Book Comment: If the Church Were Christian, Chapter 2, Part 1

If you are joining this book review series mid-stream , you can read the comment from the beginning by going to the LABELS section following the last post on this page and clicking on PHILIP GULLEY.

Gulley, Philip, If the Church were Christian. Rediscovering the Values of Jesus (New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 2010)

CHAPTER 2: Affirming Our Potential Would Be More Important Than Condemning Our Brokenness

Pastor Philip Gulley says,”I am weary of the church’s efforts to manipulate and shame me.” He believes that the church is a shame-based culture which uses embarrassment and disgrace for control of its followers. “For God to be good, we must be sinners in need of redemption.” This elevates “God at the expense of humanity.“

In his excellent (I highly recommend it) book, After You Believe, Bishop N.T. Wright talks about the type of religion against which Pastor Gulley is in revulsion: a Rules-Based religion in which you are saved by grace and then immediately go back under the Law, trying to live up to your new position as “saved.” People in this type of faith live in constant dread of inadvertently stepping out of line, of any small lapse of protocol and watch other people’s behavior for lapses which they can point out. They think God has a little scorecard He keeps on each of them.

Pastor Gulley calls this a mental illness. Bishop Wright wouldn’t say that, but he would agree, as I do, that it is a perversion, a total misreading of the purpose of the Christian life.

Pastor Gulley insists that salvation is not about “going to Heaven” but is about how we live here and now.  Well, salvation ultimately results in eternal physical life in a place prepared by the Lord (look it up), but Pastor Gulley does have a point.

This is part of a continuing chapter-by- chapter response to this book. More to come.