The Divine Commodity

I just started this book last night (barely)… I’ve only gotten through the Introduction.

However, it has already captivated me.

The premise of the book is about how the American church has become the church of Consumer Christianity.

It sounds like it would be a pretty negative book… but, from what I can tell, it promises to be less on the negative side and more on the what we can do about that side.

Here are a few quotes from the intro that have already begun to spin through my head:

“This church is a corporation, its outreach is marketing, its worship is entertainment, and its god is a commodity. It is the church of Consumer Christianity.”

He also quotes Richard Halverson (who was a chaplain for the US Senate at one time):

“In the beginning the church was a fellowship of men and women centered on the living Christ. Then the church moved to Greece, where it became a philosophy. Then it moved to Rome, where it became and institution. Next, it moved to Europe, where it became a culture. And, finally, it moved to America, where it became an enterprise.”

I’ve never thought through that before. Pretty crazy to think about where we’ve gone.

The Author (Skye Jethani) doesn’t plan on arguing that the church today should do its best to try and look exactly like the church of the first century. He makes a good point that: “History has shown syncretism to the culture is a chronic ailment of the church.” The early church struggled with some of the same things as we do… it just looked different.

So… how do we move forward from here?  The answer needs to be found looking forward, not in looking backward…

Well, hopefully I’ll find some sign posts within this book that can shed some light on that conundrum.

I’m sure there will be more posts to come about this book.