REFORMATION REBOOT:
The need of the 21st-century church
By Paul Yeulett
Evangelical Press, 133 pages. £8.99
ISBN 978 1 783 972 791
This book is based on a series of sermons preached at Grove Chapel in London in 2017 to mark the 500th anniversary of the Reformation.
Rather than looking back to the 16th century however, the author encourages us to look around at the condition of the 21st century church and to recognise the great need for another reformation so that the contemporary church recaptures the Biblical gospel.
In 12 short chapters, each based on one or two verses of Scripture, Paul Yeulett identifies the urgent need to turn to the living God and to return to the Bible. The world needs a gospel-centred church, because it is spiritual reformation that leads to social transformation. The church should engage in God-centred, joyful worship with Bible-centred preaching as a priority, and many individual Christians need to understand what it really means to be in union with Christ.
In Chapter 8, the author pinpoints some aspects of modern life that need ‘beautifying’. He says, for example, that we need to cultivate true friendship in a digital and over-sexualised age. In Chapter 10, he describes the narcissism of our ‘selfie’ society and the relentless pressure to affirm and embrace every opinion and lifestyle.
This book challenged me about the responsibility we bear as individual Christians and as churches to live God-centred, gospel-focused lives that will be distinctive, so that collectively we can ennoble our communities as salt and light, even as the world strives to silence our witness and to ostracise us socially.
There are questions for discussion at the end of each chapter and these are helpful for personal reflection or if you wanted to read the book 1to1 with someone or in a book group.
