Product Description

The goal is to enable everyone to be a participant, not just a spectator. The chuch can quickly be restored to everyone because, contray to popular belief, laypersons are eager to share their hearts, take active roles in worship, and resume the work of God.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #512420 in Books
• Published on: 1992-06
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 180 pages

Customer Reviews

A clear call to return to 1st century church practices
The book will really open your eyes about how the generations of well-meaning Christians have piled restrictions and traditions onto the basic message of the Church as the Body of Christ. If you are a regular church-goer, happy with the status quo, be prepared to be offended. Jim Rutz is more than willing to jettison 2,000 years of tradition and expectations and try to find out what Jesus and the apostles considered CHURCH. He points out all the things Christians do that aren't mentioned anywhere in the Bible, like church buildings, pews, steeples, church on Sunday morning,, etc., sometimes a little harshly, and encourages and nearly demands that we as the Body of Christ here on earth return to JESUS definition of CHURCH - helping our fellow man and worshipping our God. Mr. Rutz has been hurt by organized church, it is plain to see, but so have a lot of Christians. This will be an eye-opener for many - and a challenge to live an OPEN Church lifestle.

Good idea, poor research
The basic premise behind this book is good (seeking to restore primitive, orthodox Christianity), and I applaud and encourage all who seek it. However, the book did not handle well or portray accurately the enormous amount of literature which we have from the first three centuries, much of which is written by disciples of one or more of the apostles. Much of the information in The Open Church is simply erroneous, and this is a verifiable fact. I would encourage readers not to accept anyone who is a second hand or third hand source, but go to the horses' mouth and read about the early church from the pens of people in the early church. I would recommend reading The Ante-Nicene Fathers, a collection of the Churches writings from before Nicea, and to recommend a single volume book that accurately handles the early church, I would recommend Will the Real Heretics Please Stand Up. But please, don't judge me right or wrong just yet, but read the originals for yourselves and not a book that grossly misrepresents the originals. God bless.

AN EXCELLENT PRIMER ON WHY THE OPEN CHURCH CONCEPT IS VITAL
I truly relished this book when first I read it. It answered a lot of questions as to why the local churches often languished in either boredom or lack of growth...or often both!

Jim Rutz has done a service to the Body of Christ in writing this informative and entertaining book. But and yet it is much more than this: It is a call for early New Testament Christian community as participatory and informal family-love relationships.

If you want to get back to the roots and the

"nuts and bolts" of REAL Community-Life in Christianity, read this book. It will challenge you perhaps like few others you will ever read.

LenBenHear. - Seeker and teacher.