June 19, 2007

What drives your church?

Seth Godin says most successful organizations are driven by something. Then he goes on to list a number of drivers. So I'm reading the list and nodding, when suddenly, this jumps out:

SUBSCRIPTION DRIVEN: How do we transform a stranger into someone who uses what we do, all the time. Intuit, certainly.

(He means that the company Intuit is an example.) This seems very much like things I've heard from Adam Hamilton, our senior pastor. To help people become deeply committed Christians, first we need to get them to try us and then we need to get them to become a regular. Spiritual growth comes out of habitual practice of the spiritual disciplines that we offer in our churches. We need to convert people from occasionally picking up a copy from the news stand into every week subscribers.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

AMEN.

Recently while speaking with the Disciples of Christ in an interview about planting a church here in Camden NJ -I was asked how would you measure the performance of the church...

I stated - 2 ways.

1. How many mentoring relationships am I active in.

2. How many people are coming back again and again - not just to do "church" but the be challenged - to learn more - to want to find out what else is going on - how they can be part...

I cannot agree any more with the statement you made.

My home church started a men's Bible study - 6AM on Thursday's and no one showed up.

When I asked the guys in the church I had 2 answers....

1. Honestly Glenn - its more exciting to sleep

and

2. I don't know those guys - why would I open up to them.

While the answers are typical - they are not surprising...

So - How do we convert people from picking up the paper once in a while to getting it daily ...

We need to build relationships - we need to get them to trust - and know us - as friends - as people.

The goal of marketing is simple - to make friends. Friends will trust you - they will take your advice and buy what your selling...

I can't help but think this is what Jesus was in the business of - Friendship. True Friendship.