christian mugging (aka bait-and-switch: the struggle for relevance {aka the dangers of an evangelism program at your church})

Many people feel {or come across to others} just like the person in the video whenever they invite someone to church--not to mention share their faith.  The focus of this post is on the evangelism side of the issue.  Perhaps at a later point I will do something on extracted Christian living, if there is such a thing.

I was recently reminded just how hard/scary evangelism can be.  I was at a large mall in the D.C. area to do some intentional evangelism.  I was not the team leader; but was bringing a group with me to work with a group that regularly evangelized at this mall [they used EE].  Although I have taken many seminary classes in evangelism and missions, gone on numerous mission trips, shared the gospel with many many people from all walks of life and religions, and have even done those "crazy" and "radical" things like open air street preaching, the hardest part for me is walking up to a complete stranger and starting a conversation [particularly one wherein I will either be asking them about heaven and hell within 30 seconds, or announcing some completely ridiculous reason as a pretext for our "random" conversation].  Once I am in the conversation and we are deep in discussion, I am high as a kite.  But after all these years and all these hours of training and experience that initial fear remains.  Fortunately, I was working with a partner who was at ease overcoming the awkward [albeit through the interjection of his own special awkwardness-more about this in another post] introductory moment.  So I piggy backed with him and had a great time.  I was able to talk with several postmodern Muslims from Pakistan and Somalia and a postmodern Catholic from Bolivia.  We made some good progress in their understanding of the gospel, so the night was a success in those terms.

I recently had the pleasure of meeting a stellar missional, cultural thinker, Derek Webster{he is linked in my blog list-go check it out}.  I listened to him for a day, picked his brain on a number of occasions, and have thought about it all ever since.  He discussed the postmodern culture of Europe.  One problem he notes in evangelism, a problem to which the postmodern mind reacts and rejects, is the bait-and-switch.  This tactic exhibits itself in people who build relationship which are artificial in their nature and are instantly turned for proselytizing.  The moment someone doesn't convert, then the relationship is over.  I remember going out with the seminary evangelism team to the hood.  My partner went up to a group of thugs and started with some kind of "you have a Jesus shaped hole in your heart."  As part of his pitch, he promised them that he wasn't like other Christians who were there just to win people and then would leave.  The sad truth is it was his first and last trip to any hood, much less that one.  He ran it, shot off, and ran out.  He fulfilled his duty; he has a war story; he is finished.  Those people are no closer to the gospel as a result of his drive by shooting.  I am sure that there are many stories like this where people go back to their home church and talk about how resistant folks are to the gospel, when in reality they just don't like suburban Christians who are too clean to actually live in this world. The other kind of bait-and-switch is the cheesy segue and shameless analogy.  Are you really doing surveys as you knock on doors?  Is the blood of Jesus really like paint?  I think you get the point....  Someone who is dead in sin and hardened philosophically to the gospel is not going to be won by some quick shot across the bow.  The key to them understanding the gospel is not to be found in some pathetic analogy wherein you take whatever {and I do mean WHATEVER} they just said and bending it back around to whatever it was your were going to say anyway.

After chewing on Websters insights for a few days, I jotted down the following statement {probably during one of the boring sessions}

Evangelism exists because missional living does not.  That is to say, Evangelism--as a system or pitch--exists because missional living--living the daily life of a follower of Jesus--does not exist.  Since missional living does not exist, we live with the reality of vast lostness living in close proximity to the church.  The result is that there is now a need for those who are on a church campus to go off campus to proclaim what they believe.  They must proclaim since they are not living it out visibly before the world.  There is a disconnect between their life and their message.  This makes the message appear as a shameless ploy to try to fix the shortcoming of not living out the faith in and before the world. 

To put all this another way, it is necessary for us to evangelize because we are not truly living in the world in a way in which we can, from the ethos of our lives, genuinely tell them the gospel with any real conviction.  It is easier to "mug" them, and then blame them for the hardness of their hearts.  Perhaps some introspection would do us some good here?  God did not divorce his message from his messenger.  He put the gospel, and divinity itself, into terms that we could understand: the person of Jesus.  Jesus lived among us and put the gospel into a context.  To be honest, the people who address their distance with the world through active evangelism are the minority.  The majority try to close this gap through the voting box!

Here is a short list of the dangers of evangelism {evangelism that is divorced from contextual involvement in the world}:

• we start checking boxes {if we are even willing to check that box}

Evangelism becomes something of legalism.  It is merely an action which we perform.  It becomes a passionless sales pitch.  It doesn't matter if it is coherent or relevant to our hearer so long as we get through the pitch.

• we adopt a one size fits all mentality

Similar to the last one.  If we just HAVE to get through our acronym or survey or whatever, then there is never any need to think creatively about people as unique groups or as unique individuals.  Remember, the last thing in the world a Buddhist wants is eternal life....  Hindus and cultural Catholics are happy to "receive Jesus" though that means different things to both of those groups and it doesn't mean to either of them what we intended to say.  The gospel presentation of Peter in Acts 2 and Stephen is much different from Paul at the Areopagus.  Luke's presentation of the life of Jesus is vastly different from John's portrayal. 

• The gospel looses relevance {and we never blame ourselves}

Since the gospel is a placard and not a way of life {in this system} it comes off as headhunting.  Since the gospel is not given a face {ours} it will not be understood as it originally was {when it was Jesus' "face" on it} and the gospel will be viewed through the skewed lenses of postmodernism, Republican vs. Democrat, North vs south, black vs white, rich vs poor kind of dichotomies.   Do we really want to accept our portrayal by the media of who and what we are?  If you don't, then you better be willing to put a face and a life on the gospel {but count the cost, for you might loose your life!}  We present the gospel in such a trite scratch-and-sniff way, with no demonstration, that people are predisposed not to believe.  They appear to be "hardened."  {I am not trying to rub you reformed guys the wrong way, but I would rather work positively with God than for him to work in spite of me}  It is easier to pray for hardened peoples than to get involved in the messy, not to mention dangerous, business of living the gospel.

• we live extracted lives

More on this in a later post.

• the gospel has no natural context in our lives

The gospel turns into something that is merely believed and taught rather than something to believed and followed as well.  Thinking back to that guy in the hood {or any other lost person for that matter}, he had no means of connection with what my partner was saying.  My partner was only making a blitz through a part of town he knew nothing about.  The reason his presentation appeared to be artificial and empty is because it was.  There was no natural flow or context whatsoever.

• either we are in "evangelism mode" or "personal time mode"

There is a secularization of even our Christian life.  Either we are focused on presenting the gospel {by that I mean the acronym which we like best of have memorized} that we cannot really talk and listen to people, or we are in our normal mode where we walk about with an independent, segregated life with no real connection to people. 

• we develop relationships and conversations which are merely "bait-and-switch"

We only make friends to share the gospel.  When they don't appear to accept our trite representation of the truth, we leave them behind.  This has all the romantic appeal of someone who is looking for love only to be continually wooed by a series of one night stands.  When we bait-and-switch we are not really listening to the other person.  Typically I am with someone else when I share the gospel.  I am amazed and shocked by some of the things my partners will say.  It has no real relevance, correspondence, or or even contradiction to what the witnessee just said.  It is simply point 2.a.II of whatever method they are using.  They don't care if the other person is really saying or hearing and thus no real communication takes place.  The witnessee will raise a valid concern or question, and the person will say "well this is why..." and they will start right back wherever they were before they were interrupted.  Recently at the mall, my partner had cornered a man from Pakistan, Salmon.  When I arrived, Salmon was firmly and verbally resisting everything my partner was saying.  Finally Salmon tried to use an analogy to help my partner understand how obnoxious he was being.  He said "I like Lost.  And if I go around and only talk about Lost then everyone will be annoyed with me and won't want to hear anything about it."  To this my friend replied, "Well, lost has a lot of Christian ideas, just like C.S. Lewis' books..."  My friend was throwing out ideas and labels as thought Salmon would mystically be brought closer to cross by only hearing the word "Christian" adjective, verb, and noun forms enough times.  Needless to say, no real communication was taking place, and my friend was only putting a cheap face on the gospel.  {I will tell you how we resolved this situation in another post}

Before anyone gets up in arms and thinks I am saying that there should not be proclamation, you are wrong.  I am not saying this at all.  But there must at least be equal parts of proclamation and demonstration.  If we aren't living in the world, we have no right to speak to the world.  After all, Jesus was the one who set the model of living in the world and proclaiming the kingdom.  I am not recommending the removal of evangelism as a plan, per se, only the addition of living with intentionality in the world and loving its people the way God does.  We do need to face the facts.  Few people actually evangelize even with a method.  The problem is that they are scared and it feels weird to go talk to someone they don't know {perhaps the first step is to become involved in people's lives}.  And for the few who do evangelize, very few people listen with any real interest.  Part of this is that they are dead in sin.  But a large part of it is because in their mind there is no reason we should be talking to them.  We are complete strangers and we just walked over and are getting all in their business.  Even believers react to this methodology.  When I go out, I think it is very odd when someone just walks up to me.  I am more at ease when they are obviously there to tell me/sell me something because that always answers my first question: why?  But when someone walks across the mall straight to me and starts making small talk and asking me questions, my street smarts kick in and I am automatically suspicious, defensive, on guard.  As a result, I am not really listening as I am trying to discern their real motives.  Usually, I get to the "I need to go" long before they have time to get it all out.  Sound familiar?  If it doesn't maybe you have never been "befriended" by someone who, to your joy, invites you over for dinner only to find out that it is an Amway party...  Get the picture?

I am not advocating less proclamation, only more honest incarnation.

like a sore thumb: a personal journey of feeling out of place...

Ever felt out of place in church?  I feel that way every Sunday these days.  I tell people who are unfamiliar with this feeling to go and visit a mosque or synagogue.  They speak a different language, know when to stand and sit, etc; and you are left there playing catch up.  I remember one visit to a synagogue distinctly.  I was taking a world religions class which was the pretext for the visit.  It turned out that there was a bar-mitzvah that night.  I was unaware what the proper protocol was concerning invitations and such.  It appeared to be an open event.  So, we went on in and sat in the back.  I had taken a few semesters of Hebrew and was trying to follow along as best I could.  In spite of my efforts, I was a line or two behind everything that was happening.  All of a sudden everyone stood up and turned and faced me and my wife.  I just knew that we were moments away from making the evening news.  I felt the heat rising to my head as I frantically read to see if I could make sense of what would certainly be a stoning.  For those who are not familiar, Jews move their body in various ways to illustrate what they are reading and saying.  Words that speak of contrition merit a forward bow of the audience.  My pulse slowed back down as I finally caught up to what everyone was doing.  They were singing something about turning to face the new morning light.  Their bodies followed their words.  We now see the humor in this event.

I have pondered, by the hour, why I feel out of place in church.  There are two churches that I felt at home in.  Both were churches I attended from childhood through college.  But even when I went back to these after having left them, I still felt oddly out of place.  The reasons I feel out of place have absolutely nothing to do with a language barrier or not knowing what is going on in the meeting.  I grew up in a Christian family and have been in church as long as I can remember.  I know that a small part of my feelings are due to the fact that I am headed overseas.  But this doesn't explain why from when I left for college till now I have felt foreign to church. That is to say, my feelings predate my involvement in overseas affairs.  I felt this way even when I served on staff with three different churches.  The feeling was even greater when I moved back to my home town and started looking for a "home" church again. 

I think I am beginning to figure it out.  The basic idea is this: the modern church is not situated in such a way that it is in the natural daily context of its constituents.  That is to say, the church, as we know it, geographically, socially, and even culturally exists in an artificial relationship both with the people who attend and the watching world.  Don't misunderstand me.  I am not equivocating artificial and fake, rather, I am juxtaposing artificial verses natural. 

If the church is truly artificial to its ethno-politico-religio-socio context, this explains why so much energy is spent trying to convince and attract the surrounding community to come and see and why so few people are in fact coming and seeing.  So if this fact is true, then why did I feel at home at those two childhood churches?  Also, why did I later feel out of place at the same churches I once considered home?  The truth is, those churches were always artificial.  They only felt like home initially because that was the only world I knew.  My whole context of growing up revolved around my parents.  When I left home, that changed.  Home itself-the house I grew up in-never felt like home again.  When I came back to those churches as an adult, and now an outsider, I experienced just how out of context these churches actually were.  They were like any other church I had visited in those years away.

I am using this post to start a short series on extraction methodology.  I will explain this more in those posts, but it should suffice to say that extraction methodology is doing church, ministry, evangelism, or missions in such a way that it is not in the context of the target people.  This is having devastating effects on the younger generations.  Ed Stetzer says:

70 percent of young adults (who attended regularly for at least one year in high school) ages 23-30 stopped attending church regularly for at least a year between ages 18-22.

It is not just me.  The question to all of this is, "why?"  What are the causes?  I am sure that part of the reason many kids never come back to church is because many of them are not in fact believers.  They grew up as cultural Christians and no one ever noticed till they never showed up again or until they did show up in some poll demonstrating how heretical the younger generation is.  I think the issue of conversion plays a larger part than anyone realizes, or, perhaps, is willing to admit.  But rather than asking the "why not?" question, "why don't kids come back to church?" or "why aren't the unchurched coming to our hip and trendy services?" it is better to ask "why would they think about coming in the first place?"  

That last question is one that hit me the other day as I was visiting a church.  I thought "why would I ever go here?"  Don't get me wrong, there was nothing intrinsically wrong with the church.  They didn't teach heresy.  There was an acceptable amount of love and fellowship.  I realized however, that it was completely outside any natural element of my daily life.  This was a piece of ground in my city where I never travel at any other point in my week.  It is a group of people I have no other interaction with at any other point in my week.  The teaching, while sound, was geared to a new believer audience, even though everyone in the audience has been believers longer than I have been living.  There is no natural context for this church whatsoever.  Granted, I could go there and make friends and take part in the fellowship.  But these relationships would be artificial in the sense that they were made purely on the basis that I was now making myself artificially part of some group.  Remember, artificial does not mean superficial or phony, rather, it is juxtaposed to natural. 

This series is not another "down with traditional church" rant.  Repairing the problem is not just a matter of getting rid of church buildings but goes much deeper into our understanding-or lack thereof-of culture and context.  

Some things to look forward to:

• How ministry to Muslims and Independent Baptist types are the same
• Evangelism comes across as mugging because we have left the world and now must invade it.  God doesn't invade the world; He is already at work.  He made it; it is already his.
• The only reason we are having to find were God is working and get involved is because we have moved out to our safe enclaves.
• Natural groupings and meetings-lessons we can learn from work overseas.
• Jesus is Lord; Context is King: not just a hermeneutical quip. 
• When the father revealed his Logos to us, he put a face on it so we could understand it.  God's strategy hasn't changed.
• What contemporary church and traditional church have in common and why they their struggle to be relevant is useless.
  

welcome to first baptist church of facebook inc.

There is much talk about Gary Hamel's article concerning the facebook generation's impact on the corporate world.  I want to discuss what some of the implications might look like for the church.  {The bold points are Hamel's original points, my reflection is in brackets}
1. All ideas compete on an equal footing.
On the Web, every idea has the chance to gain a following—or not, and no one has the power to kill off a subversive idea or squelch an embarrassing debate. Ideas gain traction based on their perceived merits, rather than on the political power of their sponsors.
{Theologically, I am not sure that this would be such a great idea.  But what about strategy, methodology, and atmosphere?  I went to a church function today which designed to attract the local community.  It was a complete flop.  Barely anyone showed up, including church members.  This isn't such a problem since we have all had ideas go down the tubes.  However, I found out that this is an annual event. Essentially, this is the way they had always done it whether it worked or not.  Success/outreach was not the issue; activity was.  It seems that it would be positive to bring in new ideas to the design and strategy team at least to examine the "way we have always done it" crowd.  Considering Hamel's point concerning subversion, it would provide a cathartic dose of honesty to expose, address, and repair problems rather than just shoving them under the rug.  Ever been to one of those churches where there was civil war brewing under the surface but everyone on stage provided such a sterile environment?}
2. Contribution counts for more than credentials.
When you post a video to YouTube, no one asks you if you went to film school. When you write a blog, no one cares whether you have a journalism degree. Position, title, and academic degrees—none of the usual status differentiators carry much weight online. On the Web, what counts is not your resume, but what you can contribute.
{The church's insistence on "professional" leadership is the very thing stultifying growth.  The problem is not so much that we DO have highly trained leaders, but that we DO NOT have people who assume a role in the movement due to a lack of professional training.  Translation: laity sits in pews because they think you have to have an Mdiv to serve God.  But what if they were like cyber folk?  We would have churches full of people who were part of a movement being sent out and trained by seminary trained staff.  The current model explains why so few are coming to faith: we show up to support the staff, hear what they have to say, and send the few to the masses.  The lay churchplanter is a vital need to the church of the next generation.}
3. Hierarchies are natural, not prescribed.
In any Web forum there are some individuals who command more respect and attention than others—and have more influence as a consequence. Critically, though, these individuals haven’t been appointed by some superior authority. Instead, their clout reflects the freely given approbation of their peers. On the Web, authority trickles up, not down.
{Whether or not we realize it, this is the way the world works.  This is the reason why in many small churches it is someone other than the pastor, elders, deacons or other leadership actually pulling the strings.  Sadly, this leader is rarely constructive and often selfish.  More generically, this is exactly what a "person of peace" is.  From the negative side, few believers make their way up the unspoken hierarchy within or without the church-see my post on being a follower.  At the strategic level, we need to look for those unspoken persons of leadership and influence.}
4. Leaders serve rather than preside.
On the Web, every leader is a servant leader; no one has the power to command or sanction. Credible arguments, demonstrated expertise and selfless behavior are the only levers for getting things done through other people. Forget this online, and your followers will soon abandon you.
{If only the church's march forward were based on "credible arguments, demonstrated expertise, and selfless behavior!"  Instead, we move forward only when the right people approve, it looks safe enough for the key-holders to enjoy, and when it looks close enough to how we have always done it.}
5. Tasks are chosen, not assigned.
The Web is an opt-in economy. Whether contributing to a blog, working on an open source project, or sharing advice in a forum, people choose to work on the things that interest them. Everyone is an independent contractor, and everyone scratches their own itch.
{Ever been to a church which automatically assigned everyone to a job and you have to request your name be taken off if you don't want to do it?  Many churches uses these manipulative means for acquiring participation.  It is as if we think that in order to follow Jesus we must be miserable at what we do.  Think about how most people describe their calling to Christian service.  They wanted to do plan A, and said they would never do plan B but God wanted them to do plan B.  They "surrendered."  What if God gave us passions and gifts specifically for the purpose of ministry; sound familiar?}
6. Groups are self-defining and -organizing.
On the Web, you get to choose your compatriots. In any online community, you have the freedom to link up with some individuals and ignore the rest, to share deeply with some folks and not at all with others. Just as no one can assign you a boring task, no can force you to work with dim-witted colleagues.
{One of the strangest things I have found in church, after leaving the church I grew up in, was how artificial the grouping at church was.  Often it is a group of people who have nothing in common, can't get along, and, barring Sunday, never associate with each other in any other capacity.  Is it any wonder why all the programs in the world are not bringing the world to church?  In our church planting strategy, we need to look for those natural groups-something we do overseas but fail to do here.}
7. Resources get attracted, not allocated.
In large organizations, resources get allocated top-down, in a politicized, Soviet-style budget wrangle. On the Web, human effort flows towards ideas and projects that are attractive (and fun), and away from those that aren’t. In this sense, the Web is a market economy where millions of individuals get to decide, moment by moment, how to spend the precious currency of their time and attention.
{The church emulates the corporation here.  I have been at churches where various ministries of the church were notorious for making a last ditch effort to spend the rest of their budget so their budget wouldn't be reduced the next year.  There is a need to plan the money strategically, but we need more spontaneity.  All too often we plan and budget non priority items early on and have no money for great ideas that happen later in the year.  Do we really need to plan ahead to have dedicated flowers every Sunday?  It would be better to focus the spending around reaching the goals set forth in the great commission vision.}
8. Power comes from sharing information, not hoarding it.
The Web is also a gift economy. To gain influence and status, you have to give away your expertise and content. And you must do it quickly; if you don’t, someone else will beat you to the punch—and garner the credit that might have been yours. Online, there are a lot of incentives to share, and few incentives to hoard.
{I don't think this will be too big of a change for stateside churches.  This tends to be an attribute of American culture.  In other parts of the globe, however, knowledge is power, and this includes gospel knowledge.  This particularly happens in male dominated cultures, which happens to be most of the 10/40 window.  This is particularly true in Muslim circles.  Often the men, who are literate, receive the gospel first and fail to transfer it to their wives, who are non-literate.}
9. Opinions compound and decisions are peer-reviewed.
On the Internet, truly smart ideas rapidly gain a following no matter how disruptive they may be. The Web is a near-perfect medium for aggregating the wisdom of the crowd—whether in formally organized opinion markets or in casual discussion groups. And once aggregated, the voice of the masses can be used as a battering ram to challenge the entrenched interests of institutions in the offline world.
{Again, there is some semblance of this in many churches so the change may not that revolutionary.  But the truth behind this point is that any kind of real movement must be grassroots.  A change or revival at the top is meaningless unless the grass catches fire as well.}
10. Users can veto most policy decisions.
As many Internet moguls have learned to their sorrow, online users are opinionated and vociferous—and will quickly attack any decision or policy change that seems contrary to the community’s interests. The only way to keep users loyal is to give them a substantial say in key decisions. You may have built the community, but the users really own it.
{True also of church.  In a secular society, people can walk away from the church at any moment for any reason.  Most churches, both contemporary and traditional, have forgotten this fact.  Many churches are top down in every area of church life.  They are run by trained professionals.  They are designed for people to come to and enjoy and grow.  Churches which often grow fast and large do so based on the personality running the show.  When he leaves/retires/dies, the movement dies.  We must begin to get back to utilizing the lay force.  We need to rewrite our vocabulary so that no one hears that they need to leave it to "the professionals."  The sooner we build consensus and really sell our vision to the rank and file, the sooner we will see a movement with historic impact.  If we fail to do this, the church in the west will be all but gone within a few generations.}
11. Intrinsic rewards matter most.
The web is a testament to the power of intrinsic rewards. Think of all the articles contributed to Wikipedia, all the open source software created, all the advice freely given—add up the hours of volunteer time and it’s obvious that human beings will give generously of themselves when they’re given the chance to contribute to something they actually care about. Money’s great, but so is recognition and the joy of accomplishment.
{Again, what if we didn't sell following God as the mortification of joy?  The way the church is most powerful-the way God designed it to be-is when the members are using their actual talents for God's glory.  God has given people burdens and passions for a reason.  We would do better to utilize the ways in which it is obvious that the should serve God than to insist that serving God must be a drudgery.}
12. Hackers are heroes.
Large organizations tend to make life uncomfortable for activists and rabble-rousers—however constructive they may be. In contrast, online communities frequently embrace those with strong anti-authoritarian views. On the Web, muckraking malcontents are frequently celebrated as champions of the Internet’s democratic values—particularly if they’ve managed to hack a piece of code that has been interfering with what others regard as their inalienable digital rights.
{In church circles, heretics are the hackers.  I am not talking about actual heretics, ones who would deny the divinity of Christ or the resurrection.  Rather these are people who try to move the body, when the body only wants the status quo.  Look at Luther [The reformer, or the king-take your choice].  The only reason he goes down in history affirmatively is because he won the fight.  Had he lost, he would have been a hacker. 
So that was "hacking" on the positive side.  On the negative side, there are many people who are critical of anything and use their, sometimes, brilliant critiques to advance themselves.  These are the people we are to be on guard against.  It is always easy to make something look bad and irrelevant.  It is a soft target to go after the SBC.  Anyone who has been paying attention can do that job.  But how many could actually fix it if they were given the chance?  The ability to "diagnose" does not necessarily imply the ability to repair, restore, and reform.  Many bloggers were able to win a recent SBC election.  At the end of the day, their guy was a decent candidate.  But their agenda had more to do with self advancement with a "because we can."  Again, it is easy to win based on how bad the other party is.  It is much harder to win based on personal merit.}
Conclusion
By and large, the impact that the facebook generation will have on the church will be a positive one.  The key will be the establishment becoming flexible to this kind of change.  Even better would be if the establishment pursued this kind of change since it is unclear whether or not generation F will be willing to force their change on the establishment or just walk away and do their own thing.

Christian Mugging

I have some forthcomming thoughts on "Christian mugging." Here are two skits to get you thinking.