Off the Shelf

New Expanded Bible Coming Soon

No, Thomas Nelson hasn’t added new books to the Bible. We are, however, trying hard to meet our customers’ need to understand God’s voice as shown in His word.

We have a wonderful customer. They desperately want to know, understand and apply God’s word to their daily lives.  From church pastors and leaders to the person who encounters the Bible for the first time, this need is the same. The challenge for the vast majority of them is that the Bible represents an intimidating, time-consuming book full of ancient characters, places and languages.

 

To overcome this need Bible Publishers like Thomas Nelson try to develop products that give the customer help and hope in their quest to “hear” God’s voice. For example in the last two years Thomas Nelson has released three landmark products – The Chronological Study Bible, The Word of Promise Audio Bible and The Voice New Testament. Each one in it’s own way helps meet this universal customer need.

On August 11, 2009, Thomas Nelson will release a new product especially designed for our customer. Developed by a trusted team of Bible scholars The Expanded Bible New Testament, like the three titles I mentioned above, gives the reader help to reach their goal of hearing God’s message to them directly from the Scriptures.

Why is it different?

•              It meets the needs of the contemporary student of the Bible by combining devotional reading and in-depth study in a completely new way. Users can now study the Bible while they read with study aids and resources placed in-line with the text of the Bible.

•             It joins Bible text with traditional wordings, explanatory comments, additional wordings, literal meanings and expanded word definitions, all integrated within the text of the Scripture. 

•          It offers readers a unique Bible study experience by making them a part of the process and decisions made by scholars while developing a translation 

The end result is a Bible that is highly readable for devotions or study purposes that includes a richer in-text explanation of the Scripture. The experience will help customers grasp all that God is saying and give them a complete meaning of words and their alternative wordings. It’s like having a robust Bible reference library at your fingertips without having to flip a page or grab another book.

You can try this exceptional new product now. Simply go to this site and download a free PDF file and enjoy the experience first-hand.

Post your thoughts on your personal blog, and share the comments in the review sections of a few online retailers and send me the link so that I can hear your thoughts about The Expanded Bible New Testament. The Thomas Nelson team will send the first 200 responders/commenters a free paperback copy of the Bible (a $19.99 value) as soon as they hit our warehouse as a thank you for your input.

Honest Leadership

Good leaders are never afraid of communicating truth to their people. Every time we stop shy of the truth we cheat ourselves and, worst of all, we rob our people of opportunity and personal growth.

We all need to be upfront and honest with our people about the situation, the marketplace, the competition, resources and performance. It’s the best way to maximize the organization and them.

Here are some random thoughts on why we must be honest:

·         It helps them grow. The best way to help an employee grow is to tell them the truth. Holding back in a attempt to be “kind” won’t help them isolate areas for improvement, recognize blind spots or grow. And, as an aside, please don’t wait for some annual review time to help them. Communicate honestly and communicate as frequently as possible.

·         It helps them solve problems. Most of the time the answers you need to grow your business, get out of the hole or do something different are right there in your people’s heads. By telling them the truth about the situation you’ll tap into their creativity and problem solving abilities. Telling them the truth will unleash tremendous solutions.

·         It gets them aligned. Whether the news is good or bad having your people aligned with your vision and the reality creates tremendous team strength and synergy.

·         It gets the right team in place. As hard as it is, and I’ve learned this lesson, honest communication about performance and other employee issues helps leaders to get the right team. People who won’t listen, will leave and people with a learning spirit will stay and be valuable team members.

Kouzes and Posner’s landmark book, The Leadership Challenge, relates, “in every survey we conducted, honesty was selected more often than any other leadership characteristic.”