The church can learn a lot from worldly business and marketing trends, but many times churches and church leaders end up promoting the wrong thing. The one personality on stage is put on a pedestal above all others—even Jesus, or the excellence and trendiness, or overall professionalism is marketed more than Jesus himself, or the “brand” of the church the style or the good things it does is placed above Jesus.
This is a problem. I have heard many talk about these things like they are the number one priority at their church. Above anything else they push the personality on stage, above anything else they push the professionalism and excellence of the weekly service, or above anything else they push the “brand” of the church.
While all these are good aspects to promote we cannot promote them at the expense of Jesus, we instead need to use them to enhance how we promote Jesus.
Here are a few things to keep in mind:
Promote Jesus—Not Personality
There are so many instances of churches being driven solely by personality and this is not just a megachurch problem either it can permeate even the smallest churches. We definitely need good stage presence and excellent preaching, but the problem exists when the only draw to a church is the preacher or the personality of those on the stage and not Jesus. The draw should be “the preaching is so great and clearly points you to Jesus” instead of “the preaching is so great it is good entertainment.”
Promote Jesus—Not Professionalism
Professionalism in your weekly services is something to strive for, something to work for, and I hope you are working for it. But, do not strive and work for professionalism and excellence at the expense of promoting Jesus. People should be saying “the worship experience is so great it really helps point people to Jesus” not “the worship experience is so great, it is really fun and entertaining.”
Promote Jesus—Not a Brand
Something that has really taken hold in churches recently is brand presence and promoting the brand of the church. Cool logos, press releases on good deeds, and promoting everything “so and so church brand” has become big business. But, do not promote your brand at the expense of promoting Jesus to your community.
All these things—personality, professionalism and brand—are good things to do well in your church setting. We just need to be careful as to how we promote them and to what expense are we promoting them? Are we promoting these aspects above Jesus? What do you think? Let us know in the comments.
