Church Today June 2014 by Initiate Media

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SQUARE PEGS IN ROUND HOLES

TOP HEAVY LEADERSHIP 6 SURPRISING TRAITS OF

EFFECTIVE PASTORS 8 DAYS IN A

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CONTENTS

JULY 2014 ISSUE 2

08. 6 Surprising traits of effective pastors 10. 8 Days in a drug rehab 12. Square pegs go in square holes, get it? 16. Why it’s a smart idea to silence complainers 18. 5 Ways to improve your Church’s YouTube Channel

20. What your church can learn in marketing from a Thai Restaurant

N O W

16 BO O K

ABN 58 090 450 285 CEO Matt Danswan Editor Nicole Danswan Advertising Australia P: 02 9007 5375 Advertising New Zealand P: 09 281 4896 Advertising Manager Ray Curle ray.curle@initiatemedia.net Correspondence Australia PO Box 1321 Mona Vale NSW 1661 P: 02 9007 5376 W: www.churchtoday.tv Correspondence New Zealand PO Box 47212, Ponsonby, Auckland 1144, New Zealand Unless otherwise specified, all Scripture quotations are from the New International Version, copyright-1973, 1978, 1984, International Bible Society. No part of this publication may be reproduced in whole or part, without prior written permission. Opinions expressed in this magazine do not necessarily reflect those of the staff. All attempts are made to verify advertising material, and no responsibilty is taken for misleading or erroneous material. Due to spam issues, all email addresses have been removed from our publishers section. © 2014.

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www.churchtoday.tv | 7

Character

6SURPRISING TRAITS OF

effective pastors THOM R AINER HAS SOME INTERESTING VIEWS ON WHAT DEFINES AN EFFECTIVE PASTOR...

e have looked at the characteristics of effective pastors from different perspectives over the past few years. But this information may prove to be a

8 | Church Today July 2014

bit surprising. A couple of caveats are in order. First, the idea of ‘surprising’ can vary from person to person. I think you might be surprised at some of these

traits, but you might not be. Second, the term ‘effective’ is nebulous. I am not speaking of the size of the church or the level of ‘fame’. I have subjectively noted several dozen pastors whose ministries

have been consistent and whose impact in their churches and communities has been positive. By the way, these same traits could apply to other church staff. Indeed, some of them could apply to any leaders. I’m omitting the obvious characteristics, like good preaching, strong morals, and faithfulness to family. Those would not be among the surprises. What, then, are some of the surprising traits? I’m glad you asked.

. They are persistent. Their lives could be characterized as “three steps forward, two steps backwards.” They have setbacks, but they remain stubbornly persistent.

. They have a good sense of humor. They take their ministries seriously; but they don’t take themselves too seriously.

. They are highly intentional about connecting with unchurched persons at least once a week. In fact, weekly intentionality is the norm. They put such interactions on their calendar. They take unchurched people to lunch. They are involved in non-religious community events.

. Their most consistent discipline is daily Bible reading. This time in the Bible is beyond sermon preparation. This discipline is kept with greater rigor than any other discipline in their lives. Again, these are some of the surprising traits I have noticed in effective pastors. CT

. They look in the mirror. These pastors have clear selfawareness. They are not only evaluating themselves constantly, they typically have a trusted advisor who tells them on a regular basis what he or she sees.

. They are intentionally consistent learners. These pastors read a lot. They attend conferences. They expand their educational opportunities, both formal and informal.

This article was originally published at ThomRainer.com on June 21. Thom S. Rainer serves as president and CEO of LifeWay Christian Resources. Among his greatest joys are his family: his wife Nellie Jo; three sons, Sam, Art, and Jess; and seven grandchildren. Dr. Rainer can be found on Twitter @ ThomRainer and at facebook.com/ Thom.S.Rainer.

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www.churchtoday.tv | 9

Outreach

8 Days In A Drug Rehab When one Pastor went undercover at a drug rehab he had no idea he would experience God in such a way...

ow many pastors get to experience a week living undercover as a recovering drug addict in a drug rehab? Just one that I know of, me. I would be staying in a house with 15 other guys who had just come off drugs, come out of years of prison and were facing both physical and psychological pain. Even though I was going in under cover, the fear and anxiety I felt going in was certainly real. As I go into the house my head’s down, no eye contact. I’m not looking confident or confrontational. I’m shown to my room where I’ll be sleeping or laying awake for the next seven nights with three other guys in the same room who are just coming off drugs and dealing with psychosis and a range of different physical and mental issues. And I’m on the top bunk of a creaky old wooden bunk bed that’s too short for me and I have a pillow that’s more like a dead animal stuffed in a bag than a pillow. I hear reports of sleep talking about violence saying things like “I’m going 10 | Church Today July 2014

to cut your throat, stop snoring” which was not comforting when I am a snorer myself. I experienced this sleep talking myself as the man in the bunk below mine was saying things in his sleep like “You’re a dog” and “I’m going to cut your head off.” Needless to say I didn’t sleep too well, but then again neither was anyone else in the room. Now I’m used to working full time at church, so being in that environment I guess the question might be “Did I feel far from God around all that pain?” You know when it comes to pain, people question where God is? Well I felt so close to God in that house. And not because of the possibility I might have been standing face to face before him sooner than I’d hoped, but because of this passage from the Bible which kept coming back to me over the week: Psalm 34:18 The Lord is close to the broken hearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.

I realised being in that house, around all that brokenness, that God really is close to the broken hearted but maybe I wasn’t which made me question if I was really close to God if He was somewhere I had ignored or been naïve of up until now. While I was missing my kids, some of these guys didn’t get to see their kids for months at a time. This changed my perspective and I experienced that when you focus on some of the problems others are facing, yours seem a lot smaller. Coming from a culture consumed with complaining on social media it was refreshing to be around people that actually have reason to complain but aren’t. Instead they are learning how to face their issues properly and not just vent online. Even though I was undercover, I realised something. I really did need rehab. I needed rehab for my selfish and hard heart. I needed to spend time with broken people and while I didn’t do much for anyone there, a lot was done for me just by being there. I found if you’ll just get closer to people, you’ll see the truth, that these

The Lord is close to the broken hearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit. Psalm 34:18 are God’s kids and He loves them as much as He loves me and they may have been abused and trampled on and rejected just like Jesus was but He is watching to see how we treat His kids and whether or not we’ll judge them and heap on more labels or if we’ll help them see how important they really are and help strip the false labels off their lives. A week came around and it was time for me to tell the group who I really was and say goodbye. So as I began telling them I’m a pastor, their jaws are just wide open. One guy confessed that he had been saying to other guys in the house “I think Jimmy is an undercover cop.” But we got through that and I encouraged them and told them how impressed I was at what they are doing,

and then I packed my bag with an hour or 2 before I had to leave to go to the airport and come home. So I went and sat outside at a table out the front of the house. One guy came out and we’d become pretty good friends over the week. He was my age, and we had become pretty good friends over the week so I wasn’t sure how he’d take it that I was not who he thought I was. So I asked him “How are you going?” And he started to open up to me and he said this: “When you said you were leaving to go home I just wanted to burst into tears. When I was young, my best friend died, and after that I went from Caravan Park to Caravan Park and was never good at making friends and never really opened up to anyone. And now I finally just

made another friend and you’re leaving. It’s like it’s happening all over again.” The reality hit me that I had more to offer than I thought. I could be a friend to someone who doesn’t have friends. And even though it wasn’t a new idea for me, I experienced this reality in a new way. People are dying lonely without a friend and without knowing God and I could offer both friendship and the love of God to someone else that needed it. Both of these things were shown to me when I felt far from God and now as a Christian I must do the same. So, what was the point of all this? What should you do with it? What’s the application for you? God is close to the broken hearted. Do something for hurting people and you will experience God. CT

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www.churchtoday.tv | 11

QUESTION. How do you fit a square peg in a round hole? ANSWER. You donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t. Berni Dymet investigates...

SQUARE PEGS GO IN SQUARE HOLES, GET IT?

12 | Church Today July 2014

Leadership

xhausted Church Leadership They say that church is a bit like a football match. Twenty– two thousand people badly in need of exercise, watching twenty–two guys badly in need of a rest. That’s pretty much it isn’t it? In way too many churches, you have a handful of leaders doing the lion’s share of the work. Of course, some of those are paid workers – the pastor, the church administrator, perhaps even a youth leader and a worship leader and a few others – depending on the size of the church. The rest are the stalwarts – the olds and bolds who have been at it for more years than anybody would care to remember. At my church, husband and wife team John and Marion, led Boys and

many respects in the same way as we visit our local café. Hmmm... the coffee today was too weak or too strong or to hot or too cold. And the service, well, I’ve had better service here. They were a bit slack today. Oh and the eggs weren’t quite cooked to my liking. How many people attend church with that consumerist type of attitude? And if you can get them involved in doing anything then at best they behave like volunteers rather than committed disciples. (There’s a big difference between a volunteer and a disciple … perhaps we can talk about that another time). And so as church leaders, we sit there and bemoan the consumerist attitudes of the younger (and not–so–younger) generations wondering what to do, while the stalwarts, the olds and bolds are

The churches who get it are particularly good at identifying a person’s gifting and releasing them into an area of ministry that fits, hand in glove with who God made each member of the Church body to be. Girls Brigade every Friday night for over forty years! Now that’s what I call staying power. And this is a model that fits well with the younger generations (I include myself, at the tender age of 55 in that group, perhaps somewhat optimistically!) because we’re much more interested in attending church as consumers. The Church Consumerist Mentality We love to go church shopping to find the church that best meets our needs. And to some extent, there’s nothing wrong with that. A young family with children, is obviously keen to find a church with a strong youth ministry. And then, some styles of worship are going to suit some people and not others. All well and good. But there’s a point at which we start taking that too far, and we start attending church, in

running themselves into the ground. Does any of this sound vaguely familiar? Whose Fault Is It? Well, I would like to suggest that it’s not all their fault. In fact, whilst this is not a finger pointing exercise, much of the cause of the problem in fact rests with the church leaders themselves. I know, I know, now you want to take me out and burn me at the stake! You’re already exhausted enough, and now you have some joker poking his finger in your chest telling you it’s your fault! Well, that’s not necessarily my intention. In fact far from it. I’d rather be seen to be in the business of getting some positive conviction going than playing the negative blame game. So, here’s what I’m on about. I see two types of churches, when it comes to getting the church members

actively and directly, willingly and enthusiastically involved in ministry and mission. Those that get it and those that don’t. What’s there to get? you may ask. Simply this: For as in one body we have many members, and not all the members have the same function, so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually we are members one of another. We have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us: prophecy, in proportion to faith; ministry, in ministering; the teacher, in teaching; the exhorter, in exhortation; the giver, in generosity; the leader, in diligence; the compassionate, in cheerfulness. (Romans 12:4–8) Anybody who knows this passage is probably aware that the giftings referred to here are generally called the ‘motivational giftings’. In other words, the natural motivations that God has hardwired into a person’s DNA and character. Interestingly, many of the personality type systems out there in today’s commercial marketplace align rather neatly with the seven motivational gifts (or, as we’d perhaps call them today, personality types) outlined by Paul in his letter to the Romans almost two thousand years ago. And when it comes to answering that question: What’s there to get? it comes down to this whole issue of our inherent motivations. The Churches that Get It The churches who get it are particularly good at identifying a person’s gifting and releasing them into an area of ministry that fits, hand in glove with who God made each member of the Church body to be. The senior pastors and leaders of those churches aren’t killing themselves working 80 hours a week, because they have their church members enthusiastically involved in ministry. www.churchtoday.tv | 13

Leadership

The churches that don’t get it (and they’re the ones where the leaders are flogging themselves to death) are the ones who keep on doing the square peg in the round hole thing. Think about it, if someone asks you to do something you don’t want to do – are you keen to do it? At one church we attended some years back, without even knowing us, the pastor’s wife asked Jacqui and me to become involved in children’s ministry? I almost keeled over. Children’s ministry?! Either it’d kill me … or the children! ( I say that in a loving, Christian kind of a way.) Anybody who knows me would fall over laughing at the prospect. In another church that I attended, I was a member of the Church Council. One person on the council suggested that each of us should ‘adopt’ twelve members of the congregation as their pastoral carers. At this point, I was mature enough to say ‘no’. The woman, lovely lady, as I recall was mortified. How could I not want to get involved in pastoral care?

Simple really, it’s not what I’m gifted to do, as much as there are some people that I do draw along side of from time to time. I asked her if she would care to preach my sermon next Sunday, at which point she recoiled in horror and got the point.

An Organic Model For Church is Biblical Christian Schwartz in his book Natural Church Development which is all about growing a church naturally, almost as an organism or, dare I say it, a body, talks about gift–oriented ministry being a key factor in a healthy, growing church. A friend of mine pastors a rather large and ‘successful’ church in a regional centre in Australia. He works hard, but he’s not killing himself. Turns out that this guy totally understands gift–oriented ministry. Fitting the giftings and motivations of the individual, to the ministry needs of the church. And so he has a mighty band Let us help you get your of leaders and life back on track today workers, making it all happen around him. As I read my Bible, I’m pretty sure that that’s the way it’s meant to For over 13 years, Crown Financial Ministries has been helping Australian Christians get their finances in order. work. Crown specialises in providing The last time easy-to-use resources that reveal God’s way of doing I checked, square finances, with particular emphasis on saving, investing and pegs don’t fit so becoming debt-free. well in round holes. No, you The very affordable resources include DVDs, textbooks, try to bludgeon study guides and a free website budget monitor. a square peg into a round hole, So don’t stress about your money worries any longer. Learn the path to true financial freedom by contacting Crown today. and the peg gets damaged. And so, no matter how important the whole (the role) Visit: www.crown.org.au | Email: crown@crown.org.au is to you, it’s just a bad fit. Telephone: 1300 132 783

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In business, on a couple of rare occasions running an international IT consulting firm, I had to put consultants into jobs with clients where I knew they wouldn’t be a good fit. And can I tell you on the few occasions that I did it, it always came back to bite me. In fact, the very best consultant in the wrong situation, turned out to be a disaster, in 100% of cases. (I only did it twice – never again!) The churches that don’t get it (and they’re the ones where the leaders are flogging themselves to death) are the ones who keep on doing the square peg in the round hole thing. If you’re in that place, here are three bits of helpful, albeit perhaps gratuitous, advice: 1. It doesn’t work and what’s more it never will. 2. The reason is square pegs go in square holes and round pegs go in round holes. 3. They always have, and they always will. Okay, it sounds pretty obvious, I know. But if it’s that obvious, how come so many churches aren’t getting it? When we as church leaders take the time to get to know our people, who they are and what they love to do, when we as church leaders start loving our people enough to get into the business of helping them fulfil God’s plan for their lives, then all of a sudden, our churches will start working the way God always intended them to work. As organic organisms. As the body of Christ in a lost and hurting world. Rocket science it ain’t. CT

Berni Dymet is the ceo + Bible teacher of the global media ministry Christianityworks. His radio programs are heard by millions of people each week on over 1200 radio stations in 160 countries. You can download his eBooklet “Flourishing in the House of the Lord” at FlourishInGodsHouse.com

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WHY IT’S A SMART IDEA TO SILENCE COMPLAINERS 16 | Church Today July 2014

Advice

How does an interim pastor model the proper way to deal with negativity and complaining?

ince you will be dumber for listening to them, doesn’t it make sense that interim pastors ought to silence the whiners and complainers in their client churches? Negativity Trap • Letting them complain doesn’t solve anything. • Ignoring them may calm your nerves but everyone else is still left on edge • Letting them complain invites a culture of criticism to take deeper root • Tolerating those who spew negativity is contrary to scripture • You run the risk of lowering your IQ to room temperature You read that right. Prolonged exposure to negative, complaining people will actually make you dumber. That’s according to an article Thom Rainer recently cited from Inc. Magazine. “New research in neuroscience demonstrates how negative and critical people affect us. She notes that “being exposed to too much complaining can actually make you dumb. Research shows that exposure to 30 minutes or more of negativity – including viewing such material on TV – actually peels away neurons in the brain’s hippocampus. That’s the part of your brain you need for problem solving.” So what is the result of exposure to negative and critical people? “Basically it turns your brain to mush,” the article notes. It has the same effect even if you are passively listening to them. That’s why I had to quit watching the nightly news and reading most newspapers. The constant stream of drivel from the left and the right was wearing me down, making me stupider. It got so bad that I actually considered running for political office. Seriously, this poses a dilemma for interim pastors because we often confront negative or complaining people. It comes with the territory. How do we deal with the negative ‘Neds’ and ‘Nancys’ in a client congregation? How does an interim pastor model the proper way to deal with negativity and complaining?

. Ask if this is helpful criticism in negative garb. It stresses some folks to offer constructive criticism, so they keep it bottled up until it boils over, spilling out in a rush of negative words and ideas. Read the metacommunication with care and focus on the message, not the negativity.

best practices. That includes showing them what they will gain to replace that which they fear losing.

. Keep your political views to yourself. Don’t discuss what you saw on CNN or Fox News. Don’t cite articles from Sojourners or Reason. Maybe its just me, but in virtually every church I’ve served I’ve rarely had time to address the political cause de jur; far more important things are on the Sunday morning table. Banish that kind of unproductive negativity from the congregational gatherings. When someone else brings politics and causes up before the congregation, shut it down because it detracts from the purpose of the transition and creates division within the congregation.

. Make complaints teachable moments. Early on in your ministry you are the one who gets to set the tone for the interim period. The first time a complainant comes to you, instruct them. “I’m having a hard time hearing what you’re trying to say through the negative vibe I’m picking up. I’d love to talk to you about this matter but I can’t help you unless you can frame it as constructive criticism that contributes to what I’m trying to accomplish for you. Think about that and let’s get together again when you’re ready.” If you stifle the complainers and silence the negativity, you and the whole congregation will be smarter as a result!

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. Discern whether loss or fear of loss of control is the heart of the issue. When a complainant petitions for greater control, tread carefully. If you don’t know how to respond in the moment, say so. “I’m not sure what to say, you’ve caught me off guard here. I won’t respond now but give me a couple of days to reflect and I promise I’ll get back to you.”

. Determine whether fear of loss in the face of change is the issue. If the complainant is lamenting the loss of something valuable it’s probably your fault. An important part of the interim pastor’s job is to use change management’s www.churchtoday.tv | 17

Digital impact

There’s no question that a great number of churches and ministry organizations should be addressing today’s ‘Digital Mission Field’. And one of the key platforms is YouTube. Most churches just think YouTube is for randomly posting short video clips of the pastor’s message. So I asked my friend SEAN CANNELL, to give us some examples of how churches and ministry groups can use YouTube more effectively. Here’s what he said...

here are some great churches that are using YouTube very well (I mention a few in this post). But I have yet to discover a church that really ‘gets’ YouTube and is strategically creating content specifically for the over one billion unique monthly YouTube visitors. Most churches are like the Starship Enterprise in need of a ‘Scotty’ in the engine room. Their results with YouTube are good, but with a few tweaks they could reach further and do more than ever before! So here’s five ways to improve your Church YouTube channel: 1. Create a Channel Trailer Youtube has a feature to autoplay a video trailer on your YouTube channel to everyone who is not subscribed, telling them why they should subscribe to your YouTube channel. This is a great way to explain what your church and your church YouTube channel is all about. The act of creating one will help you think about and clarify your content strategy for YouTube.

18 | Church Today July 2014

2. Speak to the YouTube Audience Many churches upload sermons, announcements and other videos to YouTube, but not many directly engage YouTube viewers. One way to do this would be to add an intro to your sermon videos talking directly to the YouTube audience, encouraging them to like, comment, and share the video and possibly educating them about other resources, like podcasts, sermon notes, or bonus content on your website. Many churches create video devotional content or quick update videos that they post directly to YouTube as well. Level-up those videos by including a call to action directly to the YouTube audience at the beginning and end of the video. Verbal calls to action will increase your likes, comments, subscribers and shares which will result in more people discovering your content! 3. Create Remarkable Content with the YouTube Community in Mind There are some great YouTubers like

Jeff Bethke who is well known for his viral video, ‘Why I Hate Religion, But Love Jesus’. That video has been viewed over 27 million times and has started many conversations about Jesus. Jeff continues to post weekly videos on his YouTube channel teaching biblical principles and creating engaging content. There are more ‘Christian Creatives’ creating great content and influential channels every day but not many churches have approached YouTube with the same intentionality. What kind of content could you and your church create specifically for the YouTube audience? As Jeff’s video demonstrated, the potential reach of our content is huge and it’s growing every day. 4. Engage the YouTube Community The churches using Facebook and Twitter will engage their online audience by responding to comments and @replies and reaching out to their community with advanced twitter search. What if your church did the same thing on

“

YOU CAN ADD ANY VIDEO ON YOUTUBE TO A PLAYLIST ON YOUR CHANNEL, SO YOU COULD COMPILE ANSWERS TO COMMON QUESTIONS ABOUT CHRISTIANITY FROM TRUSTED LEADERS INTO PLAYLISTS AND SHARE THAT LIST WITH YOUR MEMBERS.

YouTube? Answer questions, comment on church members YouTube channels, and adopt the same mentality that you have for Facebook and Twitter. After all, YouTube is social network too! 5. Embrace YouTube’s Features There are some super cool features on YouTube that you creatively utilize for your church’s channel. YouTube playlists could be used to group sermon series, devotional series and announcements. You can add any video on YouTube to a playlist on your channel, so you could compile answers to common questions about Christianity from trusted leaders into playlists and share that list with your members. Playlists auto play from video to video and offer search and

discovery benefits as well. Annotations allow you to add call out boxes, comment boxes and links to other YouTube videos or an external website. Many YouTubers use annotations to give calls to action like asking for likes, comments and subscribers. They are also useful to linking to other content on your YouTube channel at the end of the video. What if my church doesn’t have a YouTube Channel? If your church doesn’t have a YouTube channel yet, create one and start publishing awesome content. If you already have a YouTube channel but it has been a ‘back burner’ platform for your church, crank up the heat! YouTube is most powerful yet underrated social network by church leaders. Apply the

suggestions above and if you want more tips for crushing it on YouTube I have created a free for video YouTube Series and eBook that you can access at youtubeforchurches.com. CT

Sean Cannell is the Campus Pastor of The Church OC, co-founder of THiNK International, a Church Leadership Blog and well known YouTube channel, and Author of YouTube for Churches.

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What your church can learn about

marketing L

et me ask you something – should churches be into marketing? After all, it’s the Gospel of Christ that we’re “selling”? Is it really appropriate? Should we be following secular ways? My answer, is an unequivocal ABSOLUTELY! Here’s why: In the first century, there were two major, secular “conduits” that allowed the Gospel to spread – the amazing road and port infrastructure (thank you to Caesar and the pagan, Roman Empire) and the almost universally spoken koine Greek language (thank you to the pagans in Greece). Without those, the church probably wouldn’t be what she is in the 21st Century AD. And today, those physical conduits have been largely supplanted by two equally pervasive ones. Branding (hence the need for marketing) and media. What is a brand? Best definition I’ve ever heard is from Phil Cooke (see my blogroll to the right): A brand is a compelling story that surrounds a person, a product or an organisation. And the flip side of that coin from a marketing perspective is, as Seth Godin put it more recently, that: Marketing is no longer about the stuff that you make, but about the stories you tell. So, if the Church is in the business of telling God’s compelling story – aka the Gospel – and if branding and marketing are the Roman roads and Greek language of the 21st century, why are we so bad at this?! Sure, there are some notable exceptions, but in the main, well … you know. I swear, if I see one more of those corny signs that someone produces, hanging outside a drab, boring, grubby little church building that hasn’t

20 | Church Today July 2014

FROM A THAI RESTAURANT

Marketing

MARKETING TIPS FROM A THAI RESTAURANT. YES. BERNI DYMET DISCOVERS...

changed for the last 50 years, I’m gonna scream! Is it any wonder they’re not knocking our doors down to meet Jesus? So … what’s the Thai Restaurant have to do with all of this? Well a few weeks back I visited an average looking Thai restaurant in a fairly ordinary little place called Buderim (Queensland Australia) – nice, but nothing fancy you understand. The name of the establishment is Thai Frenzy. It seats, I’m guessing, about 35 to 40 people. Food was great, service was great. The thing that caught my eye though, was the small flyer on our table. It basically said this: To thank you for your feedback, we would like to give you a FREE 3 course Thai meal for your birthday. And there was a flick ‘n tick feedback form on the back, together with a spot to put your name, mobile phone number and email address so they could send you the voucher for your free meal. Pretty good offer I thought (although granted, the flyer I guess could have had a little more pizzaz to it). So I went and asked the owner Gareth (no he ain’t even Thai) about it. This is what he told me:

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Marketing

“Well,” he said “we’ve been doing this for about 3 years and we have …” wait for this, it’ll knock your socks off “… we have around 3,500 names on our database now. We send them special offers and things and these days, most nights we’re full.” Just let that sink in. A small, ordinary restaurant, in an ordinary place with a simple marketing idea, with an okay (but not stunning) execution tool. And they’re going … gangbusters! Why? Three reasons. Firstly they do have a great product. Secondly, they’ve found a way of engaging their audience by asking them what they think, and making them an offer they can’t refuse. And thirdly, they’ve found a way to do some ongoing marketing to keep people coming back (because in our busy world, how quickly we forget even the ‘great products’ in our lives).

Don’t know about you, but I know lots and lots of ordinary churches, in ordinary places, that have a pretty good, sometimes even brilliant ‘product’. God is moving in those faith communities, touching people, healing them, transforming their lives. But have they figured out a way of telling people about it? Have they figured out a way of expressing their compelling value proposition to their consituency in such a way as to make it ‘an offer people can’t refuse’? And I’m not talking about turning our churches into some shallow compromise that appeals to the world. Not at all. You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. In

the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven. (Matt 5:14-16) CT

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