After sifting through the "cheers and jeers" in response to my article "Six Ways I Quit Church," I found some themes worth exploring. Did I really quit? If not, what did I mean? And what does it mean for our ecclesiology and our personal holiness?

Here is further explanation of my "quitting" and what it meant for me personally and for the churches I have served. I also want to offer my three rules for engaging our culture.

Some people took the article quite literally. I received some kudos from people who dropped out of Christian community. Other readers didn't engage the tongue in cheek boat/fish metaphors at the level I intended, taking them too seriously, taking them beyond their usefulness, or not getting the spirit of the metaphors. What I offered as a winsome word picture some received with a vitriolic spirit, which probably makes quite a few people long to quit church for real.

Still other readers were steamed because they concluded that not only had I lazily and selfishly disconnected ...