Phil Cooke says: Politics, the prosperity gospel, movie boycotts, wacky Christian media efforts, and more have only marginalized the Christian community in the eyes of the people we’re supposed to be reaching. But if we would put our money (and time) where our mouth is and impact the local communities around us, people would notice. Christians certainly benefit personally from faith in Christ, but that’s not our only goal. We should always be ready to share that faith in tangible ways with others so they benefit. Here’s a video Phil has produced about the Make the Moment...

Carey Nieuwhof writes: Almost every church I know says they want to reach unchurched people.  But few are actually doing it. Part of the problem stems from the fact that many churches don’t really understand unchurched people… And part of the problem is that our model of church is designed to reach and helped churched people, not unchurched people. Churches haven’t embraced change deeply enough. Here are 9 signs your church is ready to embrace unchurched people: 1. Your main services engage teenagers. 2. People who attend your church actually know unchurched people.  3.  Your attenders...

The New World Gospel Presentation app, created by InterVarsity Christian Fellowship/USA, is a creative way to share the gospel right from your smartphone or tablet. Based on material from True Story by James Choung, this free app helps you illustrate the main points of the gospel message by drawing four “worlds” on your screen. Suggested dialogue and Scripture references are included for each world to help you explain the gospel as you draw. The opportunity to make a decision for Jesus Christ and join his mission to heal the world is presented at the end; a suggested prayer is...

Mark Morford writes: Six percent of Americans believe in unicorns. Thirty-six percent believe in UFOs. A whopping 24 percent believe dinosaurs and man hung out together. Eighteen percent still believe the sun revolves around the Earth. Nearly 30 percent believe cloud computing involves… actual clouds. A shockingly sad 18 percent, to this very day, believe the president is a Muslim. Question:  How do you reach someone with the Gospel that believes in unicorns or that cloud computing involves actual...

Warren Bird writes: If Park Community Church in downtown Chicago, IL, was going to achieve its mission of helping transform the surrounding 200-plus micro-neighborhoods, the church’s leadership team had an ego-swallowing hurdle to clear. They had to be willing to give up imprinting their church’s name on what they did. As the young, affluent congregation founded an organization that partners with other churches, community development agencies, schools and non-profits for the common good of the city, they named it simply Renew Chicago. They also renamed one of Renew Chicago’s original...

…To reach people we must appreciate and adapt to their culture, but we must also challenge and confront it. This is based on the biblical teaching that all cultures have God’s grace and natural revelation in them, yet they are also in rebellious idolatry. If we overadapt to a culture, we have accepted the culture’s idols. If, however, we underadapt to a culture, we may have turned our own culture into an idol, an absolute. If we overadapt to a culture, we aren’t able to change people because we are not calling them to change. If we underadapt to a culture, no one will be changed because no one...

Thom Rainer had a great post this morning on the reasons why we’re not really reaching the unchurched.  He starts with five reasons, and promises five more soon… here are the first five: 1.  Spiritual Lethargy One of the main reasons many Christians do not share their faith is simply explained by the word disobedience. Spiritual lethargy takes place when we fail to obey Him. 2.  Growing Inclusivism There is a subtle but growing belief among many Christians that somehow “good” followers will make it to heaven outside of a true Christian conversion. Our message will fall on...

Thom Rainer had a great post today about ten signs of an inwardly obsessed church.  Here are some thoughts: 1.  Worship Wars.  Man, I remember trying to transition a traditional church to a contemporary one (at least worship style).  It really WAS a war.  And it’s still that way in many churches.  When you make changes in worship, you can expect casualties.  But if your church is STILL in the midst of a war over worship, it’s time to stop.  Chances are at this point, you’re fighting a war with your own people.  End that battle soon, or you’ll never reach out to who...

Pastor Adam Hamilton shares his strategy for connecting visitors and new people to his church: What do you think? HT:  MinistryMatters

An article in Outreach Magazine by Granger pastor Rob Wegner shares what Granger has learned over the past ten year journey to becoming a “Missional Church”: Small and reproducing The key to any missional success is keeping it small enough to be easily replicable. In our multiplication efforts in India, for instance, we do not seek to directly reproduce Granger clones of 5,000 member churches with massive facilities and several strata of highly trained professional staff. Rather, the average size of a faith community in India is probably 20 to 50, most likely meeting in a home or small,...