This fascinating book addresses the question of how the decline of the church in the West might be turned around. The authors contend that the solution is not found in persuading secular people to enter our sacred spaces, but to invade secular space ourselves, as God did in Christ. They survey the lamentable condition of many traditional churches, which survive financially on a church tax, or by selling buildings, and are filled with clergy for whom leading is a profession rather than a passion. Even growing churches in the West have often simply learned “how to attract Christians from other churches more effectively than other congregations can”.

There is a desire for a “quick-fix” solution, perhaps taking the conventional wisdom of marketing strategies, but the authors claim that what is really needed is to “ignite a movement”, turning people into activists rather than merely participants. The world is yearning for an experience of community that the church would like to offer but has forgotten how to model.

In chapter 2 there is a helpful survey of church history and how the state and church have interacted for good and for ill over the years. In later chapters they move on to describe how they see the problem being solved. They question the idea that we simply need to pray for revival, arguing that we have romanticised many revivals of the past, and actually the church has grown more through gaining the favour of those around than simply through revival. People such as Wilberforce with his work to abolish slavery are seen as key to changing the nation’s opinion of the church.

Church planting is strongly emphasised throughout the book as a vital strategy in turning around the decline. They see this not just as an exercise for new churches, but as a process for renewal of traditional churches, planting fresh congregations in place of existing dwindling ones. They see a recovery of the Eph 4 ministries (not necessarily “offices), as crucial to this process.

Church leaders whose vision is merely for a bigger church come in for some censure – mission should be the end, the church is just the means. All churches (megachurches included) need to plan to plant other churches, and use small group discipleship as a means for training new leaders, spreading the vision, and helping people to “live the story”. There is also strong criticism for the “lone leader” approach, where a church is run by a senior pastor. They claim that the Biblical model is “team leadership”, drawing on 1 Cor 12. I think they overstate the case though when they say “there is no passage in the New Testament where leadership, in any dimension, is ever dealt with in singularity”.

Churches are described as “organic”, meaning that they will have a natural cycle from birth to maturity to decline and death. This model is used throughout the book, and some attention is given to how churches in the “decline” phase can be revitalised. Churches that want to help ignite a movement that will last beyond a single generation are encouraged to start praying seriously, using small groups for discipleship, take a pragmatic approach to evangelistic strategies, and ensuring that church planting is in the “DNA” of the church.

Overall I would say that anyone interested in church growth should read this book, to be challenged and stimulated to new ways of thinking. Even my own church grouping, New Frontiers, which has embraced many of the principles in this book, would do well to consider whether mega-churches are being sought as an alternative to church planting, rather than as a means for more aggressive church planting. Whether by restoration or renewal, the church in the West needs to regain a passion for what it is called to be and to do in this world.

If I was asked to name my top ten difficult doctrines before reading this book, I’m not sure that the love of God would have featured in the list. Right from the start, Carson acknowledges that many readers will wonder why this subject should be deemed ‘difficult’. The book is less than 100 pages long, and is based on a series of four lectures that Carson has given on the subject in various places. As lectures, they expect the reader to be comfortable with theological terminology, and also assume a broadly Reformed readership.

Carson starts by expressing concern that God is being “sentimentalized” in the evangelical church and we are abandoning the multi-faceted Biblical vision of his love and more generally his character. He lists five distinct ways in which the love of God is spoken about in the Bible, and these are key to the rest of the discussion throughout the book. If we make one of them primary to the neglect of the others, we end up with a warped view of God. He warns against the some cliches about God’s love which are at best only half-truths.

Chapter two deals with the statement “God is love”. He briefly repeats some of his arguments from “Exegetical Fallacies” here, claiming that some Christians have proved more than is legitimate about the meaning of agape as opposed to other Greek words for love. He argues that it is the love relationship between the Father and Son that is the standard for all other expressions of love.

The third chapter tries to deal with the issue of the affective nature of God’s love (denied by some versions of impassibility). Here he builds on a foundation of the sovereignty and transendance of God, along with the doctrine of election to affirm “compatibilism”. This is the view that though God is sovereign, we can and must affirm human responsibility rather than adopting fatalism. In this section he also briefly outlines his rejection of the “openness of God”. Carson clearly does not want to actually deny “impassibility” (it is after all in the Westminster Confession), but he wants it “rightly constrained”. God loves with emotion because he chooses to do so, a choice grounded in his own loving character. This is a love that differs from human romantic love – it is a love that is set upon the unlovely, and it is this type of love that Christians are called to emulate.

The fourth and final chapter deals with God’s love and wrath. Another cliche “God hates the sin but loves the sinner” is tried and found wanting here. If God’s love is Biblical, so is his wrath. If his love is emotive, so is his wrath. But he asserts that “there is nothing intrinsically impossible about wrath and love being directed toward the same individual or people at the same time”. God’s love and wrath are of course seen most explicitly at the cross. Carson deals briefly with some issues surrounding the atonement here – not seeing Jesus as placating an angry Father, but both Father and Son being intimately involved in propitiation. He also defends limited atonement, though prefers to call it “definite atonement”.

I found this book very helpful in summarising the Biblical material concerning the love of God, and bringing it into balance with other related Biblical themes. The love of God is amazing, and worthy of meditating upon far more often than we do. But lets not exchange it for a sentimental and shallow substitute that ends up denying the Biblical testimony to the character of God.