ReChurch: Healing Your Way Back to the People of God ~ Book Review

Product Review:

It seems that everyone who has ever been part of a church has suffered a “church hurt.” The pastor had an affair or the congregation fought over money or the leaders were disguising gossip as “prayer.” Stephen Mansfield has been there. Though he is now a New York Times best-selling author, he was a pastor for over 20 years, and he loved it—until he learned how much a church can hurt. Yet he also learned how to dig out of that hurt, break through the bitterness and anger, stop making excuses, and get back to where he ought to be with God and his people. If you’re ready to take the tough path to healing, Mansfield will walk you through it with brotherly love, showing you how you can be better than ever on the other side of this mess … if you’re willing to ReChurch.

My Review:

I received this book from Tyndale House Publishers. All opinions are my own and I was not required to write a positive review.  Now that I have read ReChurch, I have to say that it has great insight into the issues associated with leaving a church (for whatever reason).   The author Stephen Mansfield does not hand hold the hurt person but yet he wants to see them healed and back at church. Let's face it, unfortunately, Churches hurt people.  Often the hurt is over little things, sometimes it is over large things. But no matter the cause, once someone has left the church because they have been hurt, it is hard to get over the hurt and get back into church.  This would be a very good book for them.   I personally have not been hurt by a church but I know many who have.

Below Mansfield explains his purpose in writing `ReChurch':

I want to show you how to get clean and free from what you have done to yourself in your church hurt. That's it. Along the way we are going to talk a bit about how to be a part of a church without surrendering your soul and what healthy churches look like. But I'm not trying to fix the body of Christ. I'm trying to get you to fix what you can in you, so that God can fix the rest and get you back into the fold.  Counselors nurture souls. Coaches teach skills. I'm your coach.

Second, I want you to understand that you will not get free unless someone gets tough with you. When we are in pain, we have too many voices playing in our heads - voices from the past, voices of our critics, voices of our admirers, and even the voice of our own inner dialogue. There are likely other voices from demons we have known and loved... Suffice it to say, a riot is taking place in our souls when we hurt. All of this tends to make us distracted at best and crazy at worst. We need someone to cut in harshly and silence the storm. (p. 14)