Can we be the Bride of Christ?

When I requested this book, I was not sure about it. The title was a little odd and it seemed the authors were trying hard to be funny and contemporary with the title. As I began reading the book I found a very enlightening text that made me pause and think about the church, God's vision for the church, and how all of us are called to live as the church, reflecting Christ as we struggle to grow out of our sinfulness and into His holiness.
The book spends its time alternating between personal stories about the authors' experiences in church with good solid theology. This mix gives the reader a first hand look at how we as Christians should handle the conflicts we have with our brothers and sisters in the body of Christ.
One of the central points that launches the ideas in this book is that the church has become a bastion for individualism. We have become a people that focus on self. When we approach worship, we miss the amazing grace that God gives, inviting us into worship, and instead get so concerned with what we want from worship that worship does not really happen. Instead we worship styles of music or dynamic pastors or the coffee bar outside the sanctuary. This is the base of our problem in the church. Much of the hurt we cause one another comes from the fact that we fail to focus on God and on Jesus Christ in our experience as the church. We are too busy being self and refuse to realize that we are together in the body of Christ.
Following the establishment of the basis for the hurt we bring into one another's lives, the authors spend time exploring various types of hurt. They ultimately blame the hurt we cause one another on the truth of the sin that continues to reign in our lives, even as we are seeking to be followers of Christ.
Kluck and Martin conclude with a call for forgiveness. We as Christians need to reflect our Savior who forgives each one of us and bring forgiveness to one another. In II Corinthians Paul speaks of our being reconciled to God through Jesus Christ. Then he calls us to become agents of reconciliation. While Kluck and Martin did not reference this text, they could have because it makes the point they conclude with. We need to forgive one another so that we are reconciled one to another. In doing this we can be unified, lose our individual approach to the church, and be Christ in the world, a world that desperately needs the love and forgiveness of Christ.
I received this book as part of the blogging for books program with Multnomah Publishers.