If you are looking for a book to share with a young pastor early in ministry, you can do much worse than giving them a copy of What Every Pastor Should Know (Baker Books) by Gary L. McIntosh and Charles Arn. Subtitled 101 Indispensable Rules of Thumb for Leading Your Church, the book offers brief, practical treatments of topics under categories such as Ministry Rules for Evangelism & Outreach, for Visitors, for Connecting with and Assimilating Newcomers, for Facilities, for Finances, and much more. The “Ministry Rules for Worship” include comments on things such as “The Sermon Preparation Rule” (“a pastor should spend at least 15 hours each week in sermon preparation, divided across at least two weeks”), and “The Message Rule” (“the sermon is not the message; the service is the message”).
