Best Description of the Christian Church Ever

I didn't buy much at the book sale, but I bought a book called Grace by Mary Cartledgehayes. She writes about her spiritual life, her relationship to God as a Christian and her three years of pastoring a United Methodist Church. As her time with that congregation was drawing to a close she considered the state of the church:

Lurching on toward the kingdom, I decided. Staggering drunkenly toward the kingdom, the way every good church must because, while bringing in the kingdom of God is the business of the Church, we never get it right. We lurch, we stagger, we fall, we rise, we resist, we refuse, we fail, we fall, we rise, we fall, we rise. Bad planning on God's part, if you ask me, making human beings responsible, but there it is: the pattern abides.

I love this book. It made me laugh, it made me cry. It made me smile smiles of recognition at the silliness that can be the Christian church. It made me tingle when the sacred broke through. It reminded me of the struggles no one will talk about when it comes to women in the teaching and preaching ministry. It reminded me once again that it was no accident that when I finally came to faith in Jesus Christ, it was in the corner of Christendom called Wesleyan-Armenian. I'm so glad I picked up this book.