20 Truths From ‘Becoming God’s Family: Why the Church Still Matters’

“What could the Spirit do with a community that is honest about our propensities toward distraction or the numbness we feel toward the world’s problems? What if we prayed together in desperation for an end to the wars that ravage the nations of our world?”(55)

“When we gather for worship, among the many other things we’re doing, we are cultivating shared attention. Watching a church service on demand from the comforts of my own home can never quite accomplish that.” (68)

“Our children need to know about the challenges we’ve faced and how God helped us to overcome them. Remembering trauma reminds us that we are shaped by what has happened to us and also that we have moved on and found life and hope again. Knowing that can help our communities face fresh wounds with courage.” (74)

“Praise is what unites and makes possible the radical transformation God has in mind for us. It inaugurates a new kind of community under the rule of our gracious King.” (76)

“By personally praying psalms of praise and lament from the Bible, we develop the habit of bringing our deepest needs to God and of celebrating his work in our lives. The Psalms shape our capacity to pray by providing model prayers with both depth of feeling and breadth of topics.” (77)

“The purpose of the law was to facilitate Israel’s mission to be a light to the nations. Others should be able to watch Israel to see Yahweh’s character and values on display.” (102)

“If we read Romans backwards, Romans 16 sets the stage for the kind of churches Paul commends—those marked by collaboration in ministry from a wide variety of people, including both men and women.” (107)

“Paul’s vision is a dinner table where we pursue people who are not like us with the goal of becoming knit together as a family. What if the goal of our social calendar was to eat with people who think differently than we do? What sort of world would this be if we moved toward those whose views challenge our own, rather than moving away from them?” (108)

“The global church can bear prophetic witness to the theological distortions of the American church (and vice versa!), helping us to perceive the ways we have absorbed the values of our culture rather than embodied gospel values.” (112)

“Participating in a church community is not an extracurricular activity for those who want to be ‘super Christians.’ Instead, church participation is the central means by which every Christian becomes part of God’s family and participates in God’s kingdom.” (120)

“On our own, any one of us is incomplete. We are meant to join with others to become something more than we can be by ourselves. We gather prayerfully, serving one another and waiting for God to act among us. God chooses this community in which to tabernacle and to manifest his presence to the world.” (122)

“Our doctrine may be precise and our church planting methods sound, but if we don’t like people in our church, they will not entrust themselves to us, nor we to them. Paul models fondness in so many ways as he longs to be with those with whom he has shared the gospel.” (126)

“A single vocalist, no matter how talented they are, is unable to produce the full and complex harmonies of a choir…This is also true of the church.” (130)