Life After Church

Life After Church is a book that is written by Brian Sanders. This book was fantastic. I enjoyed reading the book and grabbing a hold of to some of his insights. I have numerous underlines in this book, many folded pages and a few YES, YES AND YES'ES written by statements. I will post a few of the highlights for me in this post, along with the Amazon description of the book.

Here we go:


Product Description (from Amazon)

Life without church. It's getting easier to imagine. And maybe you already left. A leaver, then. Committed to Jesus, not an institution. Perhaps you've left your church in spirit, remaining in the pew. Outwardly silent. Secretly bored. In either case, Brian Sanders has a word for you. Out of his own experience as a leaver, Brian distills the complex problem into two viable options: Stay. Remain in your church with the blessing of Christ and in the power of his great vision for the church to come. Take the path of revolutionary leaving. Move purposefully, seeking the kingdom of God that is beyond institutions. Whether Sunday mornings find you alone in a one-bedroom apartment or isolated in a church of thousands, Brian reminds you that the choice is yours. Reform the church that is Christ's. Be it from the inside out, or the outside in.

He believed that he was being called to leave the church and shared with his readers the journey and his insights. He reference the book process by sharing that what prompted him in this journey was a question the preacher asked at church during the sermon. The question was the following:

What does the Holy Spirit what you to do. For him, he thought the answer was Leave. On page 15, with that in your mind, this is what he states:

The questioned that awakened this internal conversation in me that day is a variation on the question that this book will address: Is it really possible that God might be actually leading Christians to leave the church? Certainly people leave churches every day for myraid reasons.

Now, let me say, this book is good for everyone. It is not just good for those who are wrestling with the question; should I leave the church. This book will help you wrestle with your faith and what we may be doing "as church".

In a later post, maybe tomorrow, I will share about his thoughts in chapter 4; which dealt with Our Building Project: The Leavers Reconstruction of Church. I think that this was one of my favorite chapters and the insights are too many to contain in a paragraph.

Here is one of my favorite paragraphs in the book:

The church sits as the only institution with the resources to transform the face of the planet Earth to a place of justice, peace, and equity, a place without sufferring. We have the message (gospel), we have the leader (Jesus), we have the example (sacrifice), and we have the power(love). The church has neverless lost its way. On the one hand, we are capable of so much, and on the other hand we are accomplishing so little (pg. 100).

That just "fires" me up. We can do so much and yet, we really do so little.

He shares the "vision" of some of the "leavers" and this just resonates in my soul and I do not see why people can ot stand behind the following:

We believe in a kingdom where the subjects don't rest until everyone is treated like human being: love, respected, forgiven, accepted. Where every child is seen as the bearer of the fingerprint of God. Where the Third World problems are first priority. Where we fight, scratch and bleed until there is no more child prostitution, no more slave labor, no more racial profiling, no more hate crimes.

We believe in a kingdom whre little girls look at themselves in the mirror and say, "I am just right." Where the little boys fight for the weakest among them and never for themselves. Where hope is alive because we hold before our eyes the vision of Jesus both crucified and risen. Where sufferring is our joy because we found worthy to suffer for Christ. Where, as Jesus died at Gethsemane, see see the price we must pay and pay it, embracing the suffering before us and demonstrating the inexhaustible power of the one who calls us, the one who went before us, the one who receives us - Jesus the Christ (pg. 117).

To those paragraphs, I scream, "Amen!"

More from this book later. There is the description and three of my favorite paragraphs; among many. I definitely reccommend this book and then ask you to share the info with those you come into contact with.