searching for sunday -- a book review

Rachel Held Evans' Searching for Sunday:  Loving, Leaving, and Finding the Church is a theologically astute book that makes you think.  And if you're not searching for a book that leaves you to look at the Body of Christ in fresh ways, it isn't a book for you.  Because the one thing Evans does well -- to reintroduce us to Jesus and to his beloved community -- is accomplished by refusing to give us simple answers.  You won't be told what to think in Searching for Sunday.  Instead, you'll hear a memoir of a love story.  In her own words:

In my struggle to find church, I've often felt that if I could just find the right denomination or the right congregation, if I could just become the right person or believe the right things, then my search would be over at last.  But right's got nothing to do with it.  Waiting around for right will leave you waiting around forever.  The church is God saying:  'I'm throwing a banquet, and all these mismatched, messed-up people are invited.  Here, have some wine.'

In some circles, Rachel Held Evans has gotten a reputation for hating the Church.  But Searching for Sunday is a testament to that reputation's life.  Evans loves the Church.

And for those who invest the time in this beautiful little book, you'll learn to love the Church, too.  Through the filter of her own search, you'll hear God's love story with people that takes everyday relationships and everyday things, and sanctifies them.  Heaven has met earth in Jesus, and that meeting continues each Sunday in the Church's sacramental life:

The church tells us we are beloved (baptism).  The church tells us we are broken (confession).  The church tells us we are commissioned (holy orders).  The church feeds us (communion).  The church welcomes us (confirmation).  The church anoints us (anointing of the sick).  The church unites us (marriage).

Held set off in "search of Sunday".  What she found, though, was Jesus himself.  Because Searching for Sunday is a story about how Jesus encounters us in the midst of death and leads us to new life.  Searching for Sunday is an Easter story, because every Sunday is a mini-Easter.  And if Easter says anything, it says "Jesus lives".

Searching for Sunday is a witness to that truth.

That makes Searching for Sunday is a must-read.

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Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from the publisher through the BookLook Bloggers <http://booklookbloggers.com> book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255 <http://www.access.gpo.gov/nara/cfr/waisidx_03/16cfr255_03.html> : “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”