Effective Church Communications

Effective Church Communications provides Timeless Strategy and Biblical Inspiration to help churches create communications that fully fulfill the Great Commission

Effective Church Communications provides Timeless Strategy and Biblical Inspiration to help churches create communications that fully fulfill the Great Commission.

Yvon Prehn's Church Communication Blog

The Bible tells us that “out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks, (Luke 6:45)” or as the J.B. Phillips translation puts it “For a man’s words will always express what has been treasured in his heart.”

My goal in these blog entries (actually in all of the ECC Ministry, but particularly here) is to give your heart and mind a biblical viewpoint and foundation in church communications, so that your communications, whatever form they take, will reflect God’s Word and not primarily secular marketing or current cultural views, fears, or attitudes.

I used the word “primarily” quite intentionally in the previous statement because though we learn from secular marketing and contemporary culture, these influences should not be primary in our work. The primary influence on our work is God’s Word. God’s Word informs the Effective Church Communication ministry in our goal, which is to help church communicators create communications that fully fulfill the Great Commission.

Learning from, observing, and sharing other sources, while staying true to a biblical perspective and providing useful commentary is a challenging path to walk. No doubt I will often make mistakes, but to serve you in this way is my goal in these blogs.

Unlike the Occupy Wall Street Movement, churches have a unifying message, but are we communicating it?

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Occupy Wall StreetQuote:

"The weakness of the Occupy movement is its lack of a unifying message, other than the mantra about representing 99% of America."

Lionel Beehner, "Will 'Occupy Wall Street' movement fizzle out?" USA Today, 10-13-2011

Commentary:

It's a little early to know if the movement will fizzle out, transform, mature, and bring about change or none of the above. However, as time goes on, this lack of a coherent, unifying, doable message is being noted, if not as the cause of the movement's eventual demise, but at least as a stumbling block to it making any significant impact.

No matter what the outcome of the Occupy Wall Street Movement, it gives church communicators a challenge.

We have a unifying message

Our unifying message is the Great Commission. In some of Jesus last words to his disciples, he told us what we are to be about and what we are to do when he said:

“All author

ity in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” Matthew 28:18-20

We gave our message: to make disciples, to baptize them, to teach them everything Jesus taught.

Our challenge is to communicate it, all of it

[Read more...]

You can do all you need to do in church communications, for your church and by your people

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In Perelandra, the science fiction fantasy by C. S. Lewis, the primal battle between good and evil on a newly created world is fought by an unassuming scholar, thrust unwillingly into individual combat with personified evil. In the moments before their last, physical wrestling, his mind is wrestling with these thoughts:

The impudence, the unfairness, the absurdity of it! . . . What was the sense of so arranging things that anything really important should finally and absolutely depend on such a man of straw as himself?

At that moment, far away on Earth, as he now could not help remembering, men were at war, and. . .freckled corporals who had lately begun to shave, stood in horrible gaps or crawled forward in deadly darkness, awaking, like him, to the preposterous truth that all really depended on their actions. . . [and in years past] Constantine settled in his mind whether he would or would not embrace the new religion, and Eve herself stood looking upon the forbidden fruit and the Heaven of Heavens waited for her decision.

He writhed and ground his teeth, but could not help seeing. Thus, and not otherwise, the world was made. Either something or nothing must depend on individual choices.

from Perelandra, by C. S. Lewis
—when Ransom realizes his personal responsibility to fight evil personified

Thus, and not otherwise, the world was made.

Either something or nothing must depend on individual choices.

You are responsible for the effectiveness of your church communications, as this challenging quote from C. S. Lewis reminds us. Your church communications are effective if they make a significant contribution to, either through your personal outreach, individual ministries, or your church as a whole, people are coming to know Jesus as Savior and growing to maturity in their Christian lives.

Effective church communications can change the eternal destiny of individual people, enrich the lives of families and communities, and inspire compassion and service to a world desperately in need of sacrificial kindness.

You, as a church communicator have an immensely important calling. [Read more...]

Bible teachers should teach, not conduct public therapy sessions

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Teaching is an exacting form of communication. Based on a biblical foundation, teaching in the church is an essential element in enabling people outside the church to understand the truth of the Christian faith and inside the church to instruct believers to grow in Christian maturity. Successful teaching in the church also involves more than our content alone, but it also involves the character of the teacher.

Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you. Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. We have different gifts, according to the grace given us. . . . . . if it is teaching, let him teach (Romans 12:3-7, italics mine).

If the lives of our people are not reflecting the kind of Christian maturity we would like to see, if we find ourselves  lamenting their lack of basic biblical knowledge among Christians today—it is instructive for leaders in the church to examine what their people are actually being taught.

We have at most, a couple of hours each week to teach, and it might serve us well to look at how we use those precious minutes. Some considerations:

  • How much time is spent actually sharing content, solid Biblical content?
  • How much time is spent giving Biblical background and Biblical application?
  • How much time is spent putting the Biblical narrative in a historical context?
  • How much time is spent sharing your personal opinion of the lesson and associated topics?
  • How much time is spent sharing your past life experiences or recent domestic dramas?

The Apostle Paul is an instructive example here to contemporary folks who seem compelled to share every detail of their childhood and the weekly status of their marriage in a time theoretically set aside for the teaching of God's Word.

Paul most certainly would have had some incredible stories to share. Stephen was only one of many whose death he facilitated. Did he have nightmares about the families he threw into prison, the lives he destroyed?  His relationship with his family, who paid to have him study with Gamaliel, and who had proudly watched him become a "Hebrew of Hebrews"  only to turn into a Christian evangelist most likely would have yielded some colorful stories.

But we know nothing of them. His focus was not on public therapy sessions of sharing, but instead:

"One thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. All of us who are mature should take such a view of things (Phillipians 3:13-15)."

Immaturity in any Christian teaching situation is evident when the teacher's focus is on his or her past, personal experiences, and pain. People do not come to church to get to know the pulpit personality; they come to see Jesus.

We have so little time to teach the truths that can change lives for time and eternity, as church communicators, if we are called to teach God's Word, we should teach.