I just seen this article (off Yahoo’s games site) this morning. Isn’t it so sad that when Christians cry “foul” or “we’re offended” we are ridiculed and chastised as being intolerant or forcing our beliefs down the throats of people. Or maybe we just do not support our beliefs by our compromising so much and not focusing on becoming “holy as he is holy”? Maybe we are just too scared to say anything? Or maybe we just do not care? Or maybe ……..? Note that my comments are not against the video game, because I do know anything about the game. Nor, is it directed against the Muslim group that protested. Nor am I really complaining about Sony. I guess what I am really doing, is praising the Muslim group for standing up for what they believe. I wonder just what the outcome would have been if we, as Christians were offended by this game’s contents and made such a protest?
The webpage link is: http://videogames.yahoo.com/feature/religious-outcry-sparks-littlebigrecall/1257227
Religious outcry sparks LittleBigRecall
New PlayStation game soundtrack unpopular with some Islamic groups
By Mike Smith
ADVERTISEMENT
LittleBigPlanet, one of this year's most-anticipated PlayStation 3 releases, won't be arriving in stores next week as expected.
The "social platforming" game is already gathering rave reviews, but it hasn't proven popular with one Muslim group, which issued a complaint to the game's publisher Sony concerning one background music track. Performed by award-winning Malian musician Toumani Diabate, the song quotes two verses from the Qur'an. Many Muslims consider the mixing of music and scripture to be deeply offensive.
Although the game is already pressed, packaged, and reportedly sitting in the back rooms of many worldwide retailers awaiting its original Oct. 21 debut, gamers eager to get hold of it will have to wait at least another week while the offending content is expunged. Updated versions of the game are expected to be shipped to stores during the week of October 27.
LITTLEBIGPICTURES
"Sorry for the delay, and rest assured, we are doing everything we can to get LittleBigPlanet to you as soon as possible," commented Patrick Seybold, Sony's US director of Corporate Communications, in a statement on the company's PlayStation blog.
Page 1 of 1
Posted: 17 Oct 2008
Showing posts with label consumer. Show all posts
Showing posts with label consumer. Show all posts
Monday, October 20, 2008
Friday, March 9, 2007
Marketing The Church
“Share The Dream … Build The Team” Ten keys for revitalizing your church, Donald W. Morgan.
In the chapter “Let your light shine” Morgan makes this statement. “We in the church are called to do a first-rate public relations job. We’re to do a first-rate communications job, a first-rate sales job and a first-rate advertising job. These are not to be an afterthought, of marginal consideration, or elective. They’re points central to our evangelistic task – if we would make good on the mission committed to us by our Lord Christ”
His scriptural support, or at least his proof text, is Matthew 5:14-16, “You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do they light a lamp and put it under a basket … Let you light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.”
While I believe that his expounding of the text is stretched beyond traditional interpretation, I do not want to debate the scripture. What I like to converse about is: Are we the church, becoming to much like a business? Looking for the next marketing program so to grow our business? I know we have to get our “name” out into the public so that people will know we are in existence and so we can be found. But are we so desperate to establish our identity that we must rely upon marketing to find it?
Do new and fancy words describe who we are? Have we abandon our Biblical identity and gone to gadgets and trends to re-establish it? Are the structures (the avenues through which we do ministry) taken the lead in who we are as a church? In example: We are a seeker-sensitive church. We are a contemporary worship style church. We are a blended worship church. We are a church made up of small communities. We are a relevant church in an ever changing world. And so forth.
I fear that we are so consumed with trying to “market” the church that we a failing in getting the message out. Society/population is growing faster than the church. A higher percentage of ‘church growth” is basically transfer growth. Oh I know that this does not apply to all churches, but is it not true for most?
Can we discuss these lines of thought? I would love to hear from individuals who are in the trenches.
In the chapter “Let your light shine” Morgan makes this statement. “We in the church are called to do a first-rate public relations job. We’re to do a first-rate communications job, a first-rate sales job and a first-rate advertising job. These are not to be an afterthought, of marginal consideration, or elective. They’re points central to our evangelistic task – if we would make good on the mission committed to us by our Lord Christ”
His scriptural support, or at least his proof text, is Matthew 5:14-16, “You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do they light a lamp and put it under a basket … Let you light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.”
While I believe that his expounding of the text is stretched beyond traditional interpretation, I do not want to debate the scripture. What I like to converse about is: Are we the church, becoming to much like a business? Looking for the next marketing program so to grow our business? I know we have to get our “name” out into the public so that people will know we are in existence and so we can be found. But are we so desperate to establish our identity that we must rely upon marketing to find it?
Do new and fancy words describe who we are? Have we abandon our Biblical identity and gone to gadgets and trends to re-establish it? Are the structures (the avenues through which we do ministry) taken the lead in who we are as a church? In example: We are a seeker-sensitive church. We are a contemporary worship style church. We are a blended worship church. We are a church made up of small communities. We are a relevant church in an ever changing world. And so forth.
I fear that we are so consumed with trying to “market” the church that we a failing in getting the message out. Society/population is growing faster than the church. A higher percentage of ‘church growth” is basically transfer growth. Oh I know that this does not apply to all churches, but is it not true for most?
Can we discuss these lines of thought? I would love to hear from individuals who are in the trenches.
Monday, February 19, 2007
2007 State of the Church Address (Excerpt Part 4)
2007 State of the Church Address (Excerpt Part 4)
This is the final excerpt from this year's address. I trust that these have been a blessing to you in some way as you have read through them. If something has spiked an interest, please leave a comment in the comment sections under each post.
Call To Service
Ministry. What a powerful word. It often brings frustration, anticipation, anxiety, joy, fear and wonder. Sometimes all of these feelings come at once. It produces a sense of inadequateness and a statement such as, “Who, me? What do I have to offer?” While all at the same time a deep peace that only comes from being and doing what the Lord Jesus Christ wants! I believe that ministry is not just a thing we do. It is more than preaching, teaching, singing or serving. I see ministry as a life style, which includes these things along with who we are day by day outside of these activities. So when asked about ministry, instead of asking yourself what I can do, ask, “What am I already doing in my life now and how can I use them to further the Kingdom of God?” There is not one of us that are not already in some form or another, involved in ministry now. However; I believe that there is not one of us, who could not do more for the building of the Kingdom of God. There are so many more people who need the Lord, and God has given to us the opportunity and responsibility to reach them. We are a T.E.A.M.: Together Everyone Achieves More. Let’s lock arms together in prayer, service, worship, prayer, surrender, fellowship, dreaming, laboring, prayer, ministry, reaching out, contacting for an impact to connect and prayer. Most of all PRAYER!
The time has come for all believers in and disciples of Jesus Christ, that we can no longer be consumer based Christians. By this I mean, receiving more from the ministry of the church than we put into it. Sitting back and saying: Feed me, teach me, serve me and meet my needs. This type of Christianity will spiritually and emotionally bankrupt a church. You can withdraw only so much before there is nothing left. Just as the world needs to be an industrialized people, so does the church. By this I mean, just as the world needs goods produced, the church needs to have goods produced. As we minister to lost people around us, we must be producing goods (ministries) for them to consume. In today’s society and culture, whether it is right or wrong, people will not just come to church because it is the right thing to do. Just as people shop at certain stores for various reasons for getting their personal needs met, they also judge their church attendance with in the same criteria. Just as people decide as to their return to a store if their needs are being met or not … they need to know and experience their true need, not felt needs, are being met. What is this need? Are they coming into a personal, vibrant, soul cleansing, life empowering relationship with Christ Jesus? As we reach out and reach in the church walls with the ministries of the church, we must positively answer this question. Once again if we do not ask this question or do not make the required adjustments to do this for our ministry community, we have failed them miserably. To do this, we must be focused on the Kingdom of God.
“A kingdom-focused church is clear on two points: stewardship and ministry. Stewardship is vertical in the sense that a local church is under the authority and commission of the Father. It is His will, His truth and His work that we do. We focus on Him; we serve Him and not ourselves. Ministry is horizontal in the sense that a church focuses on people. We focus not on ourselves but on our stewardship under God to serve his people. We preach God’s Word to God’s people. We equip God’s people for God’s work. We take God’s gospel to the people in our community. It is about Him (God) and them (God’s people).”
“A true focus begins with God and moves to people whom God loves and desires to be in relationship with Him. Methods, programs, worship services, events, activities and the like all come after a kingdom focus in a church. Only with this order of focus will other priorities and programs be successful.”
“A local church is a kingdom community of believers in dynamic fellowship under Christ’s lordship. Its purpose is to establish the kingdom as it fulfills the Great Commission with a passion to see every person complete in Christ through making disciples, maturing believers, and multiplying ministries. While being faithful in fulfilling the Great Commission we must focus on living out the Great Commandment. For through the great commandment those in the church and those outside will display the love that Christ has.”
“Our church is a kingdom agent, placed here at the will of God to be salt and light to people without a clue or a hope. It is a dynamic body of believers who exists to exalt the Lord and labor for his causes. It is a family of God building relationships among people and pointing them to the Heavenly Father.”
“Our success as an individual church isn’t going to be determined by the plans we have. It’s going to be according to the decisions we make and what we do to act upon those decisions.”
(Gene Mims)
“We can make our church an infirmary in a sin-sick world. But the goal of this church is not to be the infirmary. I’m glad the army has field hospitals where we can take our wounded and take care of them. Maybe you have been wounded and somebody has taken care of you in a field hospital. Still, the point of the army is not to have field hospitals but to have soldiers engaged in battle. The point of a church is not only to be a Christian critical care center but a spiritual army teeming with well-trained soldiers of the cross doing battle in the world.”
(Gene Mims)
This is the final excerpt from this year's address. I trust that these have been a blessing to you in some way as you have read through them. If something has spiked an interest, please leave a comment in the comment sections under each post.
Call To Service
Ministry. What a powerful word. It often brings frustration, anticipation, anxiety, joy, fear and wonder. Sometimes all of these feelings come at once. It produces a sense of inadequateness and a statement such as, “Who, me? What do I have to offer?” While all at the same time a deep peace that only comes from being and doing what the Lord Jesus Christ wants! I believe that ministry is not just a thing we do. It is more than preaching, teaching, singing or serving. I see ministry as a life style, which includes these things along with who we are day by day outside of these activities. So when asked about ministry, instead of asking yourself what I can do, ask, “What am I already doing in my life now and how can I use them to further the Kingdom of God?” There is not one of us that are not already in some form or another, involved in ministry now. However; I believe that there is not one of us, who could not do more for the building of the Kingdom of God. There are so many more people who need the Lord, and God has given to us the opportunity and responsibility to reach them. We are a T.E.A.M.: Together Everyone Achieves More. Let’s lock arms together in prayer, service, worship, prayer, surrender, fellowship, dreaming, laboring, prayer, ministry, reaching out, contacting for an impact to connect and prayer. Most of all PRAYER!
The time has come for all believers in and disciples of Jesus Christ, that we can no longer be consumer based Christians. By this I mean, receiving more from the ministry of the church than we put into it. Sitting back and saying: Feed me, teach me, serve me and meet my needs. This type of Christianity will spiritually and emotionally bankrupt a church. You can withdraw only so much before there is nothing left. Just as the world needs to be an industrialized people, so does the church. By this I mean, just as the world needs goods produced, the church needs to have goods produced. As we minister to lost people around us, we must be producing goods (ministries) for them to consume. In today’s society and culture, whether it is right or wrong, people will not just come to church because it is the right thing to do. Just as people shop at certain stores for various reasons for getting their personal needs met, they also judge their church attendance with in the same criteria. Just as people decide as to their return to a store if their needs are being met or not … they need to know and experience their true need, not felt needs, are being met. What is this need? Are they coming into a personal, vibrant, soul cleansing, life empowering relationship with Christ Jesus? As we reach out and reach in the church walls with the ministries of the church, we must positively answer this question. Once again if we do not ask this question or do not make the required adjustments to do this for our ministry community, we have failed them miserably. To do this, we must be focused on the Kingdom of God.
“A kingdom-focused church is clear on two points: stewardship and ministry. Stewardship is vertical in the sense that a local church is under the authority and commission of the Father. It is His will, His truth and His work that we do. We focus on Him; we serve Him and not ourselves. Ministry is horizontal in the sense that a church focuses on people. We focus not on ourselves but on our stewardship under God to serve his people. We preach God’s Word to God’s people. We equip God’s people for God’s work. We take God’s gospel to the people in our community. It is about Him (God) and them (God’s people).”
“A true focus begins with God and moves to people whom God loves and desires to be in relationship with Him. Methods, programs, worship services, events, activities and the like all come after a kingdom focus in a church. Only with this order of focus will other priorities and programs be successful.”
“A local church is a kingdom community of believers in dynamic fellowship under Christ’s lordship. Its purpose is to establish the kingdom as it fulfills the Great Commission with a passion to see every person complete in Christ through making disciples, maturing believers, and multiplying ministries. While being faithful in fulfilling the Great Commission we must focus on living out the Great Commandment. For through the great commandment those in the church and those outside will display the love that Christ has.”
“Our church is a kingdom agent, placed here at the will of God to be salt and light to people without a clue or a hope. It is a dynamic body of believers who exists to exalt the Lord and labor for his causes. It is a family of God building relationships among people and pointing them to the Heavenly Father.”
“Our success as an individual church isn’t going to be determined by the plans we have. It’s going to be according to the decisions we make and what we do to act upon those decisions.”
(Gene Mims)
“We can make our church an infirmary in a sin-sick world. But the goal of this church is not to be the infirmary. I’m glad the army has field hospitals where we can take our wounded and take care of them. Maybe you have been wounded and somebody has taken care of you in a field hospital. Still, the point of the army is not to have field hospitals but to have soldiers engaged in battle. The point of a church is not only to be a Christian critical care center but a spiritual army teeming with well-trained soldiers of the cross doing battle in the world.”
(Gene Mims)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
