The [Seemingly] Least Creative Thing About Church Communications

What happens behind the scenes in church offices - the unglamorous administrivial number-crunching that most pastors abhor - does not seem to be a creative communication topic.  The one place you don't want a church to be creative is in its accounting.  However, a book I am reading, William Hoyt's Effectiveness by the Numbers: Counting What Counts in the Church [http://amzn.to/YoOxe9], offers a creative way to think about what missional churches count, and suggests creative ways to start counting those things.  

For example, developing next generation leaders is essential for the church, but how do you create a system for leader development, and how do you measure the effectiveness of that system?  Don't numbers have to be involved?  

Attendance is a number that many argue does not define the impact a church has on its community.  Hoyt states that attendance does not measure importance or success, but it does measure influence, trends, and outward focus.  The more people you communicate the gospel to, the better chance it will be heard by some.  Attendance going up means new people are coming to church.  New people coming to church means the church has a focus on those who aren't there, not just those who are.

Attendance is not the most important number we measure as a church.  But it does matter.  If no one is showing up, then the topic of this blog (Creative Communication in the Church, in case you didn't get it from the overly-long and not very creative title) is unnecessary.  Without people in attendance, we're just talking to ourselves.

Those who accepted his message were baptized, and about three thousand were added to their number that day.  They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe at the many wonders and signs performed by the apostles. All the believers were together and had everything in common. They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts.They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily  those who were being saved.

Only One You

What you are writing may have been written before,
but never by your hand.

What you will speak may have been stated before,
but never in your voice.

When you communicate, consider your audience,
consider your topic, but do not forget to consider your self.  

There is only one you, and no one else can communicate what God has given you to say.

"David stepped forward to fight Goliath, the Philistine challenger.  Saul offered him his own armor to give him courage, but no sooner had David put it on than he cast it off again, saying that he could not make use of his own strength with another's armor.  He wanted to face the enemy with his own slingshot and knife.  In short, the arms of another will either fall off your back, weigh you down, or hamper you."

                                                                Niccolo Machiavelli, 1532.