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Churchworks: A Well-Body Book for Congregations is an original and classic church resource. Using the human body as a metaphor for the congregation, Churchworks provides essential advice for growing and sustaining a healthy church, including help for diagnosing and treating the chronic ailments of church life. Covers vital congregational concerns, like spiritual development, covenants and mission statements, growth and new membership, conflict resolution, lay and professional ministry and more.

Q&A with Churchworks author Anne Odin Heller

Churchworks has been quite successful, and continues selling year to year. To what do you attribute the success?

I think the book is responsive to a real need in congregations -- it's like scratching an itch: when people need answers, they go to a source that will help provide them.
 

How did you imagine the book?

When I was a District Executive in the Pacific Northwest, people kept asking me the same basic questions over and over.  I thought: this must all be written down somewhere.  But it wasn't.  So I decided to write a book on churchwork 101A and 101B.

Do churches use it in much the way you thought they would, or has their use and response to the book been different?

Yes and yes.  I thought they would use it as a basic reference source, and it turns out they do that.  But they also use it as a teaching tool.  Some congregations buy the book for their boards and do a chapter a month together.  Some buy it for boards and church leaders, and just them to it when appropriate.

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