According to The American Standard Dictionary, PR or Public Relations is: “The art or science of establishing and promoting a favorable relationship with the public”

Wikipedia says that Public Relations is “the practice of managing the flow of information between an organization and its publics.”

Many of today’s “Relevant” churches believe that it is up to them to be God’s PR representative.  In fact, church marketing is a booming business.  There are businesses devoted solely to creating websites for churches, blogs dedicated to telling about the best church marketing techniques, and even marketing consultants whose purpose is creating influence for the local church.

There are state-of-the-art mega churches that have the latest technology reaching out to the masses, yet 60% or more of their attendees do not believe that Jesus is the only way to Heaven.

According to www.cia.gov, 78.5% of Americans consider themselves to be “Christian”, yet according to a Pew poll, 70% of Americans believe that there are many ways to get to Heaven.

Obviously this “church marketing” phenomenon is not succeeding in bringing people to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ.

By the world’s standards, these relevant churches are doing everything right.  They are leveraging current technology and culture.  They go out of their way to be “seeker sensitive”.  They make sure that they avoid controversial topics like politics, marriage and sin.  Numerically, the churches that use the previous techniques are succeeding.  Spiritually, they are failing appallingly.  Why would that be?

Perhaps it is because Christianity is not a product, it is a lifestyle.  Evangelism is not marketing, it is the natural expression of the joy of our salvation.  And Jesus is not a brand, He is our Redeemer.

Jesus was the only PR Rep that God ever will need and the Bible is God’s press release.

I made you some brownies!  I will bring them to you!  They are hot and fresh and smell wonderful!  Would you like some?

I should probably tell you that I put just a small teeny tiny spoonful of dog poo in them.  Don’t worry, the dog poo was fresh!

What you don’t want any now?  How come?  The brownies are MOSTLY good!

You won’t eat something that is just MOSTLY good?  Why not?

Unfortunately mostly good is good enough for many Christians.  We listen to music that is “mostly good” and ignore the references to pre-marital sex, foul language or the fact that the music was written by a guy who openly expresses his hatred for all things Christian.  We watch TV shows that are “mostly good” and ignore the fact that its characters are taking God’s name in vain, having extramarital affairs and ridiculing the neighborhood Christian.  We read books that are “mostly good” and ignore the references to the new age/witchcraft.

We have become content with “good enough.”  Well, guess what?  Good Enough is not good enough!  We can do so much better!

We are blessed by a salvation that is not based on works.  But that doesn’t mean that we should not do good works!  That doesn’t mean that we can wallow in our former filth!  We are called to be Christ-like and something tells me that Christ wouldn’t be doing half of the things that we do that are “mostly good”.  And I am pretty sure that He would be doing a whole lot more that “good enough”.  He is the standard by which we are to live our lives.  “Mostly Good” and “Good enough” aren’t!

I have a friend who has worked at a donut shop for almost 20 years.  She basically eats, breathes and sleeps donuts.  Remember the old Dunkin Donuts commercial “Time to Make the Donuts?”  You know, the one where the guy wakes up when the rest of us are going to bed and heads to work chanting, “It’s time to make the donuts.”  Well, that is my friend.  She works at a bakery, makes their donuts, then stands at the counter and sells the donuts she made.

A few weeks ago, I asked her if she wanted to go out for breakfast.  And then without thinking I said, “Or we can grab coffee and a donut and then go shopping.”  She grimaced and adamantly shook her head back and forth.

Boy, did I feel silly!  I just offered her something that she has day-in and day-out!  We ended up going to a nice little breakfast nook where she proceeded to get almost every non-donut item on the menu!

That whole experience got me thinking…and here is what I came up with:  The churches that are focusing on “leveraging culture” and being “relevant” are doing exactly what I did to my friend.  They are offering donuts to the donut lady.  They are offering the world to the world.   An unbeliever who is searching for something more won’t want “more of the same”.  We aren’t going to reach a donut-maker by offering them donuts.  We aren’t going to reach the Starbucks coffee drinker by offering them Sunday morning coffee.  We aren’t going to reach the world by offering them the world.  We will only reach them through the Holy Spirit working in their hearts!  We will only reach them with Christ’s love.  And Christ’s love never has to be watered down with Starbucks coffee, jazzed up with a little U2, or doctored up with a techno-colored digitally produced micro-commercial.

What this world needs is for us to stop hiding behind our relevance.
Blending in so well that people can’t see the difference.
It’s the difference that sets the world free.

(What the World Needs, by Casting Crowns)

This morning, I read something on a friend’s blog that deeply troubled me.  It was about our previous church and their obsession with the world and its culture.  This church, in its attempt to be “relevant”, adheres itself to the very things that Christians are to shun.  It does this in a very dangerous and insidious way.  The pastor of this church takes things from the world that sound “almost” right and merges them with scripture.  He preaches sermons based on TV shows that praise sin.  He titles his sermons on songs by musicians who are known for their new age and/or anti-Christian practices.

Why is this a problem?  I mean, after all, some of the lyrics in the songs are good.  And what is wrong with pointing to a TV show in a “what not to do” type of sermon?

2 Corinthians 6:14-18 says

^“Do not be yoked together with unbelievers. For what do righteousness and wickedness have in common? Or what fellowship can light have with darkness?  What harmony is there between Christ and Belial? What does a believer have in common with an unbeliever?  What agreement is there between the temple of God and idols? For we are the temple of the living God. As God has said: “I will live with them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they will be my people.”
“Therefore come out from them and be separate, says the Lord.
Touch no unclean thing, and I will receive you.”
“I will be a Father to you, and you will be my sons and daughters, says the Lord Almighty.”

When we bring the sin-filled products of non-Christian musicians, actors, writers, etc into our churches we are yoking ourselves with unbelievers.  We hare saying to unbelievers, “Hey!  We are just like you.  We listen to the garbage that the world offers.  We fill our minds with songs about pre-marital sex, transcendental meditation, and all sorts of other filth!  We watch shows that glorify people who have extramarital affairs.  And we just can’t get enough of foul language!  And not only do we listen to it, we preach about it and make it the focal point of our services.  We are just like you!”

“We are just like you.”  That tells unbelievers that we have nothing to offer them.  We are not different than they are.  We spend our days and nights reveling in the same sinful thoughts and activities as they do!  And we don’t even try to be any different.  We just want them to know that we are soooo uber-cool!

I am sickened!  I am disgusted!  I am angry!  Pastors like this are leading people astray and they will have to answer to God for that!

What we need to be saying is “We WERE just like you.  We are no longer who we used to be.  We ARE new creations!  Let us show you what God’s love has done for us.  We are no longer the same, but we understand you because we WERE just like you!”

Let’s start with a few definitions

Evangelical: “of Protestant churches emphasizing personal salvation: relating or belonging to any Protestant Christian church that emphasizes the authority of the Bible and salvation through the personal acceptance of Jesus Christ”  (Encarta)

Relativism:  “belief in changeable standards: the belief that concepts such as right and wrong, goodness and badness, or truth and falsehood are not absolute but change from culture to culture and situation to situation”

Anyone who has any true knowledge of who Jesus Christ is would realize that the above concepts CANNOT go hand-in-hand…at least not without tons of compromises.  And yet that is what many “Christian” churches are attempting to do: pair Christianity with Relativity.  Our previous church was slowly starting to do that, which is why it is now our previous church.

If we say that we are Christians, then that means we follow the teachings of Christ.  Jesus Christ, Himself said that He was the Son of God and that He was the only way to get to God (John 14:6-9).  If we follow the teachings of Christ, then His teachings become our code of conduct…our Statement of Faith.

Yet there are some “Christians” who claim that having a statement of faith is wrong.  Why?  Because it “stifles friendships”.  (Are you kidding me?!!!)  I refer of course, to the “Emergent Church” movement.  A group of people so fluffy in their ideology and theology that they flit from idea to idea with each cultural wind gust.  They want to be “friendly” and “people-centric”.   They seek to “love God and love their neighbors”, as long as that doesn’t mean preaching about sin or setting down hard theological or Biblical lines.  To them everything (and I mean everything) is open to  personal interpretation.  Don’t want to believe that Jesus was born of a virgin?  No big deal.  Want to believe that Jesus wasn’t exactly God?  Again, no big deal.  Want to follow one of Rob Bell’s books instead of the Bible?  No problem, that Sola Scriptura stuff is so last century!  Want to re-interpret scripture so that it better fits your sinful lifestyle?  Sure!  Why not? I mean, just because God “frowned” on homosexuality doesn’t mean that we can’t embrace it!

But to me it all comes down to this:  If you truly love someone then you will want them to know the truth, even if it means upsetting them.  If you have the choice between telling someone the truth and angering them temporarly, but allowing them to make an informed choice that will save them from an eternity in Hell away from God, why, oh why would a true follower of Christ choose someone’s friendship over their salvation?

I wrote this several months ago… BB (Before Blog) and BCD (Before Church Departure – see this and this), but I thought that I would post it anyway…

Relevance

NOUN:

1. Pertinence to the matter at hand.

2. Applicability to social issues: a governmental policy lacking relevance.

The buzzword within many churches today is “Relevance”.

I have grown to hate that word. To me it has come to represent churches that are more focused on providing entertainment than providing the true gospel. The gospel is ALWAYS relevant.

Has the movement towards relevance caused many churches to “sell out”?

Cultural Relevance should never change the Gospel or focus on bringing the world to the world, yet too often “relevant” churches are afraid to mention the word “sin” and are too concentrated upon drawing from the world to reach the world (i.e. using U2 for communion, making sure that all sermons reference a movie or TV show)

Biblical Truth vs Cultural Relevance

If our purpose is to bring the truth of Christ to the unsaved, then our first focus must be on TRUTH. We also must realize that it is not us saving man, but the Holy Spirit working through us. I have seen men in three piece suits lead hardcore ghetto kids to Christ. I have seen tattooed 20-somethings lead little old ladies to Christ.

Romans 1:16 says “I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes”

I have heard some say that “sinners won’t be reached” if the church service isn’t “relevant enough”. These are the same people who won’t preach about sin. But if we don’t preach about sin, how can people know that they need to be saved? If we tell them that they are fine the way they are, how will they recognize that the ache inside them is the need for a savior? How does giving them what they already (the world) satisfy the need for what they don’t have (God)?

It doesn’t!

In order for people to turn to Christ, they need to be shown the story of Christ. In order for people to recognize the need for a savior, they must understand the difference between a perfect God and imperfect mankind.

If we change or water down the Bible in the name of “reaching people” we are doing them a vast disservice.

Don’t ever tell me that we have to change the Bible to save souls. That is a lie from our enemy designed to further destroy souls.