Book Review - Letters to the Church

Letters to the Church by author Francis Chan is easily the most quotable book I have read this year. In my reading of the two hundred nineteen pages spread across nine chapters, an afterword, acknowledgments and endnotes, I probably averaged highlighting something on about every other page or so. What is present in Chan’s writing is very good, and much needed in a religious climate that seems to be drifting further and further from the text of Scripture. Is it a perfect work? Of course not. Is it complete? Not quite, as you will see below. Is it helpful? Yes, although that help will come in the form of a punch to the gut from time to time.

Unsheathing the Sword of the Spirit

The most important strength of this book, by far, is Chan’s reliance on the text of Scripture. Every single problem Chan addresses – and those problems’ corresponding solutions – is grounded in the text of the Bible. He couples this with a sense of humility that is prevalent throughout the book. Chan avoids, with rare exception, pointing out things he merely does not like, but rather spends his time looking at the American Church and drawing attention to the incongruities present between it and the Church found in the Bible. Furthermore, his solutions are grounded in the text. It is possible, even likely, that you will disagree with his interpretation of the text on some issues, but his commitment to the Bible runs deep throughout this book. It is not uncommon for Chan to quote multiple Scriptures in succession to prove the point he draws from the text.

Chan has also excelled at making Letters to the Church eminently readable. Similar to his most well-known work Crazy Love, he writes in such a way that the vast majority of Christians will be able to read this book cover-to-cover without ever wondering what it is that Chan is trying to say or getting bogged down by graduate-level theological jargon. Furthermore, there is something valuable here for everyone. Whether or not you hold an office within a congregation, this book provides motivation for all Christians to both rethink and become more engaged in their ministries. In particular, chapters two and three – “Sacred” and “The Order” – serve as reality checks for all Christians, the type of biblically grounded reality check that has become almost completely absent in mainstream religious circles.

A Missed Opportunity

The most glaring weakness in the book pertains to the scope of the examples and applications that Chan uses. Chan is apt at pointing out the issues many American churches face, but the application of the solutions he brings are exceptionally narrow in scope. The one notable exception to this is the call to prayer (this is present throughout the book, but especially poignant on p. 113). He relies very heavily on his experiences both on the mission field and within We are Church – the house church movement he helped start – for positive examples and application of the principles he talks about in Letters to the Church. He rightly discusses purging the Church of anything that is unnecessary, inviting the reader to, “Imagine if the Church purged until all that was left was a group of people with a Bible, a cup, and some bread” (p. 174), but then proceeds to spend twenty pages detailing how this specifically applies to “We are Church.” Please do not mistake me, I can appreciate a house church model as an effective model of the Lord’s Church, provided the biblical structure for a congregation is there (something Chan himself discusses on p.172-73). I can even appreciate the fact that in countries where the Church is actively persecuted, this might be the only possible survivable model of the Church; it certainly appears to have been that way in the New Testament (Romans 16; 1 Corinthians 16:19; Colossians 4:15; Philemon 2), but outside of that model, there is virtually zero application of Chan’s principles to what we might call a more traditional church model. It would have been helpful to see Chan point to examples of churches following more traditional models to see how some of his principles can be applied without basically destroying the congregation itself. Perhaps he does not see any. He does say he does not “believe we have found the solution for the future church, only a solution” (p. 180), but the utter lack of consideration of any other solution betrays this point. Basically, if you are not willing to switch to a house church model, there is almost nothing in the way of direct application to be found. I consider this a missed opportunity in a book that is otherwise exceptional.

Evaluation

Letters to the Church is a biblically-grounded examination and critique of Christendom in America that I am happy to recommend to the vast majority of Christians with the caveat that they understand there will be very little in the way of direct application explicitly present. Chan aptly points out many of the problems churches face today, provides biblical antidotes to those problems, and asks us to consider what it is we might change. He does not, however, give much in the way of instruction concerning what those changes might look like on a day-to-day basis… unless you happen to be considering a switch to a house church model. Elders, deacons, and preachers might benefit from this book by becoming more aware of the incongruities between their respective congregations and Scripture. Elders, in particular, will benefit from chapter four (“The Gang”), which deals with church families and church discipline, offering quotes like, “Biblical unity is achieved not by overlooking sin but through firm pruning, which can lead to repentance” (p. 83). All Christians can read this book and be made more aware of the spiritual “blind spots” in their lives, but for the Christian that is already very aware of these things, this book will not provide remedies for all those deficiencies. Should you read this book? Probably, especially since it is a relatively compact read. This book will raise questions about you and your congregation’s faithfulness and spirituality that are much needed in today’s culture, but will implicitly ask you how those problems should be solved in your particular context… unless you want to start a house church.

(David C. Cook, 2018; 219 pages)