Leaving the Christless Church I
By Jerry Bannon
A real winter blast has settled over the area, so changing the metaphor slightly instead of making lemonade now is the time to read some books.
Today and tomorrow we will briefly review a couple of books that look deeply at the current state of the church. As with pretty much all popular book writing, the emphasis is much on the problem and little with the solution, especially workable solutions. Having said that, both of these books do point precisely at the lack of true Christian leadership in American Christianity, if not directly, obtusely as I am many times accused of doing.
The book we will review today is: “Quitting Church, Why the Faithful Are Fleeing and What to Do about it” by Washington Times religious editor, Julia Duin.
Tomorrow we will review: “Christless Christianity, The Alternative Gospel of the American Church” by Michael Horton, Professor at Westminster Seminary California and host of the “White Horse Inn” radio broadcast. Both books are published by Baker Books.
On Wednesday in the weekly column and thereafter I will try to put some of the information in these books into a relevant Wonder Springs context. I am still trying to decide whether to look first at church leadership that has allowed or forced many of the best and brightest of lay and ordained Christians to flee the church, or whether to try to focus on what America’s current and historic Christless Christianity has allowed to happen in American and world culture, especially in the context of our current bailouts, meltdowns, et cetera.
Since two weeks hence this coming Wednesday, is Christmas Eve, perhaps it would then be a good thing to talk about current Christmas wars or something more benign, because Jesus Christ is the reason for the season, and contrary to what you might hear in church, Christless Christianity is essentially the reason this culture war exists at all.
So it looks like the schedule for the Wonder Springs Chronicle weekly columns for the rest of 2008 are pretty much set. Wasn’t that easy?
Julia Duin, is a reporter, consequently “Quitting Church” is really a report about what is happening in the church. As such it is really a very good report, focusing on a number of the best and brightest of American Christians who are leaving the established church either to do nothing directly related to church, to wander alone in the church wasteland, or to form small house churches.
Hence, when she discusses the church, as does Horton, the church being discussed is typically the brick and mortar church, not so much the historic church made up of living stones.
This book is really not about the great majority of so-called spiritual Christians, who do not attend and never have attended church on a regular basis. This is a book about mature Christians, including many former pastors, who either have left their former church out of frustration, or have been forced out by inept church leadership.
As a reporter, Duin discusses church frustrations, pretty much across the church spectrum, and does it without any observable bias that is so typical for what now passes as journalism, which really isn’t journalism at all but agenda propaganda.
This report, as similarly does Horton, really doesn’t address the rock confession of Peter in Matthew 16:18 where Jesus states, “on this rock I will build my church and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it.”
In context of what we have reported previously, Duin’s book deals with what Willow Creek Church, considers potential “self feeders” and Christian pollster George Barna considers “Revolutionaries.” What Duin does report that was new to me is that Barna is associated with a house church, which in my mind has a tendency to bring a certain self-righteous predilection into all of his work.
Not addressed in the book is that most, but not all, of those quitting church are associated with evangelical churches that Horton would consider representatives of America’s Christless Christianity. Since Horton’s book is a more recent publication, that link we will discuss more fully in our weekly columns the rest of the year and probably beyond.
That again should bring a reader back to the statement in Matthew and verified in both the Old and New Testament, that God’s chosen are not always and many times not affiliated with the established religion of the day, and includes the ministry of Jesus himself to sinners and not to the established religious personalities.
“Why the Faithful Are Fleeing and What to Do about it,” is the subtitle of Duin’s book. The fleeing part is well done, the what to do about it is much less developed. More to the point however, the “what to do about it” really isn’t reporting or journalism,” it is perhaps an editorial subjective required by Baker Books. That doing also lies really in the realm of applied leadership, or in our century the bloviated spin of pundits.
Along that line, the church needs to return to preaching the gospel of Christ crucified and resurrected. That is the role that current church leaders are not leading, but perhaps following, but I am not too confident of that.
Which brings us to the old leadership principle of “lead, follow, or get out of the way.” Since Wonder Springs is very commonly designed to be a source of living water, perhaps the God, who created the universe and founded the church as those he called out of the world, is positioning His church for a new and more important role in not only Christian religiosity, but also in the greater common community of our decaying culture.
That is also the message of this Advent season, which much of the church does not recognize, to their detriment.
A real winter blast has settled over the area, so changing the metaphor slightly instead of making lemonade now is the time to read some books.
Today and tomorrow we will briefly review a couple of books that look deeply at the current state of the church. As with pretty much all popular book writing, the emphasis is much on the problem and little with the solution, especially workable solutions. Having said that, both of these books do point precisely at the lack of true Christian leadership in American Christianity, if not directly, obtusely as I am many times accused of doing.
The book we will review today is: “Quitting Church, Why the Faithful Are Fleeing and What to Do about it” by Washington Times religious editor, Julia Duin.
Tomorrow we will review: “Christless Christianity, The Alternative Gospel of the American Church” by Michael Horton, Professor at Westminster Seminary California and host of the “White Horse Inn” radio broadcast. Both books are published by Baker Books.
On Wednesday in the weekly column and thereafter I will try to put some of the information in these books into a relevant Wonder Springs context. I am still trying to decide whether to look first at church leadership that has allowed or forced many of the best and brightest of lay and ordained Christians to flee the church, or whether to try to focus on what America’s current and historic Christless Christianity has allowed to happen in American and world culture, especially in the context of our current bailouts, meltdowns, et cetera.
Since two weeks hence this coming Wednesday, is Christmas Eve, perhaps it would then be a good thing to talk about current Christmas wars or something more benign, because Jesus Christ is the reason for the season, and contrary to what you might hear in church, Christless Christianity is essentially the reason this culture war exists at all.
So it looks like the schedule for the Wonder Springs Chronicle weekly columns for the rest of 2008 are pretty much set. Wasn’t that easy?
Julia Duin, is a reporter, consequently “Quitting Church” is really a report about what is happening in the church. As such it is really a very good report, focusing on a number of the best and brightest of American Christians who are leaving the established church either to do nothing directly related to church, to wander alone in the church wasteland, or to form small house churches.
Hence, when she discusses the church, as does Horton, the church being discussed is typically the brick and mortar church, not so much the historic church made up of living stones.
This book is really not about the great majority of so-called spiritual Christians, who do not attend and never have attended church on a regular basis. This is a book about mature Christians, including many former pastors, who either have left their former church out of frustration, or have been forced out by inept church leadership.
As a reporter, Duin discusses church frustrations, pretty much across the church spectrum, and does it without any observable bias that is so typical for what now passes as journalism, which really isn’t journalism at all but agenda propaganda.
This report, as similarly does Horton, really doesn’t address the rock confession of Peter in Matthew 16:18 where Jesus states, “on this rock I will build my church and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it.”
In context of what we have reported previously, Duin’s book deals with what Willow Creek Church, considers potential “self feeders” and Christian pollster George Barna considers “Revolutionaries.” What Duin does report that was new to me is that Barna is associated with a house church, which in my mind has a tendency to bring a certain self-righteous predilection into all of his work.
Not addressed in the book is that most, but not all, of those quitting church are associated with evangelical churches that Horton would consider representatives of America’s Christless Christianity. Since Horton’s book is a more recent publication, that link we will discuss more fully in our weekly columns the rest of the year and probably beyond.
That again should bring a reader back to the statement in Matthew and verified in both the Old and New Testament, that God’s chosen are not always and many times not affiliated with the established religion of the day, and includes the ministry of Jesus himself to sinners and not to the established religious personalities.
“Why the Faithful Are Fleeing and What to Do about it,” is the subtitle of Duin’s book. The fleeing part is well done, the what to do about it is much less developed. More to the point however, the “what to do about it” really isn’t reporting or journalism,” it is perhaps an editorial subjective required by Baker Books. That doing also lies really in the realm of applied leadership, or in our century the bloviated spin of pundits.
Along that line, the church needs to return to preaching the gospel of Christ crucified and resurrected. That is the role that current church leaders are not leading, but perhaps following, but I am not too confident of that.
Which brings us to the old leadership principle of “lead, follow, or get out of the way.” Since Wonder Springs is very commonly designed to be a source of living water, perhaps the God, who created the universe and founded the church as those he called out of the world, is positioning His church for a new and more important role in not only Christian religiosity, but also in the greater common community of our decaying culture.
That is also the message of this Advent season, which much of the church does not recognize, to their detriment.