Book Review:
AquaChurch: Will the Gospel "ship"
sail off the edge of the earth?
[AquaChurch by Leonard Sweet, Group Publishing, Inc. ©1999]
Order
Aquachurch at Amazon.com
Crossroads, Seattle, WA, USA
As church historian/futurist/author Leonard Sweet and others like him call the church to sail further out into the uncharted waters of our emerging postmodern culture, some fear the gospel ship is doomed to sail right off the proverbial edge of the earth and into oblivion. They believe all this talk of a "postmodern reformation" is either a passing fad or accommodating the culture. But like their predecessors who believed the world was flat, today's critics don't have enough information.
Granted, there are the dual dangers of using "postmodernism" as a buzzword or embracing elements of it which are unbiblical. And, sadly, there are examples of both throughout the Christian community. So when you enter your local Christian bookstore and see a slick new book with a borderline "cute" title like AquaChurch, it's tempting to think Sweet is simply adding fuel to a trendy postmodern bandwagon. But having been impressed with SoulTsunami, Sweet's preceding work, I was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt and plunk down my hard-earned cash. I'm glad I did.
The critics can stop their hand-wringing. AquaChurch neither waters down the gospel nor suffers from being too hip. On the other side of the coin, those looking for a cookie-cutter approach to postmodern ministry won't find it. I was expecting the book to be more of a technical manual (Sweet shoots that idea down right off the bat when he writes about "the trap of maps"), but Leonard delivers a much more soulful read. In fact, much to my surprise, reading it became a spiritually-refreshing experience.
Touted as a manual of "essential leadership arts," AquaChurch reads like a cross between Wired magazine and the works of John Wesley and comes through on its promise of offering culture-current navigational skills. His use of the term "leadership arts" shows that whereas leadership in a modern context was thought of more as a science, it's more of an art in our postmodern context.
As much as is possible in a book form, Sweet's work embodies the postmodern ethos and an "ancient-future" philosophy. His refusal to give us simply 11 or 12 leadership arts, but 11 1/3 (which is not as forced as it first sounds); the graphics and pithy quotes sprinkled throughout; and the now obligatory companion web site all serve to break up the linearity and show that Leonard Sweet knows his stuff.
He takes the navigational metaphor as far as it will go without going overboard. Starting with leadership art #1, (Orienting by the North Star: Jesus the Christ) all the way to #11 1/3 (Feeling the wet finger: Intuition), Sweet demonstrates a well rounded set of skills that are indispensable. AquaChurch is not about theory but proven skills. Each chapter not only includes questions (Personal Log and Ship's Log) to stimulate thinking about how to implement the principles in your ministry, but also profiles actual aquachurches that are living them out.
Without giving away too much of the content of the book and stealing Sweet's thunder, I'll just share a taste of leadership art #1 to whet your appetite. In my mind he did right in starting with a very basic fact in navigating our way through this fluid culture: Jesus is our North Star. Without Him we would be hopelessly lost at sea. Yet so often we get caught up in doing things for Christ that we lose touch with Him. Like Charles Hummel wrote in "Tyranny of the Urgent," frenetic service for God can become an escape from Him. What church leader hasn't found him/herself in that place before?
So when Leonard posed his first question in the Personal Log, it stuck me right in the heart: "In all honesty, how are you doing in your relationship with Jesus Christ?" You can't get any more essential than that. Sweet's words helped me return my focus to my first love, my North Star.
On the whole, AquaChurch is much more streamlined and readable than the footnote-laden SoulTsunami (which was still an excellent book in its own right). It could be that Sweet decided to jettison some unnecessary cargo. Whatever the case, with each book he produces, Leonard seems to keep getting better and better. All of which makes me look forward to what's on the horizon later this year; the third volume of his postmodern trilogy: SoulSalsa.
Do yourself and the people you lead a favor -- get this book, read it, wrestle with it, and by all means, apply it!
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Chad and his wife
Renee (and 6 month old son, Colin),
are planting a church for postmodern people in urban Seattle, WA
called Crossroads. You can contact Chad via e-mail (chad@crossroads-seattle.com) and find out more about his work at http://www.chadcanipe.com/ |
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