Tuesday, June 9, 2015

your church ads

We have been doing this create a church ad for several years; all the Bible teachers use it.
When we do it in physical class, students work in groups and design their ads on the board.

Several patterns usually happen: the largest majority of church names have the words "unity" or "unified,: etc.

Here are some ads from a Visalia FPU class (click or right click pics to enlarge)






 If you are on facebook, click this link to see more  church ads one class made :

                 Church plants 11-10 (click)



BUT here are two very very telling results.

1)I always ask the students to look at all the ads.  I then hold up a Saturday newspaper from the town I am teaching in, and open to the page with church ads.  I say, "This ALWAYS happens.  Not once in this class, or in any class in all my years of this class has anyone ever thought to include in their ad the one thing that is in 99 to 100 percent of the church ads."

Students are stumped.

The answer is: The name of the pastor or priest.

Amazing: Why is that?  Why does our culture so emphasize the pastor that their name is always in the ad, and often their picture?

How many times would you guess the word "pastor" shows up in the Bible?
An important concept, right?
The answer is ZERO.
It IS there in the plural--"pastorS" ,,but only once and in passing.

Click these two  sentencs, to open up links with some  short commentary on this.

quiz: how many times is 'pastor' mentioned in the NT?



Watch this:
2)Not once has a class church  been designed where the ad says they meet in a traditional church building...they are in parks, in homes, in shopping malls, on FPT campus.
In the Bible, there is no such thing as a church building.  Church never means building in the Bible.
As you read in Philemon, the church that meets in your house." etc

Whats up with this?  What do you think?

--]
HMMMMM
Post your feelings/responses to these two observations in the comments section below this post.
If you don't have one of the accounts to sign in, simply click "Post as anonymous"...but be sure to include your first name or initials in your comments, so you get credit

16 comments:

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  2. Very interesting! Possibly because we are trained to function with a leader, not just at church, but in every institution there is a facilitator. I learned in a prior BIB course that the early church including participation, prayer and scripture reading from the people attending. So, if there is no pastor, who would facilitate, lead, direct etc.?--S.Davies

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  5. I am not really surprised at the observations. I didn't name a pastor in my ad either. I did add that we have a trained staff available. I think it is important to have educated people during a meeting. If nobody understood the context of the scriptures, it could easily turn into a cult-ish place. That is my opinion.

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  6. I also did not include the name of the pastor in my church flyer. In my opinion as long as you have a trained pastor or facilitator conducting your service it doesn't matter where you meet. What's important is the message you are conveying.

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  7. I also did not include the name of the pastor in my church flyer. In my opinion as long as you have a trained pastor or facilitator conducting your service it doesn't matter where you meet. What's important is the message you are conveying.

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  8. I didn't include the name of a pastor in my flyer as well. I think that we are so used to being lead that we wouldn't know what to do if the church didn't have appointed pastors to lead services. I remember in Bib 438 that whoever sat in the chair of Moses was the one who was to read for the week. In my flyer, I stated that depending on the message that week, we would have a member of the church share their testimony. I think it's important to hear from others who make up the body of Christ because it is a part of fellowship. This read and the videos were quite interesting. I had no idea that the singular pastor was not mentioned in the Bible. --Miranda Mendoza

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  9. I think this video got it right. In my opinion, organized religion is a way of power and control! I looked up several Fresno Churches and yes they always list the pastor or priest. I've never paid much attention to this. This is another concept that is hard to grasp. The listing of the pastor or priest is not necessary, yet we always look for a leader. I also think that this message has been distorted, church can be anywhere any time! The presence of God is constant always with us! Friends around a dinner table talking about God is church, we don't need a physical designated place to do that.

    Yadira Lupian

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  11. The first video took me by surprise, I've often prayed for my pastors but never thought to thank God for them. I do thank them for their service; I don't want them to feel unappreciated. I do know that if any of them left, the "church" would go on. The second video seems typical of our society. There will always be people who want to put things into boxes.

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  12. The first video took me by surprise, I've often prayed for my pastors but never thought to thank God for them. I do thank them for their service; I don't want them to feel unappreciated. I do know that if any of them left, the "church" would go on. The second video seems typical of our society. There will always be people who want to put things into boxes.

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  13. I didn't write the name of my pastor either. I also drew an actual church building. Both videos made valid points. I think today's society put an emphases on the pastor because people usually like to know there is a leader to keep things in order. (maybe a less exaggerated version of the first video) The second video made me wish I didn't draw the church building. I should have been more creative. God is not just one designated area. He is all around us.

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  14. That is the main reason that I chose to make my church a home like setting. I want people to feel welcome, I want my church to be based off of love and friendship. I feel that Pastors are super important but they need to be regular people, I think that is what I like about Dave so much. I want to be around someone that will help me learn, not make me feel like I need to be careful around. I feel that people put too much emphasis on a pastor. More important than a pastor to me is a good historian, I have learned way more about the bible by learning about the context in a three worlds set. Without knowing the history, it is just one awesome story. I really feel like that is the reason to visit these places, by doing so it makes it real.

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  15. BTW, Those voice over videos are too much, they are hard for me to watch

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