available in one device, and all of your highlights available with a couple of clicks.

If you haven’t yet gone digital with your reading, it’s worth considering—especially with Amazon’s newest offerings of Kindle readers. I quickly found that the Kindle paid for itself in two ways—first, the books cost less, and second, Christian publishers often give away their books at no cost for a limited time.

For a complete list of new resources available from Striving Together Publications, click here.

Book Review: Diagnose Your Spiritual Health

caryschmidt — Wed, 28 Sep 2011 04:38:56 +0000

I just completed reading one of the most practical, helpful, well-written books about the Christian life that I’ve ever read. I wanted to share it with you.

Coming out of my cancer struggle, the Lord allowed my path to cross the book entitled “Ten Questions to Diagnose Your Spiritual Health” by Donald S. Whitney. It was timely, because I desired to step back and assess my life before the Lord, before I just resumed my “pre-cancer” mentality. I wanted to emerge from the cancer struggle with a deeper walk with the Lord, having grown in His grace through the trial. I desire for the trial to have a permanent spiritual impact on my heart and life.

This book was fantastic! It was one of those books that made me want to highlight every single paragraph! Every page was intensely scriptural, very articulate, and powerfully inspiring regarding the healthy Christian life. Here are the things that I appreciated about this book:

1. It was unquestionably biblical. The author did a great job of supporting his “health diagnosis” from Scripture.

2. It was incredibly practical. Every chapter brought me back to a baseline aspect of authentic Christian living.

3. It was very inspiring. This book made me love the Lord more, love living for Him more, and long for greater spiritual maturity.

4. It was comprehensive. The author got it right! There weren’t any glaring omissions of scriptural directives.

5. It was encouraging. Every page of this book lifted my heart and reminded me why I’m so thankful that I’m a Christian.

6. It was well written. Mr. Whitney has an easy to read, enjoyable style of writing that isn’t trivial by any stretch! His writing runs deep and challenges both the heart and the intellect.

If you’re looking for a book that will encourage you and spur you on to greater spiritual maturity, you should definitely read Ten Questions to Diagnose Your Spiritual Health.

Two New Books from Striving Together!

caryschmidt — Sun, 21 Nov 2010 00:58:55 +0000

What a great privilege and delight it is to be a part of Striving Together Publications! I thank the Lord for a great team of co-laborers who work with excellence to produce biblical resources for local church ministry and for personal spiritual growth! We are happy to introduce to you two new books that we pray will have a great impact in your heart.

First, The Ministry of a Baptist Deacon from Dr. Paul Chappell. This book is a two-hundred page manual for the office of a deacon in a Bible-believing church. It is filled with biblical, practical, and powerful instruction and resources. The first half of the book shares the biblical philosophy of deacon ministry. The last half of the book shares appendices filled with administrative information—from financial committees, to offering count procedures, to church constitution, to serving the Lord’s table. This book is comprehensive and covers everything we could possibly imagine about being an effective deacon in a healthy local church. It’s a must-have for every pastor and deacon, and it would make a great resource for training new deacons.

Second, God’s Passion, A Manual on Church Planting for World Evangelism by Dr. Bud Calvert. This book is a personal and powerful presentation of biblical advice on how to plant local churches, and it flows from the heart of a man with a great fire for local church planting. Dr. Calvert has successfully started many churches from his own church, and God has used him greatly. Chapter by chapter, this book provides practical insight and instruction for a local church planter, and for a planting church as well. It’s a must-read for every pastor who would love to lead his church to plant others. And it’s a must-read for every church planter who desires to honor the Lord in the way you carry out His commission!

Both of these books are available right now! Visit strivingtogether.com today and order your copy!

Free Resources for Ministry!

caryschmidt — Tue, 26 Oct 2010 20:49:59 +0000

One of the reasons I began this blog is to share helpful resources, book reviews, and ministry ideas. Many people are presently using Striving Together Publications, but not everybody is aware of what Striving Together and our ministry is offering at no cost. Our goal is to charge only for the things we must. Anything we can offer for free, we will!

Here is a list of some things that our ministry is happy to provide for free. I hope you will share these resources and links with others:

The Free Resource Link on the Striving Together Home Page – many of the things listed below, and much more, can be found on this page at strivingtogether.com. Free Resources at Striving Together.com

Ministry127.com – this website provides ministry articles from over 80 contributors, power point slides, videos, sermon outlines, illustrations, sermon helps, podcasts and more. It’s a fantastic repository with dozens of contributors.

The Spiritual Leadership Podcast and Outline – this monthly spiritual leadership lesson originally cost $10 per month and is now free. It comes from the heart of Dr. Paul Chappell and will challenge you and strengthen you spiritual leadership skills every month. The Spiritual Leadership Podcast

The Ministry127 Podcast – this podcast releases at least three ministry leadership lessons each month on a variety of ministry topics and from a variety of speakers. One lesson each month is focused toward ladies. The Ministry127 Podcast

The SM127 Student Ministry Podcast - this new podcast provides preaching for teenagers from youth related events taking place in our ministry. The SM127 Podcast

The West Coast Baptist College Chapel Podcast – this podcast features select messages from WCBC chapels. The WCBC Chapel Podcast

The Ministry127 Sermon Archive - many years of Sunday messages from Dr. Paul Chappell are available and searchable by text in the ministry127 sermon archive. Enter a text and you will find all the sermons related to that text. Listen for free. The editable outlines are available for purchase through strivingtogether.com. Dr. Paul Chappell’s Sermon Archive

The Daily in the Word Podcast - this is the daily radio ministry of Pastor Chappell that airs across the country on 450 radio stations. Each daily program can be downloaded and kept at no charge. Daily in the Word Podcast

The LBC Service Podcasts - nearly every service from Lancaster Baptist Church is available in video and audio podcasts. A great resource for drive-time, etc. Lancaster Baptist Video Podcast

Daily in the Word Daily Devotional – Every day, we publish a new daily devotional from Dr. Chappell. This devotional can be subscribed to and shared freely with friends. It’s a great addition to your daily walk with the Lord and a great resource for illustration ideas. Daily in the Word Devotional

Spiritual Gifts Test/Ministry Involvement Night Booklet – each year we encourage our church family to serve in ministry through Ministry Involvement Night. We teach them what God’s Word says about spiritual gifts and encouragement to take the spiritual gifts test. From there we encourage them to serve in a ministry. The test and the booklet are available at no charge.

Love Your Neighbor Resources – Pastor Chappell wrote an entire blog post about Love Your Neighbor Week, and the flyer and postcard that we use for it are available for your use at no charge. It’s a great community outreach idea!

The Lord’s Table Booklet – This booklet describes in detail the purpose and significance of the Lord’s table. It can be downloaded here.

A Collection of Various Video Productions – In recent years, we’ve produced many videos that are useful in a variety of ministry contexts. Most of them are not specific to a date or to our ministry. We have uploaded these in a high resolution. Feel free to download them here and use them in your ministry. Included among these are some that are specific to our ministry, like anniversary videos, and even a few funny videos from youth conference.

Spiritual Leadership Conference Downloads – for the second time this past year we offered the entire Spiritual Leadership Conference for free download, or on MP3 CD for a very low price. (I think it was $25.) This resource remained available for over three months, and included all services, sessions, videos, and the notebook. Look for next year’s conference in late July—or better yet, come and be part of it! Click here to download!

DONE eBook in English, Spanish, Romanian, Chinese, and Korean – Many people have trusted Christ from this little book. From it’s first printing, we decided to make the eBook version available for free download. With every additional language translation we’ve done the same. It’s been downloaded over 100,000 times. Feel free to use it to help others come to Christ. Many have emailed it to friends, posted it on their site, etc.

Internet Radio with 24/7 Music – this is a little thing, but you can now here the music of our ministry 24/7 at lancasterbaptist.org. Click here to listen.

How to Prepare for Bible College Minibook and eBook -this book is complimentary both in eBook and printed form. If you have a young person who is preparing for Bible College, it’s a great tool to help them through the process. If you would like the printed version, simply call and request it 1-800-201-7748. Download this book here.

TheBaptistVoice.com – A year ago we launched The Baptist Voice magazine. It has been very well received. A few months ago, we began the website and are posting many of the articles from the magazine on the site for your use. Please feel free to reuse these articles as needed to help others, but we would appreciate you giving credit to www.thebaptistvoice.com.

Ministry Blogs – Presently our ministry is offering a couple of blogs (and more to come)—this one, and Dr. Chappell’s. We’re doing our best to identify helpful content and make it available for the encouragement of others.

Priority Club Membership with Resources – The Striving Together Priority Club is a great thing. You join for free, you receive one copy of every new publication immediately when it comes off the press, and at a 20% discount. (Ok, that’s not free, but it’s still a great idea.) This is a great way of guaranteeing that you have everything we publish and at a great price.

Occasional Books/Minibooks in Seasons – Periodically we offer a free book with another purchase or when you register for a conference. These resources just need to be watched for and are not predictable.

To those readers who use Striving Together Publications—thank you! We count it a great privilege to compliment your ministry. Your vote of confidence is something we cherish. Our heart is to do as much as we can to encourage and equip other local churches. We pray these resources are a help!

One final word: There is a large team of incredible people who serve behind the scenes editing publications, building websites, creating media, and laboring daily to serve you. They do a great job, and they deserve the credit for the labor that has gone into creating these resources.

Nothing helps us more than getting ideas from YOU! Is there something you would like to see offered for free? Please let me know and I’ll make it happen if at all possible. What free resources would you consider helpful?

Preaching that Pleases God

caryschmidt — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 14:00:34 +0000

A New Book by Tom Farrell from Striving Together Publications.

If you are interested in growing teacher or preacher of the Word of God, you must read Preaching that Pleases God by Tom Farrell. It’s one of the best books I’ve ever read on the subject, and it will challenge you to be a more faithful preacher and teacher of God’s truth.

We were privileged to enter into this project about a year ago with Dr. Farrell. Personally, I was profoundly impacted by Tom Farrell’s preaching as a teenager, and it was a great blessing to be able to help in this project. Dr. Farrell has faithfully and powerfully preached God’s Word and trained preachers throughout his ministry. He is a man with the obvious anointing of God on his life, and this book flows from a passionate heart, a skilled mind, and a fruitful life.

You can find out more or order your copy at Striving Together Publications! Thank you Dr. Farrell for a much needed challenge to return to Holy Spirit empowered Bible preaching!

Why Use Sunday School Curriculum?

caryschmidt — Sat, 01 May 2010 15:15:41 +0000

Are there some really compelling reasons to use Sunday School curriculum? We believe YES! For nearly two and a half decades, God has developed strong Christians at Lancaster Baptist Church, and a huge part of that process is the Adult Bible Class Ministry and curriculum. Several years ago, through Striving Together Publications, we made a serious commitment to produce curriculum for local church ministry. Here’s why:

1. Equip the Teacher—while many are gifted at assimilating material into memorable outlines and thought flow, many are not. There’s nothing worse than listening to good Bible material put through an “impossible to follow” thought flow! Most lay teachers and many full-time workers appreciate having a basic outline of biblical material to use as a launching pad—a starting point and guideline. Guaranteed—providing a solid series of outlines for your teachers is an investment that will reap a huge harvest in your adult class ministry.

2. Engage the Students—when you place a student book into the hands of your class, you say something very valuable! You say, “We are interested in making a serious investment into your spiritual growth.” You say, “Take this class seriously!” You say, “Come back next week for the next lesson in this series.” You say, “We are preparing every week to build your Christian life.” These are powerful messages that make the minor cost of a student book well worth it!

3. Establish Commitment—using a series of lessons builds continuity from week to week that encourages students to commit to a class. It lets them know they are missing something if they don’t return. This is effective for regular attenders as well as first-time visitors. Think of the impact on a visitor when they walk into a class, receive a warm welcome, and are then handed a student book for the present series.

4. Encourage Follow Up Study—using the student books provides the class members with a weekly assignment including review questions for discussion or personal devotions. This also provides the teacher some thoughts for opening discussion each week and reviewing the previous lesson.

5. Enable a Journey of Spiritual Growth—using student books gives each class member a growing library that chronicles their own growth. Let’s face it, weekly photocopies end up in the trash. But nobody throws away a student book! They will save them and be able to look back over them in the years to come. That’s valuable.

In spite of these great reasons, many still wrestle with three common obstacles to using curriculum. Let’s examine them:

What about cost? The most common question I receive about Striving Together curriculum is “can we photocopy the lesson for our students?” The answer is always “No.” Why?

First, it’s just a bad practice. The students will throw away the photocopies. They won’t save them. So your time, your money, your copier is all wasted—bad stewardship.

Secondly, we couldn’t continue providing curriculum if that practice continued. I know that’s basic, but true.

Thirdly, we believe strongly in the value of a student guide—it is much greater than the cost. Striving Together student guides can be purchased for as little as $2 and $3. That’s unheard of in Christian publishing! In fact, you probably can’t even photocopy them for that price once you add up the paper, time, labor, and copier costs. On top of that, the five point list above is worth far more than a few dollars in the life of every growing Christian.

Do the students really use it? The simple answer is, “yes and no.” Most do, some don’t. Frankly, you’ll probably never get an entire class to use the student books in their entirety. The point is, many will! And many others will use them partially. The class may require some reminding. You may end up providing replacements for a few lost books along the way. You may have folks who miss a few lessons. But ultimately, most of your class will use the books and benefit from them. And over time, you will build the habit and expectation into the DNA of your Sunday School. And that’s worth working toward.

Is it really that effective? Yes. Look at the five things above and ask yourself if you would like to see these things in your adult and youth classes. Sunday school curriculum will improve your teachers and engage your students at a whole new level. It’s an investment you can’t afford not to make!

Publishing curriculum is no small commitment. Every new publication takes a year or more of development, and all Striving Together curriculum is often designed to provide the teacher with more material than can be taught in 13 weeks. That’s on purpose! We want to provide plenty of good content in every resource. But, even with good curriculum available there are many churches that can’t seem to get over the hurdle of the investment. The sooner you get over that hurdle, the sooner the investment will start to pay back on multiple levels.

Sunday school curriculum is a great way to take your adult and youth classes to the next level. Visit strivingtogether.com to get started with one of our newest curriculums this week!

What are your thoughts about the power of a good curriculum in your Sunday school ministry?

Great Books for Christian Parents

Cary Schmidt — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:31:42 +0000

Frequently someone asks what books I would recommend on youth ministry or parenting. They are generally the same books. While there are some good books on youth ministry, the most helpful to youth ministry are those on the family. Whether you are a parent or a youth pastor, I would urge you to read everything you can on biblical parenting and working with young hearts. Over the years, these are a few books that have been profoundly helpful to me as a parent and youth pastor. I encourage you to read and pass along the information found in these books:

Shepherding a Child’s Heart by Tedd Tripp—This is probably the best book I’ve ever read on parenting and deserves to be read by parents every couple of years, no matter the age of your children. Portions of this book deal with infancy, childhood, and then teen years, but the entire book teaches a parent how to focus on the heart and not merely the behavior. The strength of this book is that it is thoroughly biblical and that it gives parents a clear understanding of the vital biblical principles that pertain to parenting.

Strong Fathers, Strong Daughters by Meg Meeker—This book was given to me by a pastor friend and it deeply challenged me in my relationship with my daughter. Meg Meeker is a physician and the book, though Judeo-Christian in value, is primarily written from the experiences that Mrs. Meeker has had in dealing with families from the view of her medical practice. Every man with a daughter should read this book. It substantiates the principles of Scripture with the real-life experiences of a family physician.

Parenting by the Book by John Rosemond—I purchased this book a few years ago and worked through it in my personal time. The message of the book is that parenting by the Bible still works. The most powerful aspect of this book, in my life, was Rosemond’s explanation of authority and biblical discipline. He explains “the rod” of authority in a way that powerfully impacted me permanently in my own home. He also does a great job in dealing with heart transformation versus mere behavior modification. There were many portions of this book that I underlined, came back to, and shared with my wife.

Parenting Today’s Adolescent by Dennis Rainey—This book has been a standard in my library as a reference for teen parents for years. The book opens with much practical wisdom and then explores the traps of the teen years. As a youth pastor and parent, every page of this book resonated in my heart with wisdom and truth. One of the best aspects of this book is that it helps the parent lead the teen to develop personal convictions! This vital dynamic of training is absent in many Christian homes today.

As with most books but the Bible, I would give a disclaimer that I could not endorse everything about these books or the authors listed. I encourage the reader to read with Holy Spirit led discernment and biblical wisdom. But generally these books deal with vital parenting issues biblically and practically. I pray they will be helpful tools to your home and ministry.

New Curriculum—Salt and Light!

caryschmidt — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 01:03:40 +0000

Striving Together Publications is excited to announce the soon availability (Feb. 12) of this new adult curriculum from Dr. Mark Rasmussen! This 13 lesson series was over two years in development, and I’m extremely happy with the finished product. Dr. Rasmussen is one of the greatest Christian educators alive today, and you will find this resource helpful for both adults and teens in your church!

The study features a close examination of 13 metaphors for the Christian life—sheep, soldier, runner, salt, light, etc. It’s just a great study, and your church family will benefit from it.

The resource comes with a teacher guide and a student guide. Why? The teacher’s guide includes all the teaching material, illustrations, scripture references, and lesson details. The student guide features the blank outline, scripture references, lesson summary, and then a follow up study guide for each lesson. The student guides are extremely affordable and well worth the investment.

Why use the student guide?

Many churches ask students to invest the few dollars for the cost of their own work book, others simply give this to the students as a gift. It helps in a number of ways:

It encourages students to take the material more seriously.
It helps them follow the lesson, take notes, and further internalize the material.
It says to the students that Sunday School is a serious investment of heart and time.
It gives the student a process of application after the lesson.
It gives students a personal record of the series and their own spiritual growth to refer back to in years to come.

Presently Striving Together Publications offers fourteen adult curriculums (many which are adaptable for teens), and three teen curriculums. Additional teen and children’s curriculum are in development.

Christian Books for the Kindle

caryschmidt — Sat, 12 Dec 2009 00:53:45 +0000

Do you have a Kindle? Good news! Striving Together Publications is committed to entering and supporting the digital publishing realm. We are now offering resources for the Kindle digital reader. I’ve been asked several times just today—hence this post. (We are working on the website announcement and links.)

Presently, you can find the following books (from Striving Together) on Amazon for the Kindle. This link shows you all of them at once.

A Glorious Church by Mike Gass
Church Still Works by Paul Chappell and Clayton Reed
Grace for Godly Living by Paul Chappell
Hook, Line, & Sinker by Cary Schmidt
Just Friends by Mike Ray and Cary Schmidt
Leaders Who Make a Difference by Paul Chappell
Life Quest by Cary Schmidt
Living on God’s Economy by Paul Chappell
Mentoring and Modeling by John Goetsch and Mark Rasmussen
Done by Cary Schmidt

The rest of the Striving Together Library will be available over the coming months, so “stay tuned”! Be sure to tell someone else that these resources are available.

Youth Ministry Idea: Developing Leaders

Cary Schmidt — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 23:53:21 +0000

Quick post for youth leaders (with the spirit of idea sharing) related to developing servant leaders in student ministry.

J. Oswald Sanders’ classic book Spiritual Leadership is one of the great reads on the subject. It’s worthy of revisiting on a regular basis.

The first time I read this book, I was in 8th grade, and my junior high youth pastor gave it to me, along with a personal assignment. He challenged me to read a chapter each week (not hard) and write a half-page summary of the chapter to give to him. I was challenged by his interest in me and his belief that I had potential. And so I read, and wrote, and turned in chapter summaries.

I still have those summaries, along with his hand-written responses to my thoughts. He read them, commented, and gave them back to me. I have never forgotten that simple but powerful investment into my life.

Annually, I attempt to do the same thing with our senior class. We provide the book as a gift (for those who want it) and the teens agree to read (at their own pace) and turn in the study questions. This year, for the first time, I’m actually having the students submit their studies to me via email. I read them, consider the individual, and return my comments and encouragement.

The teens really enjoy this. They all work at a separate pace, and of course, I sometimes have to remind them to work on it. But, for the small cost of the book, it’s a great investment into young lives and an easy discipleship project to work on in addition to other ministry efforts.

Do you have an idea for developing student leaders? Please share it below…

Done—Free eBook in Chinese, Spanish, Romanian

Cary Schmidt — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 01:14:06 +0000

The Free eBook – DONE – is Now Available in Chinese and Spanish

Thanks to the help of a wonderful team of burdened volunteers, the minibook DONE is now available as a free eBook in Chines, Spanish, and Romanian. The Spanish version, “HECHO” is also available in printed form through Striving Together Publications.

The Chinese version was translated and placed in parallel with the English—something we thought might encourage a Chinese person to read it. Many Chinese desire to learn and practice English.

These three eBooks present the gospel in Chinese, Spanish, and Romanian with many Bible verses. This eBook contains a clear explanation of God’s plan of salvation.

Perhaps you know of someone (a friend or missionary) who could use these resources. Please tell them to use them freely. They can be downloaded and passed on from the links below. Please pray that God will bless these resources and use them to bring souls to Christ.

If you have a story about how the Lord has used DONE, consider sharing it below.

Living on God’s Economy—A Great Resource!

Cary Schmidt — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 01:04:26 +0000

This is a small book that every Christian should read!

This is a new book from Dr. Paul Chappell that was made available in July. Most of our announcements spotlighted other projects, but this one is well worth being noticed and used! Pastor Chappell did a marvelous job of taking many years of studying, teaching, and preaching the message of God’s Word regarding stewardship and packaging it into a great, short read!

Right at 100 pages, this small, paperback book is ten short chapters and gives ten reasons to honor the Lord financially. We almost called this book, “Ten Reasons You Can’t Afford Not to Give.” That’s the message in a nutshell. Regardless of economic indicators, Bible believing Christians should continue honoring the Lord with their resources, and this little book reminds us why.

If I were a pastor, I would give this book to every member of my church and ask them to read it. It would likely be a part of their new member’s packet when they join. It’s a quick, easy read—very biblical, very positive in tone, and very relevant in today’s economic environment.

Find out more about it here.

NOTE: If you are a Senior Pastor and would consider giving it to your church family, I would be happy to arrange a complimentary copy to be sent to you for your review. Send me an email request with your information.

Living Hymns—A Personal Story

Cary Schmidt — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 18:06:22 +0000

During my senior year of high school, the Lord allowed me to meet Dr. Al Smith and have lunch with him. I was visiting Bible colleges with my father and praying about God’s will for my future. Little did I know that God’s will for me would include serving in music ministry. I’ll never forget that lunch. It came during a time in my life when Christian music was changing rapidly, and I was forming what would become life-long convictions about how the Lord would use music in my own life, home, and ministry.

Dr. Smith was a servant-hearted, joyful man with a large personality and a happy disposition. He had never seen me before, but acted over lunch as if he had known me for a long time. He shared his life story with me—going back to directing music for Billy Graham and then publishing his first song book and starting Singspiration—the first Christian music publishing venture in modern times.

The strongest memory of that lunch was of Dr. Smith sharing his sorrow over the change in direction in Christian music publishing. With a passionate heart, he challenged me to stay Christ-honoring and conservative in my future music ministry. He urged me to resist the trends of the up and coming CCM movement.

After lunch, he gave me a book, shook my hand, and challenged me one more time to serve the Lord faithfully. That’s the only time I ever saw him, but his impression was long-lasting.

Twenty three years later, the Lord opened an amazing door that took my mind back to that lunch table—the opportunity to help revise and produce a 2nd edition of Dr. Smith’s most well-known life work—Living Hymns. For years I had wanted to use Living Hymns in our own church, but it didn’t have orchestration, and later I thought it was completely out of print. I have long believed it to be the best hymnal I’ve ever used.

After many months of labor, it’s a real joy to see Striving Together release this 2nd edition of Living Hymns, and it was a great delight to take a great hymnal and help to make it even better by adding over 50 incredible hymns and songs. I’ll be forever grateful for Dr. Smith’s kindness and encouragement to me. And I’m praying that another generation of Christians will benefit once again from his work to preserve our great heritage of hymns. Click here to find out more about Living Hymns.

New Website and Book—Church Still Works!

Cary Schmidt — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 21:53:39 +0000

One of the Most Important Books I’ve Ever Read!

Striving Together Publications is happy to announce the new book Church Still Works from Paul Chappell and Clay Reed—available July 13! (And sooner for Amazon Kindle.)

This is one book every Christian and local church leader should read and re-read. It is fascinating, encouraging, biblical, and challenging. Clay Reed, from Global Church Planters, teamed up with Dr. Paul Chappell to outsource a nationwide survey of independent Baptist churches. The survey was unbiased, covered all groups of independent Baptists, and was conducted by an independent organization. The results were amazing!

When I clicked open the first draft of this book on an airplane several months ago, I was riveted in the first few moments. It literally held me hostage. It has three sections which you can read about on the website listed below. (Or click on the photo above.) From the first page to the last, it is encouraging, enlightening, and practical. It was a great privilege to work with Pastor Chappell and Clay Reed on the development of this project, and the early feedback we received from our review team was overwhelmingly positive.

Personally, I feel that this is one of the most important and exciting projects that Striving Together has ever released. It presents a powerful reminder that the Local Church still works just as God intends. It is a clarion call to return to church planting and local church ministry, with the solid data to substantiate the title. It is written with a spirit of encouragement and a solid philosophy of ministry. And it clearly refutes the doomsday evangelical authors who claim that the local church (as an institution) is a dying proposition. This book will be tough to put down! And with every page, you will fall more in love with God’s original plan for the local church.

My favorite aspect of the book is the “Spotlighting Success” sections where we interviewed and highlighted young, healthy churches and church plants. The more amazing part of the story is that we could have filled the book with many more of these same stories from many other churches.

Now for the details: The book will be available in hardcover July 13. It’s up for pre-order now, and you will want to view the interview videos with the authors and see the website: www.churchstillworks.com. On the website you can read much more about the project, see sample graphs, and download a portion to read. The book will also be available for the Amazon Kindle very soon.

It is our prayer that this project will challenge a generation to reignite a fervor for planting and establishing healthy churches in America!