The Superimposed Church of Michael Jackson

There is a thought in the back of many church leaders minds. That lie goes something like" People just aren't hungry for God". Some are investing tons of money into multimedia and church branding with the idea that people will respond to cool advertising. In fact I saw a sign on an old church building that said "You can't judge a church by its cover, just like people." There was a superimposed teenager playing an electric guitar on the sign with cool graphics. I don't think marketing is wrong. I read recently a blog that used this phrase " Marketing is the currency of communication". I agree. But this sign made me feel sorry for the church. People outside of the church are not stupid. They do not look at a sign with a teenager and an electric guitar and think"all my life this is what I have been looking for. acne and fenders". It seemed superimposed and somewhat desperate.

The last year I have been thinking about, like that sign, how superimposed the church feels most times. Are we really communicating what we are hoping to communicate? Or are we trying to hard, by dubbing ourselves relevant. The 'sign' church was trying to communicate, "we are cooler than you think", self dubbing themselves cool. The problem is you cannot self-dub yourself. Only Michael Jackson got away with self-dubbing when he claimed to be the King of Pop. But he had the voice and the moves to back it up. Figure out who you are and what your strengths are. Then you can determine who you reach and who you want to reach. If you, as a church have Michael Jackson's voice, sweet! Sing away. But people are weary and wary of churches trying to sing like Michael Jackson with the voice of Bob Dylan.