Customer Reviews

Death of the Church

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The church is dead, and in the last throes of dying. It can die, or it can choose to die in order to be resurrected. Mega-churches, seeker-friendly churches, even cell churches can often simply be a new mask on an old way of doing things. This book calls the church to die, and to make a new start - with new methods, new structures, and a new dynamic impact on (post)modern culture.

This book was a highlight of my reading year! Written by the researchers at Percept International, who do reserach on American culture and its relation to the church, and also consult to many churches and Christian organisations, it is a perceptive and challenging book. It's stated purpose is that it is "intended to provoke".

Basically, they take and apply the Generational theory proposed by Howe and Strauss, and beginning with the Builder generation (born 1901-1924), work through Silent (born 1925-1942) to Boomer (born 1943-1960) and Gen X, which they call Survivors (nice title, actually - born 1961-1981). Although they alude to the Millennials, they never really deal with the implications of the next generation.

They also talk about the philosophical change from Modernism to Postmodernism. Although done at a basic (and practical/pragmatic) level, the few chapters on this shift are excellent, and a valuable resource in themselves when trying to explain to older folk what the impact of this change is.

The book focusses on the year 2000, and what the church will look like and what it needs to do to survive and make ready for the coming Crisis Era (anticipated by many different theorists to begin between 2015 and 2025).

Their essential thesis is that the existing church, as it has functioned since the Protestant Reformation is dead. It can no longer work, and just like at the Reformation, when not only theology, but also structure changed, so now, too, we need a structural change to recognise the philosophical changes in (post)modern culture. They state firmly that the church is dying! It cannot be s! aved. Now we have a choice: we can die, and be dead. Or we can choose to die, with the hope and plan of resurrection. This is the path to choose.

They work towards the final few chapters, which give details as to how they see the church emerging, and what needs to be changed. It is perceptive stuff, and must be taken seriously. A nice touch was the letters to the different generations which were given in the chpater on what the church must do to change. I also liked their ability to transcend (and name) their Boomer bias. They are Boomers, but they understand what must be done. If more Boomers can begin to give this leadership, we'll be fine.

So, this is a great book. An uncomfortable one, maybe. But one that is right on the money. It must be taken seriously. For us X'ers, it is an exciting book - one full of promise for the resurrection of a dead church which we so eagerly desire. The great thing is, that we will be the generation to accomplish this. Like the Reformation era - we will be long remembered if we get it right. Pray God that we do.

I have been reading several books on postmodernism and its implications for the church, but this book goes even further with better research into generational characteristics that rang true in my own life and my family. It is the best book I have read on the need change in the church, and I have read at least five. It also explained why my church has been doing well in that we unwittingly have been ministering to the Switchers and the survivor generation.

This is one of the most important books for church leaders written in the last few years. I have given away many copies, and I urge every pastor to read it. We are in a time of great social transition, and church leaders had better understand the nature of the changes around us. Mike Regele is not saying that a time is coming when there will be no people of God. What he is saying is that local churches that cannot adapt and penetrate their cultures will die. What would happen if 75% of America's churches would cease to exist in the next 50 years? Change in the culture around us is taking place at such a rapid rate that it could well happen. Thus, change in the church is not optional.

Ignore the first review. That is the denial of death. While our message must remain pure, our methods must meet the culture.

A thorougly challenging book, it describes the rise and fall of the institutional church in America, the forces at work in that progession and the forces on the horizon that will force us to re-invent ourselves if we are to minister effectively in the next century.

The message of this book is critical for the church today. The sooner we cease trying to get the world to see things our way and begin to bring the gospel to them, the better.

This is a book that should be revised every ten years or so as we move through the generational and cultural devlopments or our times. It will be enlightening to see how well the generational cycle plays out.

It is a book that has plenty of narrative (in the first and last parts) for those who are most helped by that. It also has plenty of statistical analysis for those who appreciate that.

The book would be worth having if it were only composed of part three. All worth meditation. Many modern Christians, including a couple of the reviewers here, are unaware of their own cultural conditioning. They think there is something sacred in the western, 19th-20th century institution and outlook that they call the church. They have a hard time seeing that that was a way of 'packaging' the gospel for a particular place and time in history. Disciples in the 21st century are responsible for taking the gospel to the worlds of the 21st century. Regele helps us to realize that this includes our neighbors as well as people around the world.

Read this book if you are serious about being an ambassador for Christ. Remember, an ambassador represents his kingdom to other kingdoms. He must make his message understood and attractive to others in order to serve his king.

Unfortunately, since the book was written nearly ten years ago, "Mr. Mainline" has only read the book, done a book report on it, and forgotten about it.

"Reality-challenged" people do such things. No wonder they're in the predicament they're in.

I have watched nearly everything the author predicted for my denomination to come true--and then some. The thing is: we have yet to begin to see the worst of it!

A first, second or even third reading of the book should prove to be helpful to anyone who loves their church enough to change for the better. If you're just going to "write a book report about it", then fuhgedaboutit!.

Maybe there are some chairs that you can help rearrange on the Titanic, instead.

"The church has a choice: to die as a result of its resistance to change or to die in order to live." That's the thesis of this book, which was a bombshell when it appeared in 1995. Though published by Zondervan, this book really is the work of the folks at Percept, the organization that many denominations and judicatories and local churches use to study demographic data for the purposes of reaching out effectively into the surrounding community.

"The church," argues Regele, "is moving rapidly toward a moment of decision, a defining moment. It is a moment of definition because, whether we like it or not, the church in American culture is being redefined. And our options are very limited." In fact, says Regele, there are only two basic options, reflected in the thesis above. We can die as a result of resistance to change, or we can die in order to live. The second option involves understanding the dynamics of change that are at work today in our culture, understanding the various facets of change, accepting that the traditional place of the institutional church in American society is crumbling, allowing our traditional forms and structures that are the foundation of the institutional church to die, wrestling to forge new ways to proclaim the Gospel in this changing world, and revisioning the church for the twenty-first century -- from the local congregation to the national denominational office (or beyond!).

The first part of the book is devoted to dynamics of both predictable and unpredictable cultural change. In the "predictable" category are generational dynamics and their effect on the church (based on the work of William Strauss and Neil Howe in books like Generations and The Fourth Turning); those generational dynamics are predictable because there are established historical patterns. In the "unpredictable" category are various forms of chaotic change that occur at watershed moments in human history. Regele argues that we stand at such a defining moment in which we are moving into a whole new period in human history. That discussion is reminiscent of Brian McLaren's analysis in A New Kind of Christian (which I read first, though it appeared later). Regele's analysis of historical epochs is slightly different than McLaren's, both they both share a conviction that we stand today at a critical juncture in human history, the likes of which have occured rarely in our collective history.

The second part of the book unpacks various focal points of change. Particularly helpful was Regele's analysis of how the church has, in this country, traditionally been tied to the dominant place of the traditional family and to the "Grand American Story," both of which are crumbling. To be effective in the new world, Regele argues, the church needs to free itself from those traditional associations, so that it can more effectively proclaim the gospel in a wholly different cultural environment.

The third part of the book articulates the defining moment more precisely. In the future, the church will be on the margins, not in the mainstream. We have to embrace "the inevitable death of what we have known, repenting of the recalcitrance that has tried to avoid it, and in faith accepting a redefinition of what it means to be the church in America." Our churches in the future will either be empty shells or revitalized centers of life -- depending on whether we do the necessary adaptive work. "If in faith we let our institutions go, out of the ash heap God will raise new institutions to serve a new day." After death . . . comes resurrection. That is, after all, the hope of the gospel. (Though I would suggest, based on my reading of Margaret Wheatley's Leadership and the New Science and other similar books, that the whole notion of "institution" needs to give way to an understanding of the church as "organism.")

Regele provides numerous appendices that offer detailed statistical and demographic analyses, which buttress the main claims the book makes. I found the charts showing the changing shape of the American family to be particularly helpful. We in the church tend to still want to focus on traditional families with a mom and a dad and 2.3 kids . . . but those sorts of living arrangements are becoming increasingly uncommon, as Regele's data shows.

All in all, this is an excellent book, still relevant (perhaps even more relevant!) now, eleven years after its publication. I wish I had read it long ago.

I think the author does an excellent job of examining the state of mainline churches in America today. This book is about change and that scares a lot of people. I found it very informative.

This book is now 8 years old, and we can see the 'fruit' of this kind of thinking in churches today. Many churches who have put into action the ideas in this book have turned into 'feel good' Christian social clubs. Don't talk about conviction of sin, the need for repentance and obedience to our Lord. Instead talk about mistakes and how we are basically all good people. So many churches, sadly, have become post-modern by clinging to the ways of the world, and THIS is destroying the church. I hope the authors of this book have the courage to now deal with the 'fruits' of their recommendations. Maybe a good follow-up to this book would be to deal with how the ideas put forth are now 'killing' the church, and how teaching the truth of Christ, the easy and the not so easy parts, are what people truly need in this dying world.

The idea that the Church must conform to society is laughable. Christianity is not a popularity contest, it is immutable truth. This book is totally heretical. Don't get this book.