The Incendiary Fellowship
by Elton Trueblood
Summary
Trueblood’s vision for church renewal rests on a foundation of costly discipleship and authentic Christian community. He argues that the church must be far more than a group of nominal members, whose main concern is the continuation of the institutional church. Our concern for budgets, building programs, and staffing needs must give way to a concern for the poor and broken people of the world. Like the New Testament church, we too must gather together near Jesus where we can be fanned into flames that He can send out into the world.
Favorite Quotes
“The strange fact is that these people, who constitute the obvious majority, are almost universally opposed to the kind of Christianity represented by the New Testament. The claims are too strong; the price is too high; the fire of evangelism is too hot.”
“The renewal of the Church will be in progress when it is seen as a fellowship of consciously inadequate persons who gather because they are weak, and scatter to serve because their unity with one another and with Christ has made them bold.”
“We gather in order to scatter! The Church is a particular fellowship of men and women involved in common life, sharing the life of Christ, who assemble with one another for the purpose of sending. Christians are perpetually being ‘sent out’, but they cannot be sent out unless they have already been drawn in.”
“Mild religion cannot sustain itself because it cannot start even a tiny flame.”
“Little can be done with a smoldering fire; somehow there must be a blaze. But how is this to be achieved? We do not know all of the answers to this practical question, but we know something. Since the starter of the fire is Christ Himself, our initial means of achieving a real blaze is that of confronting Him as steadily and as directly as is humanly possible. When the closeness to Christ is lost, the fire either goes out or it merely smolders…”
