What is left of the Gospel if you take away the cross?
This central question, asked by C. L. Loos but tucked away in a nineteenth-century journal, launched The Cruciform Church twenty-five years ago. Read by a generation of ministers and church leaders, The Cruciform Church began a reimagination of the church in our increasingly, secular age.
Now updated, with responses from eight key leaders, this contemporary classic aims to reach a new generation with the critical questions of faith and life.
New Responses by:
- Sara Barton
- Richard Beck
- Lee Camp
- Raymond Carr
- Randy Harris
- John Mark Hicks
- Scot McKnight
- Jonathan Storment
"For many years I've told people that, in my humble opinion, The Cruciform Church is the most important book written about Christian faith and discipleship from within Churches of Christ in my lifetime."
—Mike Cope
Director of Ministry Outreach
Pepperdine University
"Most [of the young adults I have questioned] do not know this book exists. The most important Restorationist piece of the last quarter century sits unread. Was it just a period piece? In the secular world in which we find ourselves, Leonard Allen’s clarion call for a cruciform church, a people shaped by the cross and not the market, a people deeply formed by Scripture, and a people led by the Spirit of God, not the spirit of this age, is more needed than ever. Go ahead. Read it. I dare you."
—Randy Harris
Abilene Christian University
"In Allen’s précis of how to read the Bible today (Chapter Three), he was well ahead of his time, and at times in reading this I was nothing short of amazed at his insights."
—Scot McKnight
author of The Blue Parakeet: Rethinking How You Read the Bible
"I found the chapter on the Holy Spirit to be especially persuasive in reminding us that the church’s mission and the Holy Spirit are intimately related. The Spirit cannot be considered apart from mission, and mission does not take place apart from the Spirit."
—Sara Barton
Pepperdine University
author of A Woman Called
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