What happens to a church when it buys into the myths of the surrounding culture? In America, the result is a church secularized and lifeless, a church preoccupied with itself and obsessed with reducing faith to a form of personal expression. Udo W. Middelmann calls for the American church to stand apart from culture by offering what the marketplace cannot-- the love, encouragement, moral clarity, and compassion that come only from knowing God. He pleads with Christians to regain the essentials of their faith and to return the church to its rightful place as a shaper of society.