“A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away …” or at least that’s how it seems now, I was sitting in a meeting of retail store managers discussing the good and the bad of team management. Okay, mostly the bad. One of the key negatives was the feeling that they were constantly training people who would last six months or so before moving to another job. The training seemed like a waste of time and a never-ending process. This conversation was going nowhere, and I finally asked: “What happens if you don’t train your team, and they stay?” The room went quiet and we moved on.

I wonder if this same concern is an issue in our churches? Training—by which I mean growing people in Christian convictions, character and competence—takes time, and progress can seem slow, but if we don’t train our people and they stay, what happens? My guess is that they need more work and care. More staff resources or time. We become a consumer church where people seek ‘medicine’ from the staff team but don’t learn to help themselves or others. There may be numerical growth, but maturity growth is minimal, at worst accidental.

I don’t know about you, but one of the key ways I have grown and become more equipped to encourage others is by reading. Reading the Bible, of course, but also through reading good, biblical Christian books. If I’ve read the same book as someone else and we get to discuss it, well, even better. We grow more and encourage each other all at the same time. 

“Sure,” I hear you saying. “I’m browsing the website of a publisher, so of course I agree that reading is good. What’s your point?”

Obviously it involves people reading Christian books—it’s kind of important to me. 😃 But my point is that we should move from that thought to action by answering a relatively simple question: How can we encourage people to read?

It’s a simple training step that we can all take. We know that reading good Christian books helps people grow, so how can we encourage our brothers and sisters to do what’s good for them? Here are a couple of ideas for your church or ministry:

• Promote a book of the year, term or month (whatever seems right in your context) and encourage your whole church or ministry to read something together.
• Run a ‘book week’ once a year where you focus on encouraging reading for all (maybe at the same time as the local schools for a bit of synergy, probably without the dress-up day, but every church is indeed different!).
• Mention from the front books that you’ve found helpful or would be helpful for others and encourage people to read them.
• Don’t buy into the false concept that people don’t read anymore. If you walk through any bookshop, you will see this isn’t true. People will read if they’re engaged. 

At Matthias Media we are keen to help you encourage reading in any way that we can. We can do special pricing for a box of books, supply all that you would need to run a book fair during your book week, or help you find great books to recommend. Let’s talk. If any of the above has piqued your interest, drop me a line. That’s a conversation I’d be eager to have!