Christianity Today Book Award winner

Golden Canon Leadership Book Award winner

Feeling caught between the traditional church and the emerging church? Discover a third way: deep church.

C. S. Lewis used the phrase "deep church" to describe the body of believers committed to mere Christianity. Unfortunately church in our postmodern era has been marked by a certain shallowness. Emerging authors, fed up with contemporary pragmatism, have offered alternative visions for twenty-first-century Christianity. Traditionalist churches have reacted negatively, at times defensively.

Jim Belcher knows what it's like to be part of both of these worlds. In the 1990s he was amongthe pioneers of what was then called Gen X ministry, hanging out with creative innovators like Rob Bell, Mark Oestreicher and Mark Driscoll. But he also has maintained ties to traditionalist circles, planting a church in the Presbyterian Church of America.

In Deep Church, Belcher brings the best insights of all sides to forge a third way between emerging and traditional. In a fair and evenhanded way, Belcher explores the proposals of such emerging church leaders as Tony Jones, Brian McLaren and Doug Pagitt. He offers measured appreciation and affirmation as well as balanced critique. Moving beyond reaction, Belcher provides constructive models from his own church planting experience and paints a picture of what this alternate, deep church looks like--a missional church committed to both tradition and culture, valuing innovation in worship, arts and community but also creeds and confessions.

If you've felt stuck between two extremes, you can find a home here. Plumbthe depths of Christianity in a way that neither rejects our postmodern context nor capitulates to it. Instead of veering to the left or the right, go between the extremes--and go deep.



Jim Belcher (PhD, Georgetown University) is a political philosopher, researcher, and writer. He previously served as president of Providence Christian College in Pasadena, California, and was the founding lead pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in Newport Beach, California. He is the author of In Search of Deep Faith and Deep Church, which won a 2010 Christianity Today Book Award in church/pastoral leadership.



Richard J. Mouw (PhD, University of Chicago) is a senior research fellow at the Henry Institute for the Study of Religion and Politics at Calvin University. He previously served as the president of Fuller Theological Seminary (1993–2013) and directed their Institute of Faith and Public Life (2013–2020). In 2007, Princeton Theological Seminary awarded him the Abraham Kuyper Prize for Excellence in Reformed Theology and Public Life. He is the author of over twenty books, including UncommonDecency, Adventures in Evangelical Civility, Restless Faith, and All That God Cares About.



Foreword by Richard J. Mouw



Introduction: Is a Third Way Possible?

Part I: Mapping New Territory



1. There from the Start: How to Be an Insider and an Outsider at the Same Time



2. Defining the Emerging Church



3. The Quest for Mere Christianity

Part II: Protest, Reaction and the Deep Church



4. Deep Truth



5. Deep Evangelism



6. Deep Gospel



7. Deep Worship



8. Deep Preaching



9. Deep Ecclesiology



10. Deep Culture



Conclusion: Becoming the Deep Church



Acknowledgments



Notes



"Belcher describes his very personal journey to discover a way beyond the current debate that divides the traditional and emerging camps within American evangelicalism. In sorting out the contours of a debate that is sometimes hard to follow, Belcher also sets out the vision for the church he leads and describes how they are trying to live into that vision. He calls the vision 'deep church' ... a way of following Jesus and being the church that is both grounded in what Belcher calls the Great Tradition and engaged with contemporary culture."



"An excellent survey and tutorial of the issues of dividing the emerging church and the traditional church."



"Belcher's concern for his congregants and for the future of the American church is evident on every page. Readers who recognize that the traditional church is ripe for reform but are wary of emerging alternatives will find Belcher a careful, sympathetic guide toward a more productive conversation."



"Belcher provides a balanced critique of both paradigms threaded within his own quest to present the formidable issues dividing them. . . A worthy read."



*Conversation Starter Award*"The most discussed review on our site in 2009 was by far Chris Smith's review of Jim Belcher's book Deep Church. We certainly appreciate his careful and thoughtful work and the book's capactiy to spark meaningful and needed conversations."



"All serious readers will benefit from Belcher's insights and critiques as much as from the exemplary, thoughtful manner in which he handles the discussion."



"Jim Belcher was emerging before it was called emerging. His insights into church life are broadly useful, and the balance he strikes between tradition and mission, certainty and creativity, could provide a way forward for many."



"Belcher, himself a child of the traditional church in North America and concerned with the state of the evangelical world, takes an honest look at the debates raging between the two perspectives. He looks at the strengths, weaknesses, and misunderstandings they each have of one another, and introduces a third way -- what C.S. Lewis called the 'deep church.'"



"A fair-minded treatment of a polarizing and polemic topic."



"From a former insider of the emerging church, this theologically weighty book speaks to both sides in the emerging/traditional debate. Though reflecting primarily a Reformed perspective, Belcher is irenic, showing appreciation for both emergent concerns and the great tradition of Christian faith and practice."