We Really Do Need Each Other: A Call to Community in the Church

Of course, most Christians won't buy this book as it tells the story of Christianity as it really is. It is a wonderful, yet short, description of what love is and what it should be.

This book is really a barely-edited set of notes for a church retreat that Reuben Welch spoke at during the early 1970s. Like the 1990s, the late '60s and early '70s were abuzz with talk of community. But because it was all built on human idealism, the experiments in community in the '70s failed. That context of idealism and failure sets the context in which Welch gave this series of talks.But like Dietrich Bonhoeffer in his classic book on community, Life Together, Welch points us away from human idealism and toward the divine reality of the community Jesus has actually made. It's not our place to make community; it's our place to see and recognize and live in and nurture the community that Jesus has made us to be. And what that means is that we should stop being so high minded and idealistic (which really leads to disdain for the people we're "stuck" with) and get on with loving the community God has made and put us in.Contrary to what the other reviewer wrote, the book isn't written as poetry. It's basic prose that's written more for the ear than for the eye. But it is laid out is a way that leads the eye from one emphasis to another. That style was used very effectively by Peter Marshall in his manuscripted sermon notes (see Mr. Jones, Meet the Master) so that it would flow better as he read it.So, don't read the book as poetry. It's not. Rather, hear the voice of the retreat speaker as you read each punchy line.And more than that, learn to see the community that is and stop "lusting" after some ideal community somewhere else that doesn't actually exist.

This book is written in an unique, poetic way. I could not put it down once I started it! Mr. Welch does a great job of talking about loving God by loving people. It is a small book, but packed with godly wisdom. I highly recommend it!

This little book looks at first glance like 1970's encounter-group pop psychology, an impression that is helped along by the goofy faux-poetical typesetting of the lines. But this book is shaped and informed by Dr. Welch's long, close experience of the Greek text of the first epistle of St. John, as he taught it repeatedly to his college classes. The result is a simple and profound meditation on God's relationship with us through Jesus Christ, and the true nature of our relationship with each other as a result. And the tone of the book is light-hearted-- the author's evident humility is not that of a man who needs to put himself down, but rather of someone with enough trust in God's goodness to know that he doesn't need to take himself all that seriously. A delight and an edification.