Radiant Church: Restoring the Credibility of Our Witness

Outreach Resource of the Year

Something is not right. The witness of the church in North America is eroding. Many Christians are alarmed by the decline in church attendance and seek a culprit. Too often, we point the finger away from the church, make culture the enemy, and build walls between us and others. But our antagonism and enemy-making are toxins that further eat away at our witness. Is there a better way?

Tara Beth Leach could easily be one of those millennials giving up on the church. Instead, she is a pastor who loves the church and is paradoxically hopeful for its future. In an era where the church has lost much of its credibility, Leach casts a radiant vision for Christians to rediscover a robust, attractive witness. We need to name the toxic soil we've grown in, repent for past wrongs, and lean into a better way to become the church that Jesus proclaimed we would be.

Leach casts down idolatrous false images of God to recover a winsome picture of a kingdom of abundance and goodness. We can be sustained by practices that will tune our hearts to God's and form us into the radiant communities God intends for us and those around us.

Tara Beth Leach is a pastor at Christ Church of Oak Brook in the western suburbs of Chicago. She previously served as senior pastor of First Church of the Nazarene of Pasadena ("PazNaz") in Southern California and has pastored in Illinois and New York. She is a graduate of Olivet Nazarene University and Northern Theological Seminary. She is a regular writer for Missio Alliance and writes and speaks widely about women in ministry and church leadership. She is the author of Emboldened, Radiant Church, and Forty Days on Being a Six.