I recently completed Revolution by George Barna
Barna’s main assertion is that there is a revolution that is taking place in the faith life of the United States. Increasingly, deeply committed followers of Christ are leaving their local church to live their faith radically in ways that do not involve the current structure of local church. Barna puts forth an assessment of the local church in America and some of the characteristics and habits of those to whom he refers to as revolutionaries. Barna offers guidance for individuals seeking to be revolutionaries in their faith and for local churches seeking to respond to the revolution
My Response
This book challenged my understanding of what is the most effective way to reach people with the good news of Jesus Christ. As a pastor in a local congregation, I am not sure that I am ready to say that the local church will continue to increase in irrelevance in enabling people to reach their greatest potential as deeply committed Christians. However, this does seem to hold true with some of the findings of Reveal: Where Are You? In any case, I found myself desiring to live as a revolutionary as Barna described and helping others to live in a similar way.
Revelance and application for The United Methodist Church
The content and themes of this book have application and relevance for The United Methodist Church. I think that Barna’s assessment of the state of many local congregations is relevant and holds true for many congregations of the UMC – effectiveness is not increasing and people may be seeking other places to live out their faith in radical ways. One possible application for the denomination might be to recognize that discipleship, worship and other resources need not always be targeted toward utilization within the local church. In addition, I think that there will need to be the willingness to recognize and resources communities of faith that look significantly different than the majority of United Methodist communities currently.
Revelance and application for The United Methodist Church of the Resurrection
The themes of this book are relevant to Resurrection in that they address the environment in America in which we live. Resurrection, like other local congregations, will be affected by the changes that Barna puts forth in this book.
I see at least two ways that the themes of this book could be applied at Resurrection. I think that there is a great potential for Resurrection to provide resources for revolutionaries. These revolutionaries may be currently within or outside of the Resurrection community. My impression is that efforts to renew the mainline church have been targeted to local congregations. I think that it would be possible to add revolutionary groups, as Barna describes, to the targets of resourcing. This might happen through an Internet campus as well as other types of resources.
Recommendation
I recommend this book to those who are interested in living their faith in radical ways and to those interested in seeing spiritual revival both within and outside of the local church.
What did you think? Questions? Comments?
Rev. Andrew Conard 
3 replies on “Revolution”
I’m reading “The Present Future” by Reggie McNeal. I’ll let you know if/how it relates.
I do believe Barna when he says that revolutionaries are already out there, fully engaged in the Christian life, and forming groups of Christian disciples along the way. I also agree this relates directly to Reveal. A strategy which embraces this reality is far superior to one that ignores it or even worse rejects it. So yes, lets actively seek out and nurture the revolutionaries. They need what Resurrection can offer and, over the long term, Resurrection needs them too. I say this because I have no doubt what we have been calling “church” my entire life (including what Resurrection is now) will become a smaller and smaller subset of Christian communities in the future.
I should have mentioned the Brian and I also commented on Revolution early last year. You can find those posts here:
http://appianway.blogspot.com/2006/03/new-revolution.html
http://appianway.blogspot.com/2006/03/clifs-take-on-barnas-revolution.html
Clif – I would be interested to hear / read what you think about The Present Future. I think that you may be right about the future of how we understand the church. It is and will be a difficult transition to make and certainly challenges my thinking. At the same time, though, it is exciting. Thanks also for the links to past posts on The Appian Way – good stuff 🙂