Rowman & Littlefield Publishers / Alban Books
Pages: 190
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Trim: 5½ x 8½
978-1-56699-422-4 • Paperback • January 2010 • $31.00 • (£25.00)
978-1-56699-625-9 • eBook • January 2010 • $29.50 • (£25.00)
Stephen Chapin Garner is the pastor of the United Church in Christ in Norwell, Massachusetts. He teaches preaching and pastoral studies at Boston University School of Theology. His books include Getting into Character: The Art of First-Person Narrative Preaching, Lost in the Middle? Claiming an Inclusive Faith for Christians Who Are Both Liberal and Evangelical, and Found in the Middle! Theology and Ethics for Christians Who Are Both Liberal and Evangelical. Jerry Thornell is a graduate of Northeastern University, has been a member of the United Church of Christ in Norwell, Massachusetts for over 30 years, and currently is a staff member serving as Financial Administrator and Gifts and Call Coordinator. He was employed by the Polaroid Corporation for 36 years in various financial management positions.
The religious landscape of our country today is a picture of general decline, but with pockets of vitality—dynamic congregations energized by the Holy Spirit in ways that are inspiring and instructive. They play the role the abbeys played during the Dark Ages, preserving the tradition and building upon it. Chapin Garner serves just such a faith community. There is so much we can learn from him and from the congregation he leads.
— Martin B. Copenhaver, president, Andover Newton Theological School
Scattering Seeds does a great job of offering a renewed way of doing church, one of which many churches (including ours) have followed and grown spiritually and numerically as a result. It follows a simple but profound idea: listen for and follow the Holy Spirit, and watch what God can do. This book, through stories and testimonials, leads us step-by-step through a process of wonderful transformative possibility.
— N. Graham Standish
I can hardly believe this book exists. The church growth and vitality bookcase is stuffed with offerings that permute a few common themes, inspiring delusions of grandeur among eager pastors before crushing them with despair, and promoting forms of Christianity that exchange its edgy prophetic message for smooth harmonization with cultural expectations. At last, here is a book about church vitality that is scrupulously honest, free of pastoral self-deception, sociologically realistic, and packed with reasons to be hopeful about the future of the Christian church.
— Wesley J. Wildman, Boston University