Church is a Team Sport: A Championship Strategy for Doing Ministry Together

In the book, Putman explains the strategy and elements needed for a successful church. Based on his personal experience as a coach, Putman defines church as a team sport. He stresses the importance of dealing with real life and follow it up by working on discipleship in everyday relationship.I appreciate the idea of developing a way to track people’s attendance in the services and small groups. Putman introduces the CARE (caring for all, reaching everyone) tool to help minister the people, which contributes to a healthy discipleship.Putman also points out that in American culture, Christians tend to have an individualistic kind of relationship with God rather than fellowship with other Christian brothers and sisters. What a reminder! I come from a collective culture, and Christians back in my country are well connected with each other, so are the pastors in different churches. I would also encourage pastors from different dominations in American should connect with each other as opposed to not communicating with each other at all.One critique as I read is that we, as readers, should be careful about Putman’s couching mentality leadership. The book doesn’t value much about a family success for the kingdom of God. For example, in the last part, Putman mentions that the leader should sticking to the mission no matter what. I would argue that as leaders, or Christians workers in the church, we need to keep a good balance of our family and work. It’s very important to be a role model for kids as fathers when we serve in the church. It would be better if Putman introduce more about the ways to keep a balanced life with family, friends, and church things in his coaching system.Other than that, Putman gives us great tips and thoughtful reminders regarding discipleship as we become champions for Christ.

Summary: Putman address the entire concept of church leadership through the lens of a sports oriented person. With experience coaching, numerous real life sports coaching examples are used to illustrate the real tactics used on the playing field in comparison to what is used in the church. The book also closely fallows Putman’s own life as an example of the struggles that he faced, and how he overcame them.The book covers five major sections. 1. Putman’s journey into the church, and the dysfunction he experienced once there. 2. What makes for the best type of leader in any given situation and what are the Biblical examples to follow? 3. The development of a system that properly identifies potential leaders, trains them, and releases them to be utilized by the church to their fullest potential. 4. How to ensure a unified vision and how to keep the entire team on that vision. 5. Keeping the focus on God and how to realign your team back on that focus despite speed bumps such as new people or difficult situations.Critique: There is a delicate balance that authors must keep between being entertaining with a book, and being informative. Putman regularly goes into an autobiographical style of writing that is entertaining, but not always as applicable for the general reader. This could potentially help people relate better to Putman, and therefore take the council in this book more seriously. I would consider the book to be lightly strewn with excellent ministry team tips, instead of saying it’s a book solely focused on providing as much useful material as possible.Contribution: This is an excellent example of the importance of leadership working as a team. Practicality and directly applicable messages are well highlighted in an entertaining manner that brings this book well above the average for the field of inspirational instruction manuals.

Jim Putman incorporates his past athletic and coaching experience into his philosophy of the church by developing a metaphor regarding the church as a team sport. He uses his personal experience and several sports related analogies to illuminate the vital function and role of the body of Christ. In his words, “I see the church as the Lord’s team. The opponent of the church is the devil. The playing field is the earth. The players are the people. The leaders are the coaches” (p. 15-16). Throughout each chapter, Putman uses his individual stories paired with these enlightening concepts to powerfully display a championship strategy for ministry revitalization, healthy discipleship, unity of vision, and a maintaining a God-centered focus.Putman’s work is highly effective due to his blatant honesty concerning his personal experiences within the church, whether negative or positive. This facet adds to the book because it reveals that the information he shares is not all theory, or “fluff,” but has been learned in practice, and has been enacted, or is actively being enacted—in his own life, and in the life of the “team.” His stories make the book engaging, and in turn, make it enjoyable and easy to read. However, those who are not sports enthusiasts may find it difficult to connect with, and under appreciate the creativity used when developing the sports related concepts to define the church. The book was also directed towards male leadership, which can limit the reach of the book.Overall, the book adds variety and value to the topic of team leadership due to the unique perspective given by Putman, and the applicable nature of the text. I would especially recommend it to those who love sports and the church. Without a shadow of a doubt, it’ll be a fun, informative read.