Becoming Living Stones
A Feature Review of
Downsizing: Letting Go of Evangelicalism’s Nonessentials
Michelle Van Loon
Paperback: Eerdmans, 2025
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Reviewed by Ann Byle
Michelle Van Loon has seen just about all there is to see in her five decades of following Jesus. Raised in a non-observant Jewish family, she participated in some and witnessed all of the evangelical fads, stunts, trends, movements, and cycles through the years.
Now, she says, it’s time to downsize, “We are now in a time of reckoning. We are actively sorting through the last couple of generations of evangelicalism in the West. Only those who come after us will be able to assess whether this is a full-scale rummage sale or just a spring cleaning of a slice of the larger global church. In any case, here in America, downsizing is in progress” (7), says Van Loon in her introduction to her latest book.
Her sharp analysis and excellent grasp of evangelical history will appeal to those looking for more than a quick overview of history and a slap-dash condemnation of the obvious issues facing evangelicalism (think moral failures, abuses of power). But more than a careful study, Van Loon weaves her own story throughout as she recalls her decades in the evangelical world which “has shown me that there is no single entity to whom the apostle would address a letter. There are many expressions of evangelicalism” (22).
Van Loon points to a number of beliefs and practices that need downsizing, in her opinion. From her time in a Plymouth Brethren congregation, she points to the “priesthood of all believers,” a card played “in the name of personal preference” (50). From her experience as a Messianic Jew, she’s seen a plethora of “wacky teaching” (64) that needs to be pruned, pointing out that all sorts of such teachings need to be downsized. From her spiritual trauma linked to Word of Faith and Shepherding movements, Van Loon sees the need to downsize those movements as well as help those hurt by them, and all spiritual trauma, through grief.
Van Loon’s years of homeschooling point out another item that needs downsizing: evangelicalism’s making an idol of family and children. She points to issues such as “the fear-driven overreaction toward even the slightest hint of a perceived cultural threat,” homeschooling as the best way to protect from culture, dominionism (God calls us to lead nations based on God’s law), patriarchy, and purity culture—all idols and all in need of downsizing (108).
The church growth movement also faces Van Loon’s downsizing axe. All those megachurches—she points to Robert Schuller, Bill Hybels, Mark Driscoll—were breeding grounds for both leadership abuse and an overt focus on using tools from the worlds of business and organizational leadership to build congregations.
“With the blessing of church growth teaching, pastors of megachurches evolved into CEOs, evangelism became marketing, and the names of living stones filled uniform brick-shaped slots on an organizational chart in the church conference room,” she said (120). “Evangelicals have learned to build better bricks,” she adds. But people aren’t bricks and evangelism isn’t marketing.
Downsizing means turning back to seeing people as God’s children, not just numbers. “But God has never chosen to use mass-produced bricks to build his church. Downsizing means we will leave our brick-making skills behind as we recognize that he’s always and only building his church from living stones, on the cornerstone of his beloved Son” (124).
Van Loon’s conclusion is that the downsizing taking place now in evangelicalism in particular is a refining process that will make the church even more beautiful, make her a church that God is proud of. A church where fads, power, control, and numbers mean nothing. Where individuals—living stones not merely bricks in a wall—can flourish.
She admits to Downsizing being a lament for the things that have gone wrong in evangelicalism, the things we’ve wasted our time and energy on, for the grief we all must face as we go forward as a movement. Yet that lament, Van Loon says, points to a desire for a different future. And that is a good thing.
Included with each chapter are several reflection questions to bring the points Van Loon makes even closer to home, as well as an appendix of spiritual trauma resources. Footnotes throughout offer explanations for points made and details deepened as needed.
She doesn’t know what the future holds for evangelicalism, but “of one thing I’m certain: what will survive from evangelicalism will be emptied of our dependence on abusive authority, institutional loyalty, and noxious, shallow theological innovation” (159).
God, Van Loon says, is at work and is using our downsizing to express his love for the church. The biggest questions, therefore, are: “Will we cooperate with him? Will we receive God’s correction and redirection?”
Ann Byle
Ann Byle lives in West Michigan with her science teacher husband, Ray. Their young adult children are in and out regularly. Ann writes for Christianity Today and Publishers Weekly, among other publications, and is author of Chicken Scratch: Lessons on Living Creatively from a Flock of Hens.
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