A factory produces, but what if the product was not what the manufacturer ordered? In this book, The Pharisee Factory, Glenn describes where the church has drifted off mission–choosing rules, knowledge, and power over God’s glorious reflection of himself. Like the Pharisees, who started out trying to protect the words of God, they move toward controlling the words of God. Powerful leaders chose to operate much like the very ones that Jesus called “white washed sepulchers.”
Who is responsible for the condition of the modern church? It lies with us, the local church leadership. We may know about the New Testament leadership model, yet we continue to sustain and promote practices that Jesus hated. Church leaders and church attenders have always known there is something off with our current model of “doing” church. They just didn’t know exactly what went wrong and why.
We now realize the modern model is too top-heavy, hierarchical, and authoritarian when held up next to the flattened, gift-rich, and flexible style of the New Testament church. We may even know the historical damage that our modern models have caused. But have we actually looked at the results of our systems and structures over the past couple millennia? The book just asks a simple question: have we produced more Pharisees than disciples?
