Current Music

• Amy Grant:
  The Christmas Collection
• Kenny Rogers, Dolly Parton:
  Once upon a Christmas
• The Partridge Family:
  A Partridge Family Christmas Card
• Bing Crosby:
  White Christmas

Current Books

• John Eldredge:
  Walking with God: Talk to Him. Hear from Him. Really.
• John Eckhardt:
  Prayers That Rout Demons
• Heath Hardesty:
  To the Lion: The Christian in Tension
• Mark Batterson:
  Wild Goose Chase: Reclaim the Adventure of Pursuing God

3 Comments for 'Who do you say that I am?'

1. On September 19, 2007 @ 6:21 am joe said:

   • Agreed!  Or as Paul and Silas used to say, "Amen!"  As a pastor often caught-up in Christian sales, I myself have wondered the same things: Why don't we just push off the outer shell and expose the fundamental essence of what we say we are doing…or trying to do?  For crying-out-loud, why don't we just do what we say we are doing?  But I would have to say that the marketing (whatever that is for churches) itself has become an icebreaker with those we hope to reach.  I dislike being told I must have a target audience (alothough I can fully comprehend the meaning behind the teaching!).  I am for winning everybody!  Even more outrageous, I am for "me" winning everybody.  I know this isn't physically possible but that's my heart when I wake in the morning.  When I scribble through a sermon plan for the coming week, and while I am driving to the office or over to someone's home for visitation, I am thinking "I want EVERYBODY to come to my church!" The reality is- modern America (even in South Dakota) stands just on the far side of all marketing.  That's where they are…if I look for them, that's where I'll find them.  Like a blanket of fog between us, marketing must be traversed with care and with caution and with passion and with creativity…whatever because if I am ever going to be what I claim to be…if I am ever going to do what I say I am doing, I have to go where they are. Your words are true…thanks for the early morning prod! Joe 

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2. On September 19, 2007 @ 7:53 am Stormie said:

   • Amen sister! errrr….mother!

     Church and the fellowship of the body is not a product to be sold. Jesus is not a product!

     I’m tired of churches looking at other churches like Hillsong or Lakewood and trying to model after them because “they have such cool music”, “their ministry is HUGE”, “they reach out to so many people”….and don’t get me wrong, these churches ARE amazing and are doing incredible things for the Lord but they started small, with a heart after the Lord and a heart to seek His will and HE is the one who brought them up and has blessed them(they didn’t have anything to do with it). I’ve seen a lot of churches, especially youth groups, that try to start out with a “cool sound” and “awesome lights” who do crazy big things to try to get students to come but they don’t realize that unless the heart is right, they will fail. And I have seen them fail. We get in a mindset where we try to have the best lights and sound and most edgey sermons and forget that it’s about peoples souls. It’s not about how cool the music is or if the person running the computer is on top of changing the words to each song on time. It’s not about trying to please every person that comes into the church, it’s about TRUTH. It’s about having a heart that follows after the Lord and isn’t concerned with “being cool enough”.
     I hope this isn’t being taken wrong at all because I know that people have incredible talents from the Lord, are great musicians, brilliant speakers, etc. I’m just talking about not losing sight of why the Lord gave us these abilities and what He wants us to do with them, not how we can impress people to try to get them to our church.
     As long as the heart is right…”marketing” (or I would rather change it to “using our God-given creative abilities”) isn’t so bad.
     Working for a billboard printing company, I have to say…I HATE when we print billboards for church. I hate that churches feel they have to market their church to get people to come. Jesus is enough…we don’t have to sell Him to people.

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3. On September 19, 2007 @ 8:39 am Stephanie said:

   • Interesting viewpoint.  You and I should discuss over coffee one of these mornings.  :)  One of the biggest arguments (in love, of course) we ever had in our small group was regarding numbers.  One of our small group members was all about mega-churches and numbers.  My hubby said it wasn't about numbers, it was about souls, and hearts and growing mature Christian people.  I agree that it's not about marketing.  The coolest church I ever attended was all about everyone knowing everyone else, Sunday potlucks in the church basement, making friends, going to the hospital to visit each other, bringing food when someone was ill… really being THERE for each other, fellowshipping (is that a word?) together… all the time.  More than those things, it was about being a bible-reading, God-fearing, Jesus-loving group of people.  It was a pretty small group, really.  But when the bible-reading, God-fearing, Jesus-loving thing came together, all of the rest of that (the potluck having, hospital visiting, food bringing, fellowshipping part) just came right along.  And then more people came… Our only marketing campaign was blessing the socks off of everyone we could.  No flyers, mailers, giant banners or anything else.  Not that those things don't have their place.  But Acts has a pretty good model of how it should go, right?  And I'm thinking those folks didn't have access to a Kinko's.

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