A timely look at the world we’re creating every day, with solid data to show the path our country is on and the emerging trends that will shape our world—and change each of our lives.

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The world and culture are changing at a pace beyond anything ever seen in history. But where will all these changes lead? What’s in store for our government, economy, families, and churches? Between the Internet and other news media, we’re getting a lot of opinions, but the challenge is finding accurate facts that give us a real sense of what’s happening—and what’s likely to come.

There are three types of people when it comes to the future: those who will watch what happens, those who will make it happen, and those who will wonderwhat happened. Which will you be?

Our society has widespread and unprecedented access to information, but what do we do with it all? Who do we trust to accurately track our societal trends, interpret them, and see possibilities for the future—and how can we help to shape that future?

The answers lie in Futurecast, an insider glimpse of today’s world—and tomorrow’s. Researcher George Barna will inform you about the trends that are soon to change your life and environment, equip you to face them, and encourage you to stand among the visionaries who create the future rather than react to it.

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How does God transform people’s lives? Based on a research project that took six years to complete, researcher and author George Barna describes a ten-stop journey that produces robust life transformation – and the reasons why most people fail to past the halfway mark. Combining his trademark research and analysis with a narrative of one person’s journey as well as practical steps for individuals and churches to pursue, Maximum Faith will challenge you to become the person God has always intended you to be while showing you how to get there.

The book is divided into three sections. The first portion describes the research findings, offering an empirical exploration of the spiritual commitment and efforts of Americans. The second section provides a narrative of one person’s journey to wholeness, based on a series of case studies that identified how people actually move through the process. The final section identifies ways in which individuals and churches can persevere through the hardships and obstacles to reach the final stops and the journey, which reflect God-fostered wholeness. The appendices include the text of scriptures that relate to the journey.

In Maximum Faith, author Barna provides a Bible-based working definition of transformation; data regarding the beliefs and behaviors of Christian adults that relate to the journey; obstacles to becoming transformed; the ten stops on the full journey to wholeness; the practices that have helped people to move from one stop to the next during the final half of the journey; the experiences that facilitate growth; and the fruit that are usually evident when a person reaches a specific stop on the journey.

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Purchase The Cause Within You at the Barna Group Store.

You were created for something amazing… and it’s time to discover what it is! Packed with stories of transformation, Matthew Barnett shows how to prepare for your cause, believe in your cause again, and experience the rewards of a great cause.

Whether we realize it or not, each of us was created for a great cause—and we will never be truly fulfilled until we find and pursue it. Matthew Barnett, son of a well-known megachurch pastor, discovered his great cause when he relinquished his dream of building a big, successful church like his father’s and began listening for God’s dream for his life. Sensing that God was calling him to serve the poor and powerless of Los Angeles, Matthew founded the Dream Center, a beacon of hope for homeless families, drug addicts, abused women and children, victims of human trafficking, teen runaways, gang members, and many others whose lives were filled with brokenness.

If you are hungry for a life full of passion instead of apathy; if you are ready to use your specific gifts and abilities to make a mark on the world; if you need to be reminded that God loves you and has a plan for your life—The Cause Within You is the book that can change everything. Through his own story and the stories of others whose lives have been transformed, Matthew Barnett will lead you to the cause of your lifetime.

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Purchase Pagan Christianity at the Barna Group Store.

Have you ever wondered why we Christians do what we do for church every Sunday morning? Why do we “dress up” for church? Why does the pastor preach a sermon each week? Why do we have pews, steeples, choirs, and seminaries? This volume reveals the startling truth: most of what Christians do in present-day churches is not rooted in the New Testament, but in pagan culture and rituals developed long after the death of the apostles. Coauthors Frank Viola and George Barna support their thesis with compelling historical evidence in the first-ever book to document the full story of modern Christian church practices.

Are we really doing church “by the Book?”

Why does the pastor preach a sermon at every service? Why do our church services seem so similar week after week? Why does the congregation sit passively in pews?

Not sure? Pagan Christianity makes an unsettling proposal: Most of what present-day Christians do in church each Sunday is rooted not in the New Testament, but in pagan culture and rituals developed long after the death of the apostles. Authors Frank Viola and George Barna support their thesis with compelling historical evidence and extensive footnotes that document the origins of our modern Christian church practices.

In the process, the authors uncover the problems that emerge when the church functions like a business organization rather than the living organism it was created to be. As you reconsider Christ’s revolutionary plan for His church – to be the head of a fully functioning body in which all believers play an active role – you’ll be challenged to decide whether you can ever do church the same way again.

Purchase Pagan Christianity at the Barna Group Store.

Purchase the Revolutionary Parenting Workbook and Revolutionary Parenting at the Barna Group Store.

As parents our deepest desire is to raise children who succeed in life. This is also our greatest challenge. How can we foster traits such as honesty, compassion, and dedication in young minds? How can we raise children who will love and serve God as adults? How can we develop future spiritual champions?

The Revolutionary Parenting Workbook and the Revolutionary Parenting Leader’s Edition will help you create a plan for your family to do just that. Drawn from a landmark study of Christian twentysomethings and the parents who raised them, these resources are designed to help you build a solid foundation of faith in your child.

The Revolutionary Parenting Leader’s Edition includes the complete Revolutionary Parenting Workbook, an eight-week journey to creating a parenting plan for your unique children. The Leader’s Edition also incorporates additional, beneficial resources to enhance parents’ and small group’s experience with the Workbook.

Purchase the Revolutionary Parenting Workbook and Revolutionary Parenting at the Barna Group Store.

Purchase The Power of Team Leadership at the Barna Group Store.

Most of the leadership provided in churches comes from solo practitioners – individuals who bear the burden of providing all of the leadership required by the ministry that they direct. But there is an even better way for churches to get the quality leadership they require: through teams of lay leaders serving together.

Based on his latest national studies, renowned researcher George Barna describes what you need to know about developing and deploying effective lay leadership teams in your church. Barna reexamines the value of teams, the types of leaders that produce great teams, and the process of transitioning a church from individual-based to team-based leadership. Follow this advice and see your church blossom as it utilizes the full array of resources God has entrusted to the church for effective ministry.

The Power of Team Leadership (Formerly, Building Effective Lay Leadership Teams) is one of three books that was released as part of the Barna 2000-2001 seminar tour. The other two books, titled Grow Your Church From the Outside In (Formerly, Re-Churching The Unchurched) and Growing True Disciples, are also available for purchase.

Purchase The Power of Team Leadership at the Barna Group Store.

Growing True Disciples

Purchase Growing True Disciples at the Barna Group Store.

Success in God’s kingdom is not based on earthly fame, degrees earned, material wealth, or popularity; it hinges on obedience to God’s commands. As followers of Christ we are to be known for the authenticity and depth of our relationship with God, genuine love of people, and the spiritual fruit we produce. We call being molded into Christ-likeness by the Spirit the discipleship process.

How are we doing in discipleship today? In this analysis of American Christians and Protestant churches in relation to discipleship, you will discover many insights into what we’re doing, how we’re doing, where we’re going, and what new directions we might take to enhance the disciple-making ministry of the Church. Barna provides an objective statistical assessment of the spiritual profile of born again Christians. Just as importantly, he identifies various discipling models that are working well in churches – approaches to the equipping and sending of the saints that are easily adaptable to any church’s ministry context.

“Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations…”Read this book to find out how well we are carrying out Jesus’ great commission to us, and how we might improve our discipling efforts in the days to come.

Purchase Growing True Disciples at the Barna Group Store.

Purchase Grow Your Church From The Outside In at the Barna Group Store.

There are nearly 100 million unchurched people in the U.S. Do you know how to connect with them in ways that will lead to faith-based life transformation?

In this practical and user-friendly volume, author and researcher George Barna explores the world of the unchurched. Based on research his company conducted among several thousand unchurched people, Barna describes who the unchurched are and how we might most easily and appropriately connect with them. Using additional research he conducted among churches that have had great success in attracting and retaining unchurched people, Barna also outlines perspectives and effective strategies for churches that wish to reach those who avoid churches.

More than 80% of the current growth registered by Protestant churches is biological or transfer growth – very little of the growth comes from penetrating the ranks of the unchurched. Once you understand the values, attitudes, beliefs, religious practices, demographics, life goals, and spiritual expectations of the unchurched, you will have a better chance of relating to them in meaningful ways. Let Grow Your Church From The Outside In be your guidebook in that process.

Purchase Grow Your Church From The Outside In at the Barna Group Store.

Purchase Lessons From San Quentin at the Barna Group Store.

Because we do research, I have all kinds of chances to study people’s lives. But every once in a while I get to really delve deeply into someone else’s life experience and learn from it. That was certainly the case as I wrote Bill Dallas’s story of rags-to-riches-to-prison-to-joy.

Bill graduated with honors from a highly-respected university and then moved west to seek his fame and fortune. If you know Bill, then you know he is a take-no-prisoners kind of guy: he locks onto the objective and gets the job done. And that’s exactly how he approached his career, right out of the box. He built a highly lucrative and successful real estate development business in northern California. But the success simply fueled a life that was completely out of control. The women, the substances, the spending – lets just say that he denied himself nothing. And before he knew what hit him, he was under arrest and charged with a felony by the feds. After the lawyers were done negotiating, he was sentenced to prison.

During his spectacular crash, Bill was introduced to Jesus and accepted Christ as his savior. But it wasn’t until he had been in prison for a few years that his decision to be a follower of Christ made sense to him – or impacted his life. As only God can do, unusual circumstances occurred which placed Bill in San Quentin, one of the nation’s most the notorious federal prisons. And through a further set of odd events, Bill found himself surrounded by a group of men in San Quentin who had earned life sentences – the Lifers – but who had finally come to terms with reality and were intent upon helping Bill reclaim his life and make something of it.

After several years, during which he had ah-ha moments and life-changing experiences, Bill was finally paroled. He was indeed a new man. After a relatively short time, he founded Church Communication Network, which today serves the body of Christ as the largest satellite-based training network in North America. I have known of few people whose life has been so completely resurrected by the power of God – and who have so fully committed themselves to using their gifts to add value to His kingdom.

Lessons From San Quentin is a book about how God changed a selfish, materialistic, egomaniac into a humble man of God who is honored and content to serve the Lord’s Church. As Bill and I discussed his experiences leading up to prison, during his San Quentin years, and immediately after his release, we identified a series of moral and spiritual lessons that God taught Bill. There are a dozen chapters in the book that each take a single lesson and show how God orchestrated Bill’s wake up call in relation to that step along the journey. Briefly, those lessons concern:

1. the necessity of embracing the trials and suffering you face
2. clinging to hope is vital, even when such hope is minimal or not even evident
3. recognizing that work is an important vehicle for rebuilding your mind and heart, and re-establishing your identity in Christ
4. knowing that the fullness of life cannot be realized unless you make a definitive decision to pursue a deeper, more integrated faith
5. in our culture, our self-image gets out of whack; we must continually realign it to reflect who we really are, not the person we want the world to think we are
6. realizing there’s often too much of us and not enough of God defining our life
7. we need to regularly examine our core attitudes because they significantly influence how we respond to reality
8. you cannot expect to receive respect unless you give to those who deserve it – and that means everyone
9. required for a breakthrough in wisdom and heart change
10. you cannot take the world by force; you have to let it come to you, and be prepared to respond on the basis of appropriate beliefs and values
11. the simpler you make life, the better off you’ll be, and the more you’ll enjoy the journey
12. you’ll remain locked in an emotional prison until you forgive those who exploited or hurt you

Bill learned these principles through a difficult but rich series of encounters and opportunities that he experienced behind the walls. It was a revelation for me to discover these things through our conversations about his San Quentin era and to write about them in ways that I think you will find interesting and of personal, practical value.

So, this is not a book about prison. It is not really a book about Bill Dallas, although he is the instrument God has chosen to reveal these insights. This is a book about how you can grow to become a better disciple of Christ. I pray that you find it an arresting and useful resource on your personal journey toward transformation.

Purchase Lessons From San Quentin at the Barna Group Store.

Purchase The Rabbit And The Elephant at the Barna Group Store.

If you put two elephants in a room together and close the door, in 22 months you may get one baby elephant. But two rabbits together for the same amount of time will result in thousands of baby rabbits! In The Rabbit And The Elephant, “micro church” planters Tony and Felicity Dale use the “rabbit” illustration to show the pace at which the Christian faith can (and should) be growing—through evangelism that is explosive and transformational. The Rabbit And The Elephant contains the key to 21st century evangelism—taking the gospel to where the pain and the people are.

Features:

• Documents how “church” across the world is changing from being event-based to life and relationship-based.
• Shows how small and simple churches can multiply rapidly.
• Shows how to incorporate spiritual growth and outreach into every aspect of our lives.
• Includes relevant research on churchgoing habits and impact gathered by the Barna Group.

Purchase The Rabbit And The Elephant at the Barna Group Store.