A Lover’s Quarrel With The Evangelical Church

During this summer of reading I have been quite thankful to enjoy three books.  First came The Logic of Life, then Confessions of an Eco-Sinner and now A Lover’s Quarrel With the Evangelical Church is added to the list.  So far all three have been fantastic with A Lover’s Quarrel being the most interesting.  Here Warren Cole Smith addresses what he sees as the current declining state of the Evangelical Church in America and what has subtly led to it.

Much of Smith’s critique stems from a reading of  Richard Weaver’s Ideas Have Consequences.  From the pages of Weaver’s philosophical take on the decline of American civilization Weaver is able to parallel the decline of the American Evangelical Church.  From this he formulates his quarrel.

Essentially Smith contrasts the use of modern methods in the Church instead of how the Christian Church has historically behaved.  Instead of small, local congregations there are impossibly huge mega-churches.  Instead of  an Evangelism that seeks to grow disciples of Jesus that are able to do the same they count heads as a measure of God’s blessing.  Instead of a revered consideration of God’s work through history and placing ourselves in the story there is only a toxic focus on what God is doing now.  What has come before is irrelevant.  These concepts, along with a few more much more eloquently stated, Smith sees as the consequences to the ideas that started so many years ago as the Church, and para-church organizations, hoped to reach more people with the Gospel.

I very much enjoyed this book as it shined a light on some conclusions I had already been moving toward and illuminated many things I had never considered.  Like all good books (and art) Smith’s work enlightens both reality and myself.  Now the question as I can now see myself under a brighter light is what will I do about this?

This question will be difficult, but ultimately good, to answer.