![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.blackaby.net\/members\/files\/2013\/03\/vertical-church.jpg\" "\\"vertical-church\\"")
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(<\/em>Colorado Springs: <\/strong>David C. Cook, 2012)<\/em><\/p>\n 320 pgs This is a great book. It brings a much needed focus and it offers fresh insights into \u201cdoing\u201d church. If you are a pastor or a Bible teacher\/preacher, you should consider this a \u201cmust read\u201d (and I don\u2019t consider all that many books as such).<\/p>\n James MacDonald planted Harvest Bible Chapel in Chicago in 1988 with 18 other people. Today it has a weekly attendance of over 13,000 with an extensive radio ministry and church planting network. What makes MacDonald\u2019s book compelling reading, however, is that he is not just another celebrity megachurch pastor telling you how he did it. Rather, he is promoting a radically God-centered approach to church ministry.<\/p>\n MacDonald argues that the church growth movement has been focused on horizontal relationships: connecting with seekers and developing ministries that attract people to attend. He argues that churches ought to focus on their horizontal relationship to God with their primary concern not being attracting larger numbers of people to their services, but bringing glory to God.<\/p>\n MacDonald argues: \u201cA real encounter with God changes everything\u201d (18). He explains: \u201cChurch was never intended to be a place where we serve God to the exclusion of meeting with Him\u201d (18-19). Vertical Churches seek to bring people into a fresh encounter with the risen Christ each week. \u201cOur job is to get people to Jesus Christ and to get them back to Him in profound, life altering ways each week. . . and it\u2019s about time we stopped accepting substitutes\u201d (20).<\/p>\n MacDonald argues that, \u201capart from the revealed presence of God in the midst of the church, we are just a rotary club with music, or the Boy Scouts without fire\u201d (21). He notes: \u201cThe problem is you can\u2019t fake glory\u201d (21). He asks: \u201cCan you honestly say you have been a part of a hell-shattering, culture-conquering, Christ-exalting church, where petty disagreements and pathetic protection of preferences are eclipsed by the manifest glory of God? God is not safe and he will not be squeezed into some neat, respectable Sunday School discussion\u201d (22-23).<\/p>\n MacDonald argues that people have an innate need to connect with eternity, with something beyond themselves. He also argues that it is God\u2019s manifest presence that transforms church services into life-changing divine encounters, noting: \u201cThe manifest presence of God is the only water that can replenish the parched land of the North American church\u201d (70). He also states: \u201cI experience transcendence when something infinite reminds me I am finite\u201d (52). He cautions; \u201cIn making God our buddy, we find Him nice for cuddling but not much help when the hurricane comes\u201d (55). He also notes that asking church members \u201cwhat they want\u201d simply plays into their self-centered idolatry (59).<\/p>\n MacDonald also asks readers how much they desire or depend upon God\u2019s manifest presence in their own ministry. He asks: \u201cAm I that terrified to walk a mile in ministry without the manifest presence of God? Does the thought of a weekend service or a counseling appointment or a meeting of the board\u2014apart from God\u2019s abiding presence\u2014put you in meltdown mode?\u201d (73). He also challenges: \u201cStop hiding behind omnipresence and assuming it\u2019s the same as manifest presence\u201d (76).<\/p>\n MacDonald has some great thoughts on God\u2019s glory and transcendence. Speaking of Moses wanting to look at God\u2019s glory, he notes: \u201cIf you look at the sun for five seconds, your eyes burn out. Do you know I made more than fifty billion suns by a single word of My mouth?\u201d (83). He also comments: \u201cGlory is the supernatural signature when God has been at work. And it shouldn\u2019t take a Sherlock Holmes to find His fingerprints all over everything that happens in your church\u201d (83). MacDonald asserts: \u201cIt is the responsibility of all church leaders to be jealous for the glory of God in their church\u201d (84). He makes this interesting comment: \u201cMountains do not receive glory from dirt piles. Do you understand? Oceans do not receive glory from bird baths. Redwoods do not receive glory from shrubbery, and Jesus Christ does not receive glory from people\u201d (102). MacDonald argues that if a church is focused on reaching people or serving a community, church members will grow disheartened when trials come. But if your focus is on glorifying God, then \u201cfar from retreating, we want them to relish the opportunity to reveal the glory of God\u201d (109). MacDonald argues that increased attendance is no more proof of God\u2019s blessing than decreased attendance is evidence of God\u2019s displeasure. He claims it is what happens when people come to church that demonstrates the validity of the experience (120). He states: \u201cWe must stop assuming God\u2019s involvement and start inviting it\u201d (127).<\/p>\n MacDonald argues that the church cannot replace \u201cdoxology\u201d with \u201csoteriology\u201d (143). He claims: \u201cTrust me in this; God is never watching in appreciation when we make His word palatable to pagans\u201d (210). He argues that we should learn to see who it is God is drawing to Himself and spend less time trying to \u201cconvince\u201d people who are unwilling to come to Christ at that time (214).<\/p>\n MacDonald places great emphasis on preaching in his ministry. He offers some strong counsel on preaching in his book. Interestingly, he points out something I have long maintained. He encourages preachers to stick with one text and not to use numerous passages during their sermon. He suggests that using many Scripture verses in a sermon tends to magnify the preacher more than the message (228). He challenges: \u201cUnless you are willing to be the aroma of death to those who are perishing, you will never be the aroma of life to those who are being saved\u201d (243). He suggests that God uses the circumstances of life to \u201cripen\u201d people for the Gospel. The minister\u2019s role is to watch for \u201cripened\u201d sinners seeking a Savior.<\/p>\n MacDonald has a final chapter on the role of prayer in the church. He offers some great comments and shares how in his own ministry he had to do more than give prayer a token nod of appreciation and instead, make it central to all they did as a church. He claims: \u201cPrayer is the process by which God makes us spiritually fit to receive what He is willing to do\u201d (278).<\/p>\n I thoroughly enjoyed this book. MacDonald has a number of catchy ways of saying things that keep your attention. He shares plenty of his own struggles so you do not feel as if he is simply bragging about the size he has grown his church. I am not sure if I\u2019d completely agree with him when he claims that the only place the glory of God is to be found is in the church (112). But I do greatly appreciate his emphasis on the glory of God and on transcendence. I appreciate his challenge that the church has used sociology long enough and must return to the glory of God.<\/p>\n I have no doubt that this book will exert a profound influence on the church in the coming days. It would be well worth your while to become familiar with it.<\/p>\n by Richard Blackaby<\/em><\/p>\n <\/ins><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" [rating:4.0] (Colorado Springs: David C. Cook, 2012) 320 pgs This is a great book. It brings a much needed focus and it offers fresh insights into \u201cdoing\u201d church. If you are a pastor or a Bible teacher\/preacher, you should consider this a \u201cmust read\u201d (and I don\u2019t consider all that many books as such). James … <\/p>\n
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