Kevin DeYoung, the pastor of University Reformed Church, has came out with an excellent book entitled Why We Love the Church — In Praise of Institutions and Organized Religion. It is an excellent book which refutes the Emerging/Emergent redefinition of the church, as well as the nonsense coming from the "American House-Church" movement of George Barna and Frank Viola. The review can be found here.
This book is the second of its kind co-written by Pastor Kevin DeYoung and his church member Ted Kluck. The first, Why we are not Emergent (By Two Guys who should be), was indeed a great book written in a very engaging format. For obvious reasons, I like the section by DeYoung more since he deals with the theological issues while Kluck deals more with the experiential aspect. This book is no different. Although I am sure Kluck's portion are good and could be of help to some people, I unfortunately cannot appreciate his sections much, and thus will mainly stick with DeYoung's sections in the book.
In his fight for organized religion, the main antagonists DeYoung faces are the decentralists and anti-institutionists found especially in the American house-church movement, with the main spokesmen being the emergents, the pollster George Barna and house church leader Frank Viola. In the introduction, DeYoung outlines for us this new anti-institutional house-church phenomenon, and the way he would address the issues involved.
[more]
No comments:
Post a Comment