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American Culture & Church Marketing
Posted by David Rogers in Church & Missions
As I have mentioned here at sbc IMPACT! on other occasions, I believe that living for awhile outside of our own cultural context can help us at times to see certain things a little more clearly than if we had never had that opportunity. Certainly, as Americans, the dangers of treating the church as if it were a business do not totally escape our attention. Whenever this topic is brought up, as, for example, in Bowden McElroy’s perceptive post of yesterday, there is usually a general assent given to the relevance and legitimacy of the concerns voiced. However, my impression, as someone who, due to my overseas missionary experience, has had the privilege of gaining a bit of an “outsider’s” perspective, is that, in many cases, we are somewhat blinded to the degree the culture that surrounds us influences the way we “do church.”
Several years ago, during our Stateside Assignment, my family hosted a Spanish couple with whom we had become friends for a month-long visit to the States. During this time, we took them to visit several different churches and introduced them to many of our evangelical friends. This couple, who had grown up all their lives in a typically Spanish Catholic-Secular context, and, up to that point, had relatively little exposure to the “evangelical world” at large, were especially interested in the sociological and cultural aspects of what they observed.
Towards the end of their visit, upon asking them about their impressions of the trip, I was intrigued, and also, I must confess, a bit miffed, when they talked about what they considered to be the strange mixture of religion and consumerism they had observed in American church life. Subsequent reflection has led me to ask myself a lot of hard questions.
For example, when travelling around the country this past year of Stateside Assignment, I have been particularly tuned in to the way churches market themselves. Driving down the highway in the Bible-belt South, the multiple and varied churches and church signs along the way seem to me to blend right in with the constant stream of gas stations, fast-food restaurants, and hotels that dot the landscape. On occasions, I get the same sensation I get when I am at the cereal aisle of the local supermarket, overwhelmed by the vast gamut of alternatives available, and the manner in which each one tries to play up its particular “selling points.”
Now, I do not, by any means, want to denigrate the astute use of the media as a tool to proclaim the gospel message. If we are to be good stewards of the gifts and resources God has given us in the task of making disciples of the people in our community, we will need to be good students and practitioners of the fine art of communication. No doubt, some church marketing is done with precisely this end in mind, and does an admirable job of accomplishing its objective.
However, I think it can be healthy, from time to time, to take a step back, and ask ourselves from an “outsider’s” perspective, to the degree we are able, just what it is we are trying to accomplish by the different ways we seek to “market” our church. Does the way we present ourselves in the community—church signs, billboards, newspaper ads, web-pages, flyers, brochures, logos, mottoes, and even the name we choose—really help to communicate the gospel in a sense that brings others closer to Jesus and further along the path of Christian discipleship? Or, is it merely a way of pointing out how our church is better, in this aspect or that one, than the church down the road? On the bottom line, are we really more about advancing the kingdom of God, or more about competing for our “share of the pie”?
The truth is, consumer economics, and free-market competition, are such an ingrained part of everything we are accustomed to as Americans, it can be hard at times, I believe, to separate ourselves from our culture, and see ourselves for what we really are. Some studies have even linked the “success,” from a church growth perspective, of American evangelicalism, to religious plurality, free-market economy, and competition.
If this is something positive from within American culture that God can use, and is using, to see souls won, and disciples made, I certainly don’t want to be guilty of “throwing stones” from the sidelines. Because of this, as far as I am concerned, the jury is still out, in many respects, on church marketing in general. Is the growth that may be attributable to such an approach healthy growth that leads to mature disciples of the Lord Jesus, and that will be able to withstand the winds of cultural change? Maybe so, in some cases. Maybe not, in others. However, if we are to be responsible servants of our King, I am becoming more and more convinced these are questions we should not just blithely brush aside.
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David,
This seems to be a very fair assessment of our situation.
The natural question, for me at least, is: What do we do to balance reaching people and being genuine in following Christ?
cb
CB,
I think the practical, positive response to the issues raised here are encapsulated where I recommend that we honestly ask ourselves what are the real intentions and motivations behind our church marketing efforts. We then need to adjust our “marketing strategy” to one that more closely aligns with the values of the kingdom of God, and not so much with consumeristic values, and getting people to choose our church as over against the church down the street.
I believe an important part of this is giving a higher priority to our mutual solidarity one with another as part of the broader Body of Christ.
I am not convinced that heaven rejoices when someone joins your church from another church. Heaven rejoices when a sinner repents and comes into the kingdom (Luke 15:7, 10). Any church that grows at the expense of the church down the road is not adding to God’s kingdom, they are simply “swapping sheep.” Too much of a marketing strategy could lean towards watering down our message to gain more members or “attendants.” There are plenty of lost people to go around that need to be reached. When the worship service for the gathering of God’s people becomes the primary tool for our evangelism, we are in big trouble. We’ve got to have a “go and tell” mentality, seeking to bring them into God’s kingdom more than bringing them into our store.
I am greatly disturbed with the the de-emphasis on the necessity for repentance in order to follow Christ. It was told to me that such “negative messages” might hinder people from joining. Somewhere along the line we need to come to grips with the fact that Christ is calling for us to “make disciples” (Matt 28:19), not gain church members.
Kevin,
Such good points. I was talking to a pastor just yesterday about how God was blessing “his” church. In response I asked him what God was doing, and he responded that a couple had joined by transfer of letter and they baptized a five year old.
As far as I can tell, we are becoming woefully inadequate at reaching our communities for the Gospel and the only growth we experience is at the expense of the church across the way or we are just baptizing our own children.
We have fooled ourselves into believing that “growth” does not necessarily mean conversion growth; growth = backsides in the pews. And our American, consumerist, materialistic mindsets reinforce this idea.
David,
IMHO the only way for a True Church to Advertise is by Word of Mouth. The Full Gospel much be Preached, with the Saving Grace of Jesus Christ. This Preaching and making of Disciples with cause people to share the Good News for the Kingdom of God.
God will Bless this Church and God will be Glorified. We need to keep Man and Being Baptist as Low Key and give the Glory to God and God Alone. God is blessing the PCA because they are Giving God the Credit as should Be.
In His Name
Wayne
Brother David,
Thought provoking and dead-on as usual. Our family feels the same way. After coming back from overseas, we were more than appalled at how “church” is marketed. The local community we are a part of has considered taking out a billboard that says, “Come die with us.” ;^)
Brother Kevin,
You said: “Somewhere along the line we need to come to grips with the fact that Christ is calling for us to ‘make disciples’ (Matt 28:19), not gain church members.”
AMEN & AMEN! And these disciples need to be told up front that the straight path is painful and full of suffering… yet Jesus will walk with us through it and we will come out more intimate with Him and more like Him on the other side. Then we can all rejoice in our sufferings!
May His refining fire consume us all,
From the Middle East
David,
I think this post hits on the reason our other conversation stalled a few weeks ago, as we thought about reaching “up and outers”.
I’ve given much thought to it, and I still can’t put forth a list of ideas for “reaching” up and outers beyond evangelistically intentional relationships.
So much of the church’s marketing (and by that I include “outreach campaigns”) is aimed at church shoppers, what Hunsberger calls “consumers of religious goods and services”. The urban and urbane aren’t in that “market niche”, so our marketing campaigns likely strike them as odd as they did your friends from Spain.
Stuart,
So I guess you are saying that “abundant gospel sowing” does not really work with “up-and-outers”? So does that mean, we should give up on “church planting movements” among “up-and-outers” since “abundant gospel sowing” is a “universal element” of CPMs?
David,
I’m not sure I’m ready or willing to make that conclusion. I would prefer rather to believe that there is a way to “sow abundantly” that includes intentional relationships.
The conclusion I suppose that I am willing to draw at this point is that the kind of marketing that appeals to a rather homogeneous group of church shoppers won’t necessarily aid the reaching of those in other “market niches”.
Stuart,
I think you are probably right. I believe that if we are to see any real progress in the evangelization of the prosperous West, we will have to learn how to sow much more abundantly in the soil of intentional relationships. If there are “CPM’s” that come from this, though, they will most likely look quite a bit different from what we are seeing in other parts of the world.
I know this is dead, but I felt the need to post my 2 franc.
A short while after getting the language in hand, I was asked by a friend when I would start showing the Jesus Film. “Dawda [a former missionary] always used to show the film. He would take the sheet and go out into the neighborhood and buy enough food for everyone and a hundred people would come every time.” I asked what would happen if I didn’t provide the food. “Not many people would come.”
A Muslim worker for a missionary asked me to start studying with him. “Dawda [a common name] would bring us lunch and everyone would come study. He would always have at least 10 people.” I asked what would happen if I didn’t buy lunch. “We would need to go eat somewhere else.”
Now it is definitely not a bad thing to aid people when they are hurting and needy, but we should always be directing people to their true source: Jesus Christ. In any marketing (or relief) program, an important question to ask is: What happens if the program ends tomorrow? What will happen to the people?
We need to do every church activity with that thought in mind and work for today and tomorrow. Even if everything had to stop tomorrow, we need to leave the people better off than when we found them.
Shadrach,
Interesting correlation, marketing and relief programs. I agree that is a potential pitfall of relief programs. If, at the bottom line, it is really just another way to market our ministry, something is wrong.
We help the poor because we love them, and because Jesus loves them, and we want to please Jesus. We also hope the poor come to Jesus, for the exact same reasons. If we really love, we will want to be good stewards with our resources. That means many times opting to to teach how to fish rather than giving a fish. The worst option, though, is not helping the poor at all, just because we see the potential for abuse.
I really meant it more the other way, from a States perspective more than a field one.
Setting up our churches so that people come for the music or the action (or the food) is the wrong kind of marketing. It’s not that those things are bad, but as with relief programs, if all of that were gone tomorrow and your church had to meet on your parking lot, would the people still come because they love the community of the Body and the preaching of the Word?
If the answer is ‘yes,’ I’d say you’re pretty safe. If the answer is ‘no,’ I’d say you need to rethink things about your church other than its marketing.
Shadrach,
Fair enough. I agree that ultimately we must reach and engage people at their deepest level of understanding and commitment. We must not settle for anything less than radical discipleship. However, I do not think that necessarily delegitimizes attempts to meet people where they are at, at their areas of “felt needs,” in order to bring them beyond that, to an utter dependence on the grace of God in every aspect of their life. Ultimately, our effectiveness in ministry will depend on our ability to do just this.