Christian Reflections

Of course.

And he has.

And the DVDs are coming soon.

So there.

World evangelisation taken care of.

I think all ministries need to face this challenge. Especially 'in our fast-paced modern world'.

Steve has some advice here. A little bit complicated, but plenty of stuff to glean.

How do you avoid church calendar overload?

Engage's 6th Month Anniversary from Will Henderson on Vimeo.

A certain kind of baby boomer says preaching should only go for 20mins because some 1960s educational theorist discovered that our attention spans only last that long. Besides, you can't remember much more than that.

Small groups are better because you learn better and remember more.

I really disagree with this assumption and the logic in all of this. In the first place, it's a mistake to assume that the test of a successful sermon is the ability of the listener to remember everything the preacher says.

Here's a great little quote from Peter Adam:

Preaching is like coaching a sporting team. If you ask a player to repeat what he learnt in each training session you won’t get much response. The point of coaching is to make playing sport instinctive.

Similiarly with piano lessons. You don’t remember every lesson, but you can’t play the piano without them.

H/T Murray

This is very very funny. Thanks to Jason for the link.

Latest 9 Marks Journal will be well worth the read!

That could easily attract 50 people and make a profit of $20 a head (either it costs more but this is the profit, or all goods are donated)?

If you only had the money to do one thing professionally, which would it be? A mindbogglingly awesome video, or a mindbogglingly awesome website?

This is to promote a cross-generational evangelistic rally. Not just for Gen Ys or something or whatever.

One friend of mine said a video was better, because for boomers and older in some churches, they wouldn't really visit the interwebs (they still say "http:" when they are telling you a websites 'IRC or whatever they're called') but they would watch a promo video in the church service...

But I feel like the old church is also likely to botch the screening the filming of the promo video anyway! And besides, they'd be even happier with a fancy postcard flier and someone advertising the event in person...

I don't know. Help me.

A common reaction against the masterful gospel presentation, Two Ways To Live , is that it is too individualistic, focussed on the how the individual can get right with God blah blah blah.

It's an annoying critique , in part because it is simply not true.

It seems to be based on the fact that the diagrams include only one stick figure for humanity. Don't be fooled by the stick figure.

2W2L begins with God the Creator's relationship with his creation. And it constantly speaks of 'we' and 'us' - the human race created to 'rule God's world under him' and the human race left with 'two ways to live'. It ends with two humanities: those who are 'condemned by God, facing death and judgment' and thos 'forgiven by God, given eternal life'.

Whoever reckons it's individualistic just hasn't read it.

This new tip comes from Useful Facebook Tips for Campus Pastors:

1.  http://www.facebook.com/l/7460f543wDTgZL8wO31NlGMJebQ;pagelever.com
2.  install app
3.  upload an image (optimum 520 pixels wide)
4.  pagelever creates the tab
5.  set the tab as the default tab for non-fans visitng your fan page

This means people land on a custom designed page, advertising an upcoming event, featuring your glorious design or whatever.

Some marketing gurus say you should have make a big fuss about point up to the 'Like' (become a Fan) button in this landing page. I reckon that's a bit desperate, and many innovative Facebook businesses (like Target) don't stoop to that.

Here's the end result for Uni Fellowship of Christians.

On my previous post, Bron wrote:

I know there are a lot of people there who do have heaps of friends around. But it's those people who'll probably be too busy having fun to stop and notice much other than the free alcohol. There will still be heaps of people in the same situation I was in. The party atmosphere and all the crowds just make the feeling of isolation worse.

So, maybe in a way one of the things Christians do have to offer is actually really valuable in that situation: caring about people. Perhaps having a tent or giving away something which allows people to hang around for a little bit might mean that you do that. I dunno... really wicked facepainting or something? lol. Maybe not. But something that allows people to chill out and talk to someone for a minute or two and stay longer if they want.

I think she might be on to something. How might you do this? Probably not facepainting.

What about erecting a tent with the Societies Day stall, and setting it up chillout loungue style, with nibbles? On it's own this would be a frightful Christian space where creepy cliquey Christians hang out.

But maybe you could have a survey or something, to invite people in, and do the survey? Would that work? Or would it be too Scientology IQ test?

Any other thoughts on how to provide a warm, friendly space in the midst of a potentially lonely crowd... without becoming creepy in the process?

The University Fellowship of Christians, here in Hobart, did a good job of Societies day this year. We gave away free nudie juice and free pastries. We made a good impression, compared to the more nutty, Pentecostal group who were walking around dressed as the angels, Jesus and the Grim Reaper.

But it was mainly a goodwill exercise, a public profile exercise. Societies Day is packed full off people and most of them are drunk. It's not the best place to have conversations or even make contact with Christians. It's best to just make a good impression.

So in 2011, I want to channel our efforts at making a good impression. How do you do that? How do you, with a small stall-area, make the best possible impression? How do you stand out from the crowd of stalls giving away free UDLs and slices of pizza?

Presumably we need to hire a tent, that is more impressive than simply a trestle table.

Presumably we need to hand out free food.

But what is the X Factor? Any suggestions?

(One brainstorming restriction: I don't want to go too 'youth group'. It doesn't fit out public image to be to 'fun-sy' and 'game-sy'.)

Izaac has some balanced comments about the recent Engage Conference in NSW:

I must have missed the memo, but at some point, every KCC speaker must have got together and decided that the church is fundamentally ignorant in our application of our creation theology. The kind of 'redeeming creation' vibe. This weekend, it was about redeeming the good in our work, making sure we work for excellence, ensuring we do good. I'm hearing this more and more and more, which is all good. It's probably prophetic to some degree. But I'm concerned when redeeming creation is starting to get equal billing with the gospel. The balance hasn't tipped yet, but it ain't too far away. At the moment its simply good critiquing of the church...

I think the emphasis of the conference against vocational ministry was sadly misdirected. Vocational ministry got mentioned positively once, during a throwaway line near the end of one of the talks, and negatively probably five times. .... But seriously, what's with the anti-ministry vibe of the weekend? The call for all should be the call to the gospel, with the emphasis that this will mean some of us need to reconsider what we're currently doing.

I think he's spot on. The problem with 'prophetic' responses is that they tend to just swing the pendulum right back in the opposite direction. The solution to downplaying secular work is not to downplay ministry. It is to have a better, fully-integrated outlook. Gospel ministry is still the great need. Let's just work out the details more carefully.

However, I'm not convinced that this comment is helpful either:

The temptation here is, in creating a conference for young workers, we simply find a way to justify what we're already doing without the call to consider a change in direction based on gospel priorities. I don't see too many 'Big: changes' coming from what I heard on the weekend I was there. There was more the vibe of 'whatever you're doing now, its the right thing to be doing'. That kind of level of comfort doesn't sit well with me.

After all, sometimes reassurance is the right thing. Sometimes that frees us up to get on with gospel priorities.

BTW, I really feel uncomfortable about 'redempetion' language for our approach to culture.

Do you like 'web-invites'? I find over-formatted emails really annoying and I tend to assume they're spam... I'd rather a personal email with a link, than a web-invite... but that may be me.

Would you prefer a web-invite? Would you use that functionality on a church website?