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Nominated for the Christianity Today 2004 Book of the Year Award in the Mission/Global Affairs category

Nominated for the 2004 Christian Book of the Year Award in Australia

In The Shaping of Things to Come the Australians Frost and Hirsch present an innovative vision of how the church can be more relevant and responsive to the spiritual hunger seen in the Western world.

“It is especially helpful to have an Australian perspective on the twenty-first century missional church as these two authors are engaged in church planting in one of the most secularized societies in the Western world. Their contribution brings an in-depth theological reflection as well as providing a broad scope informed by their extensive reading in theology, culture and mission as well as their on-site visits to missional churches in the USA and the United Kingdom. Furthermore, [the authors] are not armchair-theorists but are engaged in innovative and risk-taking ventures in church planting and the mentoring of leaders to extend this strategic ministry. Their contribution to the literature is as substantial as it is engaging.”
—Eddie Gibbs, Donald A. McGavran Professor of Church Growth, Fuller Theological Seminary

“This book is a bountiful multi-course meal, each serving presented with charm and class. It will satisfy even eclectic appetites, and please the most discriminating palates. Four Stars!”
—Leonard Sweet, Drew Theological School, George Fox University

Reviews

“In . . . their groundbreaking book The Shaping of Things to Come Michael Frost and Alan Hirsch call the church and Christian youth workers to recover the idea of the church as a missions movement in a hostile and unreceptive empire. They claim we are ‘exiles’ in a culture that disregards our God. The only way forward, they write, is to ‘thoroughly contextualize the gospel within the culture and subcultures to which Christ has called us.’”
—Youthwork Magazine

"Passionate.. idealistic.. imaginative… seminal.. incisive.. visionary.. these are some of the words that come to mind as I consider my six weeks living with The Shaping of Things to Come. A gripping exegesis of culture, church and history, with some careful theological reflection along the way, Frost and Hirsch contribute to the dialogue on innovation and mission and end up with re-imagining eccelesiology against the backdrop of emerging culture.

"There are so many good things about this book, that I can't imagine not adding it to a short list of recommended reading for 2004."
—nextreformation.com

“[The Shaping of Things to Come] is written with energy, drive, and enthusiasm, and it provides a clarion call for change—‘churches wanting to break free from the quagmire of their dysfunctional systems and climb out of their downward death spiral must learn to feel, think, and act differently.’ There is some clear theological and Biblical thinking. The authors provide an excellent breakdown of the Apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers. They examine the need to collapse a dualistic worldview. They explain how Christology informs missiology, which then in turn determines ecclesiology. There are some catchy ideas—the flaws of an ‘attractional’ church; the strength of an ‘ideavirus.’ The book is full of stories, full of insights, and full of passion but is not for the faint hearted.”
—Journal of Youth and Theology

“This book is a “must-read” for anyone that is serious about advancing the Gospel in the 21st century. The basic thesis of the authors, an Australian and a South African who are planting churches in Australia, is that Christendom is rapidly dying in the Western world. By “Christendom,” they mean the dominance of the church in Western culture from the fourth century, when Constantine proclaimed Christianity the religion of the Roman Empire, until recently. The characteristics of Christendom include:
• The centrality of religious buildings, epitomized by the great cathedrals constructed in the Middle Ages in Europe.
• Leadership by an institutionally ordained clergy operating primarily in a pastor-teacher mode.
• Institutional-hierarchical notion of leadership and structure.
• Institutionalization of grace through the sacraments.
• The church perceived as central to society and surrounding culture.
• The church operates primarily in an “attractional” and “extractional” mode. That is, the church expects not-yet-Christians to come to us, and when they do, we extract them from their social networks. . . . .

“The authors argue, therefore, that what is needed is a missional church, as opposed to a “parish” church which assumes that “If you build it, they will come.” By “missional,” they mean a church that is incarnational, messianic, and apostolic. These are three terms that are open to misinterpretation, and the bulk of the book is devoted to expounding on these three themes. In a nutshell:

‘The missional church is incarnational, not attractional, in its ecclesiology. By incarnational, we mean it does not create sanctified spaces into which unbelievers must come to encounter the gospel. Rather the missional church disassembles itself and seeps into the cracks and crevices of a society in order to be Christ to those who don’t yet know Him.’
‘The missional church is messianic, not dualistic in its spirituality. That is, it adopts the worldview of Jesus the Messiah, rather than that of the Greco-Roman empire. Instead of seeing the world as divided between the sacred (religious) and profane (irreligious), like Christ it sees the world and God’s place in it as more holistic and integrated.’
‘The missional church adopts an apostolic rather than a hierarchical, mode of leadership. By apostolic, we mean a mode of leadership that recognizes the fivefold model detailed by Paul in Ephesians 4. It abandons the triangular hierarchies of the traditional church and embraces a Biblical, flat-leadership community that unleashes the gifts of evangelism, apostleship, and prophecy, as well as the currently popular pastoral and teaching gifts.’. . . .

“Much mission work in the world is seeking to plant churches based on blueprints drawn up in Christendom, which is often counterproductive. I once heard a native of Central America suggest to a group of missionaries that it would be more helpful if ‘we’ would plant the Gospel in Central America and let ‘them’ plant the church there. The genius of this suggestion is that the natives of a country will instinctively know what will fit in the culture and what will not. Missionaries, on the other hand, are inevitably influenced by their own culture, and their ‘blueprint’ for the church they are planting was probably drawn up in their home country. A truly missional church, on the other hand, would be based on a blueprint to which the people for whom the church was intended had made a significant contribution.”
—John Ed Robertson, Lausanne Conference, 2004

“Missional church thinking—the response many in the West are making to the decline of Christianity across the developed world—comes of age with the book. As Frost and Hirsch demonstrate. . . . it is a radical, root and branch rethink of what shape the church needs to have in our culture in this new century if we are going to make the message of Christianity hearable again. Over four sections, the authors lay out their case that the missional church will be incarnational in its ecclesiology, messianic in its spirituality and apostolic in its leadership. Though packed with ideas and theology, it’s also full of brilliant stories and illustrations. . . . This is an excellent primer in missional thinking that every minister and church leader needs to read, mark, learn and preach. I would be even better with a study guide.”
—World Mission

“Michael Frost and Alan Hirsch put forward the argument that Christendom is dying and needs to be removed from its life-support system.

“Starting with this frank assessment of the current church, Australians Michael Frost and Alan Hirsch present an innovative vision of how the Church can be more relevant and responsive to the spiritual hunger seen in today's postmodern world. Instead of mourning the demise of the Western church as the center of society, the authors explain how the church can be reborn through incarnational mission, messianic spirituality, and apostolic structure.

“Church leaders who heed the authors' call will see death turned into new life through the creation of a vital, missional church.”
—CMDNet Weekly Update

“This is not just another book dealing with alternative visions of church and mission; it’s loaded with Biblical, theological and cultural insights, as well as very practical guidance for anyone seeking to break out of ‘ministry as usual’. I’ve not seen a book quite like this anywhere.

“Check out the first two sentences of the preface: ‘In this book expect to encounter revolutionary ideas that will sometimes unnerve you. We hope to awaken the latent apostolic imagination at the heart of biblical faith and to exhort God’s people to courageous missional engagement for our time – living out the gospel within its cultural context rather than perpetuating an institutional commitment apart from its cultural context.’

“I believe that the authors’ hopes will be realized as people read this book and tell friends about it. Frost & Hirsch are actively involved in teaching and working with missional church leaders in Australia, and they’ve included numerous examples of how fresh thinking and non-traditional approaches to ministry can reach populations thought ‘hard to reach’.

“Here are two of the convictions fueling the authors’ fire:
• Imagination, experimentation and risk are crucial aspects of effective ministry.
• Jesus’ radical ministry orientation needs to be incorporated in our lives and ministries. He is called “the revolutionary, the subversive, the activist.” Orthodox doctrine isn’t enough; doing the works of Jesus must be the target.

“Even if you are not led to pursue the more radical directions they discuss in the book, you’re not likely to look at your current ministry or your community in the same way—my own suburban New England backyard looks quite different to me after reading this book. Check it out.”
—House2House Ministries

"The Shaping of Things to Come is essentially a pragmatic book looking at how the church needs to adapt to fit our current situation, but it is not a theologically naive book. Each section and suggestion is supported by biblical reflection and reference to a wide range of Christian thinkers."
—www.facingthechallenge.org

“There seem to be a number of books around at the moment which address substantially the same questions as those addressed here. This is hardly surprising given the enormity of the task. But in its favour, this book does manage to take familiar debates further than many of its competitors, and it is worth your money for this reason alone. It will certainly provide plenty of useful material for the training of missionary church leaders. . .[T]here is much here to stimulate fresh thinking and inspires appropriate actions. I recommend it.”
—Themelios

“Over the last few years much has been made of the movement which has come to be known as the ‘emerging church’ and much literature has been generated on the subject. Much of this has been lightweighted and superficial but Frost and Hirsch’s contribution is an altogether weightier affair. That does not mean that it is a book for theorists alone. It is the practitioners, those involved in church leadership, who will benefit most from it. . . . Frost and Hirsch have added some much needed weight and depth to the literature available to those of us who are committed to thinking through the ecclesiological implication of the cultural shift the West is currently in the throes of. We desperately need to hear what they are saying.”
—Expository Times

“Two directors of Forge Mission Training Network in Australia offer here ‘a why-to book written as something of a guidebook for the emerging missional church.’ In the opening part, they sketch challenges that face the post Christendom church, frame their themes within the recovered sense of the missional nature of the church, and probe stories of innovative efforts that illustrate what is emerging. In the three sections the follow, they set out three elements which lie for them at the heart of what it means for the church to be ‘missional’: the missional church has in incarnational (not attractional) ecclesiology; it has a messianic (not dualistic) spirituality; and it has an apostolic (not hierarchical) mode of leadership. . . . [T]here are some wonderful surprises worth noting within each section of the book. The chapters ‘Whispering to the Soul’ (six), ‘Action as Sacrament’ (eight), and “Imagination and the Leadership Task’ (eleven) break away from the wider narrative and explore themes from unexpected angles. These are treats along the way, refreshing us as we travel the uncharted waters of ‘things to come’ that Frost and Hirsch invite us to navigate.”
—Gospel and Our Culture

Michael Frost is Professor of Evangelism and Missions at Morling College in Sydney, Australia and a Baptist Minister. He is the author of Exiles: Living Missionally in a Post-Christian Culture and the co-author of The Shaping of Things to Come: Innovation and Mission for the 21st-Century Church and ReJesus: A Wild Messiah for a Missional Church.

Alan Hirsch is the founding director of Forge Mission Training Network and a founder of shapevine.com. He is the author of The Shaping of Things to Come with Michael Frost and The Forgotten Ways: Reactivating the Missional Churc and The Forgotten Ways Handbook.

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