This book pointed out many glaring problems in churches today. Sadly many churches are more focused on power and social standing. Unfortunately most unhealthy churches are interested in excuses rather than change. While I do not agree with every point, overall the book could be a great guide for changing a church.

Encouraging and helpful read for those in ministry! Highly recommend! Building a healthy church should be our primary goal.

This book is written for pastors but still very practical and insightful for any church member! Very well written and very easy to understand.

Thanks to Netgalley, I was able to read this book before it is released on August 24th.

In this book, Mark Dever (along with Paul Alexander) expands upon his original book, the Deliberate Church. It takes readers through a detailed explanation of many common practices in church ministry. It explains how to deal with church discipline, how to think about the worship time on Sunday mornings, and how conduct membership interviews, among many other topics. As he explains his church's processes, he often goes back to scripture to illustrate the reason for their way of doing things.

I have mixed feelings about this book. I appreciate Dever's passion for cultivating healthy churches, and it's clear that he desires to strengthen and encourage pastors through this book. I did struggle with the level of detail that the book goes into. One memorable point was when Dever was talking about how to run elder board meetings, and he was so specific in his description that he mentions that his elder board typically meets on Thursday nights. Now, Dever certainly doesn't say that a healthy church depends on following his details to the letter, and he does briefly mention in the beginning that other churches may have different views on certain things, but with how easy it is for Christians to fall into legalism ( and believe that a certain way of doing things, rather than God, can fix things), I think it could have been helpful to mention again that there could be multiple ways of conducting ministry. With how specific this book is, it may be less helpful for pastors and leaders in a church that has well developed processes that might look different than Dever's way of doing things, but it could be very valuable for a leader who is looking for different ways of doing things or for a young pastor who in the process of learning how to lead a church.

One other thing that stuck out to me is that this book seems to be written with male readers in mind. There are a couple points where Dever's action points (like finding another man in the church to be an accountability partner) are specifically written to men. It's not a big deal, especially knowing that Dever's personal belief is that only men should be in positions of authority, but it was a little jarring since the description says the book is for "pastor, elders, and anyone committed to the church’s vitality."

Overall, this book will probably be most helpful for pastors and elders, but it could be interesting if someone is interested in a deep dive into the way that one church functions and why they choose to do things a certain way.

A big thank you to Mark Dever and Paul Alexander, Crossway, and NetGalley for the opportunity to read and honestly review this book!

If you have followed 9Marks and Mark Dever’s ministry for a while, this book will not be a surprise to you. But this book is a biblical and practical guide to building a healthy church. In Dever’s classic, 9 marks to a healthy church, he lays out biblical foundations and principles. Here, he takes those principles and practically shows how a local church can live them out week to week.

As a young pastor, this book encouraged me that the simple, yet important preaching of the Word is the chief task of the pastor. This book also convicted me to be patient and trust the Lord. To think not just 5 years but 50 years.

Dever’s work is applicable and excites me to be a pastor!

*Thanks to Crossway for the opportunity to read and review this work prior to release.

Posted on my goodreads account.