If you look at the most successful salespeople in any industry, they are all diligent, focused and on point. They manage relationships well, they articulate benefits with clarity, and they always are moving to close the deal.

But if you take a closer look at the top of the food chain in any sales organization, there are basically two buckets in which you can put the pros into:

The best of the best either love it, or they shove it.
Which one are you?

The love it crew love the product or service they are pitching. In this method, their credibility lies in the fact they fully understand what they are talking about. This crew can explain things in ways that are personally relevant to the person sitting across the table. Why? Because they use it, they live it, and in the end, they succeed because they simply share it. That’s how they gain more customers.

The shove it crew doesn’t have any personal investment in the product themselves. All they are interested in is pushing the customer to sign on the dotted line whether it makes sense or not. They claim the product is exactly the medicine needed. “Our product will solve your problem,” whether you knew you had a problem or not to begin with! This approach is all about speed, agility, and understanding where any vulnerabilities may be located. The shove it sales pro’s mission is certainly to help. . . themselves! They see their own job solely as shoving the product down the prospect’s throats.

Both can be quite effective. The question is which is your choice in doing the job? Especially when your job is to demo something that is all Good News.

Church “Marketing” gets a bad rap sometimes.

Why? Because when you hear the term, people might immediately think of the over commercialization, almost crass marketing tactics that some churches are using to get attention. Yes it is a fight to grab attention in this media-frenzied world today.

But the answer is not to reduce it all down to “productizing Jesus.” Nor is it running your ministry with the ultimate objective and measure of success to be church services that mimic a Superbowl half-time show.

In my own humble opinion, using marketing tactics to support the Gospel is entirely different than using the Gospel to support your marketing tactics.

Those that know me personally understand that this is NOT what I mean of being a Godvertiser:

Godvertising and church marketing should serve a clearly different purpose — not the marketing or event itself. But rather to put God and His work on display.

Want the best litmus test to know where you stand? As soon as you think “look at me!” vs. “look at Him!”, you’ve crossed the line.

Penn (of Penn & Teller) speaks his mind about the responsibility Christians have for sharing the Good News. Proselytize!

No, don’t run out and get yourself a megaphone for the street corner. We don’t need Bible thumping maniacal representatives invading the public realm.

But take a good listen to how this Christian brother was received by Penn – the atheist, in this video clip:

Can you envision yourself making such a bold move,done in a way that keeps respect and integrity intact?

Now, would you push someone out of the way of an oncoming truck to save his life? Would you? Really?

Have you been doing the same thing over and over again? Planning the same ministry calendar year after year?

As we head into Advent season, most churches are just pulling out the good old playbook and setting the same things in motion. But is that really witnessing to God’s story in the most creative way that you can?

Sometimes if you take the most lack luster things (like plain old water in a plain old water fountain in the mall) and rethink the experience, you are able to find something that stops people in their tracks.

I bet you that people (and kids in particular) cannot help themselves to be captivated by this display in the video.

You can imagine the people walking along, turn the corner, and then literally stop walking or turn to watch. The conversations that start about how it is done, or how they’ve never seen this kind of thing before. The children that don’t want to go back to their original mission of getting those new shoes or shirt. Some that look back after they’ve passed it. The people who can’t do anything else but smile and have just a little lighter walk walking away.

In a way, isn’t this mall fountain a lesson in what we are supposed to be doing in our churhces — displaying God’s greatness in a way that just stops people in their tracks to take notice of what God is and has done for us?

There are some people that are just gifted as prayer warriors.

Don’t underestimate the power of prayer.

It works — even in situations where you don’t usually associate prayer with. This video showcases just how powerful prayer can be. The gift this woman had was to have a faith life which allowed her to default to prayer.

How many of us can say the same thing about our confidence in the same situation?

Her faith and dependence on prayer assumedly reflects the strength of her spiritual faith. But that doesn’t get the rest of us off the hook!

Just imagine what else prayer can do if you believe and approach it with the holiness it deserves. Are you replying enough on prayer within your own ministry? With which parts of your ministry can you start to involve prayer which you normally don’t associate it?

Please encourage others by leaving a comment below with your thoughts.

Critics of church online all point to the sterility and breakdown of human connections across the digital highway.

Stefana Broadbent, an anthropologist who has studied human relationships across technology (cell phones, IM, Skype / video chatting, Facebook, etc) for over 20 years, has come to a different conclusion.

While you watch this video of her presentation on how the Internet and technology actually increases intimacy in human relationships, you’ll find the eerie Dunbar number coming up (120-150!). Technology hasn’t drastically increased the number of real connections we manage online – humans are in the end humans.

But of course there’s a little twist. . .

Did you notice the typical number of people each person connects with in close relationship (80%…___ intense relationships) when using technology mediums? Surprising? No?

Broadbent’s findings can have real implications for how church online approach and use technology to communicate and connect its people.

But this learning isn’t just applicable to digital worship communities trying to build out complete online church experiences. Technology won’t just by default destroy or degrade intimacy in relationships — it can actually leap across distance and social/cultural structures (like workplace rules) to enhance and build relationships where offline just can’t compete.

The presentation in this video is an interesting data point when thinking about how to approach the use of social media by pastors and churches.

What do you think?

A new nationwide study shows that there’s a shift happening with how people view and engage with the Bible.

Young adults have an overarching skepticism regarding the Bible not present in older audiences surveyed.

So what does this mean for your church and ministry?

One way to look at it is that what you’re doing right now isn’t working.

It’s time to not just try different things. It’s time to BE different.

Are the sermons being crafted for the pulpit taking into consideration some of the issues important to the younger generation? Is your church’s discipleship curriculum trying to engage the younger Mosaics or are you just trying to force it upon them? Is your entire ministry embracing some the easiest ways to gain and keep the attention of our church’s future?

If you pay attention, you’ll see some of the things this report has found to be useful in evolving your ministry work:

• Young people want to participate in the process of learning
• They are turned off by too much formality in sermons and lectures on the Bible
• Instead of classrooms, they are craving experiences that appear unscripted and interactive
• One way dialogue is the old way. This group want a medium that allows open and honest questioning
• They want technologically stimulating, creative and visual content
• They want to grow in communion with their peers through authentic relationships

Does anything strike you as completely opposite of what you’re seeing now in the church?

Right now, there’s approximately 40 online churches across the world wide web.

None of them have gotten it fully right yet.  Most online pastors will tell you they agree with that assessment too.

But all of them are also forging ahead without looking back.  It’s all about wrestling with technology, content and how to make the connections made in church online constitute authentic Christian community.

Check out this vid from Pastor Dave Adamson from LiquidChurch.com about the immediate future.

This is a glimpse of what’s ahead immediately in front of us.

It’s inevitable that church online will embraced by thousands of more people going forward.

Only time will tell about the real distant future — about what church online will look like then.  A bunch of stuff needs to happen with the church online model as it becomes fully acknowledged as another way of “doing church.”

What are your thoughts?

Church growth is such an important topic these days.

Some criticism has been that the mainline denominations haven’t been strategic enough about assimilation strategy and evangelistic intentionality.

But the Catholic Church apparently isn’t going to sit back and let church attendance decline on its own.

Instead, it seems that the Vatican has announced a decision to forgo organic growth in preference for a mergers and acquisition strategy — or rather a hostile takeover bid aimed squarely at the Anglican Church.

The Roman Catholic Church is taking advantage of recent political heat the Church of England is taking over female and gay clergy issues.  And the Pope felt it was the right time to reach out in hopes converting masses of disgruntled Anglicans to the Catholic faith.

At a press conference, the Vatican even announced a new canonical structure to accommodate existing Anglican traditions inside of the Catholic faith. In a way, it’s like acquiring a company and letting the current management to stay in tact. For example, married Anglican preists to stay married, alongside existing Catholic priests restricted from marriage (Hmm…will that sit well permanently without causing any friction????)

It’s a bold move.  Apparently it took a lot of people by surprise.  It also looks like the Anglican Church leadership didn’t have much choice either.

What do you think about this?  What is the Catholic Church really trying to do via this move?

The Bible has been around for ages.  It’s worked just fine in print.

First, people tried to bring it alive with audio.

Then others said, hey, while we’re at it, why not dramatize it!

And now we’ve apparently arrived at the next iteration of experiencing God’s Word. . .

Finally, some one has brought the Bible into the present Web 2.0 world.  Or have they?

Here’s my wish list for a Bible 2.0 that would embrace all

• We live in an Internet world, put it online! A multi-media Bible should be available on-line, all the time, from anywhere.
• Instant Community - We should be able to interact live with other people that are reading the same portion of the Bible at any given time.  If it’s on the internet, it would be easy to know who’s invovled with which parts of the Bible in real-time.
• The Power of User-Generated Content – We grow by hearing each other’s testimonies.  By sharing our own.  By identifying with the common struggles we are all going through.  The next generation Bible will allow individuals to contribute their own stories, their own viewpoints, their own insights and joy.  Content shouldn’t be limited to ivory tower authors.  Wikipedia is more accurate than the Enclyopedia for a reason.
• Don’t Let Sermons Go To Waste - Preachers generate TONS of content weekly, easily tagged to a specific anchor verse.  Imagine being able to open the Bible and gain access to thousands and thousands of sermons of different flavors on the same portions of scripture.
• FAQ + SAQ – By aggregating the masses, you could assemble the most robust set of answers to FAQ’s as well as the Seldom Asked Questions.  Just imagine how many more questions would be sparked by a resource like that!
• Tour Guides – You could have live or multi-media guided tours of the Bible.  With virtual tours of Biblical landmarks, drama, art and other great content, real value can be created by taking people different journeys that bring new meaning to Bible Reading Plans.

Those are just some wish list ideas off the top of my head.

But I guess just like the Web 2.0 is waiting for the next big thing to bring us to Web 3.0, the Bible 2.0 is a step in the right direction.

What other features would you want in the Bible of the Future?