Where Are The Christians? --Book Review

I love this book! It prompted me to ask myself the most honest question, “What kind of Christian am I?” and give my best answer, “As good as I know how to be.” 

In Eric Shuster’s recently published, “Where Are The Christians? The Unrealized Potential of A Divided Nation”, he starts at the birth of The Beginnings of Christianity History laying it all out in plain view and easy to follow way the explanation of why there are over 33,820 Christian churches in the world.

Eric helps siphon categorically where, why and how they began—their similarities and dividing points and how that translates into what we see today—a cornucopia of Christians dotting the earth in various degrees of truth-seeking hunger. 

Reading this book, has reminded me of my childhood years growing up in the Deep South where there are more Churches than schools—there was the First Baptist Church, the Second, Third and Fourth Baptist Churches, the First and Second Presbyterian Churches, and on and on. My grandmother went to the Second Presbyterian Church, although she was raised by her Irish Catholic mother and had a little figurine of Mary in her bedroom. My parents were married in that church, although my father was raised in a devoutly religious family in the Pentecostal Holiness church, even attending a theology college himself.  Together, my parents raised me and my brothers as Baptists.

 

I chose to be baptized at 13 years old in a huge Baptist church in Southern Florida—myself and what seemed like 100 other people were baptized that day.  Shortly afterwards, with my hair still wet from the water-filled font, the Church’s Youth Minister called me to his little office. A polite smile on his lips, he frankly told me that if I wanted to continue to go to their church, I had to abide their rules: No Dancing, No Pants, No Rock n’ Roll music, etc. I met my parents out at the car and related the words of the Youth Minister. My father shook his head and said, “That’s a hard-shell Baptist, right there. You aren’t coming back.” All the joy I’d felt moments before evaporated in the summer sun.

 

Understanding why there are so many different Christian Churches, sheds a brilliant light on why there’s such confusion in answering the question, “What kind of Christian am I?”—we are products of the traditions of our fathers—they may declare with enthusiasm and conviction that the religion that they ascribe to resembles a feast fit for a king, and we may come to the banquet hungry and thirsting for knowledge and answers, only to leave the same way.  

I have always felt that religion is a vehicle to express one’s faith.  What I have come away feeling after reading Eric Shuster’s book is the importance of knowing with certainty the origins of the vehicle before I get in, or continue the journey.  Is my faith of choice going to get me where I want to end up? Is it a positive in my life? Can I depend upon it’s teachings to lead and guide me to create and sustain a happy family? 

Eric Shuster’s intense research answers the question about ecclesiastical genealogy and examines with clarity where the scattering of Christian faith began and what that scattering has yielded in its impact on our worldwide religion and societies, right down to our individual families.

By the end of this book, I not only feel enlightened and educated about my own religiosity and my convictions towards it, I also felt a deep sadness at the realization that my fellow Christians and I are not more faithfully united across the board. As Eric puts it so well: “…most of us as Christians—and Christianity in general—are operating far under our spiritual potential. If we strive to do a little better each day in Jesus Christ, amazing things will happen.”

Is it too much to say that I want every Christian I know, to read this book? I would love for them to discover for themselves what they truly believe, why they believe what they believe, and how to claim their own authentic faith that brings them closer to Jesus Christ in a meaningful, life-changing, sustaining way that blesses their daily lives and in the eternities that follow.  This book opens the door to that light-filled path.