{"id":715,"date":"2011-02-23T11:18:58","date_gmt":"2011-02-23T11:18:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/jazztheologian\/2011\/02\/if-the-church-were-christian.html"},"modified":"2011-02-23T11:18:58","modified_gmt":"2011-02-23T11:18:58","slug":"if-the-church-were-christian","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/2011\/02\/if-the-church-were-christian.html","title":{"rendered":"If the Church Were Christian"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I just started reading Philip Gulley&#8217;s new book, &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/If-Church-Were-Christian-Rediscovering\/dp\/0061698776\/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1298478434&amp;sr=8-1\">If the Church Were Christian: &nbsp;Rediscovering the Values of Jesus<\/a>.&#8221; &nbsp;I love provocative titles!<\/p>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>I haven&#8217;t read enough to comment about the overall content but I am intrigued by his thesis:<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<blockquote class=\"webkit-indent-blockquote\">\n<div>&#8220;&#8230;if the church claims Jesus as its founder, it should at lease share his values. &nbsp;The question for Christians is whether the church reflects the priorities of Jesus.&#8221;<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Gulley&#8217;s title indicates the obvious. &nbsp;There is a wide divide between Jesus and those who follow Jesus. &nbsp;However, as far as I can tell, this is not a church bashing book and I don&#8217;t want this blog post to turn into that. &nbsp;So instead of asking about how the church fall short of it&#8217;s calling, I&#8217;d rather focus on what it would look like if we got it right. &nbsp;<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div><b><i>Join the Groove: &nbsp;What would a church look like if it shared the values of Jesus? What would it feel like to be part of a fellowship that truly lived as the body of Christ?&nbsp;<\/i><\/b><\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I just started reading Philip Gulley&#8217;s new book, &#8220;If the Church Were Christian: &nbsp;Rediscovering the Values of Jesus.&#8221; &nbsp;I love provocative titles! I haven&#8217;t read enough to comment about the overall content but I am intrigued by his thesis: &#8220;&#8230;if the church claims Jesus as its founder, it should at lease share his values. &nbsp;The&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":79,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-715","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-books-music-movies"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>If the Church Were Christian - The Jazz Theologian<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/2011\/02\/if-the-church-were-christian.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"If the Church Were Christian - The Jazz Theologian\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I just started reading Philip Gulley&#8217;s new book, &#8220;If the Church Were Christian: &nbsp;Rediscovering the Values of Jesus.&#8221; &nbsp;I love provocative titles! I haven&#8217;t read enough to comment about the overall content but I am intrigued by his thesis: &#8220;&#8230;if the church claims Jesus as its founder, it should at lease share his values. &nbsp;The&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/2011\/02\/if-the-church-were-christian.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Jazz Theologian\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2011-02-23T11:18:58+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Robert Gelinas\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"If the Church Were Christian - The Jazz Theologian","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/2011\/02\/if-the-church-were-christian.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"If the Church Were Christian - The Jazz Theologian","og_description":"I just started reading Philip Gulley&#8217;s new book, &#8220;If the Church Were Christian: &nbsp;Rediscovering the Values of Jesus.&#8221; &nbsp;I love provocative titles! I haven&#8217;t read enough to comment about the overall content but I am intrigued by his thesis: &#8220;&#8230;if the church claims Jesus as its founder, it should at lease share his values. &nbsp;The&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/2011\/02\/if-the-church-were-christian.html","og_site_name":"The Jazz Theologian","article_published_time":"2011-02-23T11:18:58+00:00","author":"Robert Gelinas","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/2011\/02\/if-the-church-were-christian.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/2011\/02\/if-the-church-were-christian.html","name":"If the Church Were Christian - The Jazz Theologian","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/#website"},"datePublished":"2011-02-23T11:18:58+00:00","dateModified":"2011-02-23T11:18:58+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/#\/schema\/person\/5e3ecb360405bd8603a61c7115194e01"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/2011\/02\/if-the-church-were-christian.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/2011\/02\/if-the-church-were-christian.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/2011\/02\/if-the-church-were-christian.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"If the Church Were Christian"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/","name":"The Jazz Theologian","description":"Beliefnet Voices - Robert Gelinas on Composing a Jazz-Shaped Faith","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/#\/schema\/person\/5e3ecb360405bd8603a61c7115194e01","name":"Robert Gelinas","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/fbe\/fbe4a8ffc24002390e969652fba5c72bx96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/fbe\/fbe4a8ffc24002390e969652fba5c72bx96.jpg","caption":"Robert Gelinas"},"description":"\"For more information visit: Jazztheologian.com Robert Gelinas is Lead-Pastor (and resident Jazz Theologian) of Colorado Community Church\u00e2\u20ac\u201da multi-cultural, interdenominational community of 3000+ followers of Christ in the Denver area. Author of Finding the Groove: Composing a Jazz-Shaped Faith (Zondervan) and the upcoming, Strange Fruit: The Cross as a Way of Life (2011). Founder of Project 127, a ministry dedicated to seeing the day when there are no children waiting for homes in Colorado's foster care system. Robert deeply desires to see the body of Christ mobilized to serve the least of these. The poor, the down and out, the disenfranchised and disabled, those deemed unimportant and the unborn. He believes that God loves all people yet he has a special heart for the poor and the poor in spirit, the miserable and the marginalized. A Contributing Editor for Leadership Journal and Urbanfaith.com. He acquired a B.A. in Bibilcal Studies from Colorado Christian University and a Master of Arts in World Christianity (Missiology) from Denver Seminary. Robert is married to the love of his life, Barbara, and they have six energetic children (3 boys &amp; 3 girls--one bio, five adopted--two from Ethiopia). Friend of God...Passionate about the Body of Christ...Lover of this thing called jazz! Please visit Jazztheologian.com for contact info., speaking schedule, videos, Facebook and Twitter.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/author\/rgelinas"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/715","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/79"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=715"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/715\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=715"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=715"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=715"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}