Posts Tagged ‘Who’

Response // The WHO of community planting?

August 23rd, 2008

I struggle with the concept of a target audience.  Stanely Hauerwas [author, theologian, & seminary professor] once said in a class I took that having a target audience implies that you are going to shoot someone.  His crass humor points out the absurdity of thinking of people as “targets.”  To be blunt, I think that having a target audience turns people into objects.  Additionally, the underlying assumption for creating a target audience is that the point of the church is to get as many people as possible to come on a regular basis in the hopes that they will start giving money and other resources to the organization.

I was on staff at a church that sent “mailers” to people as a means to market the church.  I was horrified to discover that the lead pastor only sent those mailers to select zip codes of the affulent in our area while specifically avoiding the more economically and racially diverse zip codes.

I feel like a response to my arguments would be the cliche – If you aim for nothing, that it exactly what you will hit.  Well, if a community plant must have a target audience, I feel like Scripture would point us to the poor, the oppressed, and the marginalized.

Saying these words are much easier than actually doing them.  Right now, the house church I am a part of certainly does not have a target audience.  It is still pretty underground as the only real way to even discover it exists is to find out from a current member.  I have intentions of “targeting” the poor, marginalized, and the oppressed.  My wife and I recently bought a house in a diverse and mainly low income neighborhood with the hopes that ministry opportunities would present themselves.  However, I am not quite sure how such a person would feel coming to the house church.  We are a group of heavily educated white people with good jobs, and the majority of the group has known each other for quite some time.  I cannot help but think that an outsider would feel like an outsider in our group.  I admit that I am not quite sure what to do here.  I think a key is to begin and develop relationships with people who are not like you.  This makes sense to me on a personal level, but I am not quite sure how to do this on a community level.

I think that before getting into the who, it is probably more important to determine the what, as in “what kind of community is this going to be?”  Perhaps the who will be clearer once the what has been determined.

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// The WHO of community planting?

August 19th, 2008

I’ve read a few books (most notably The Purpose Driven Church) and have heard a couple pastors talk about their “target” audience.

Recently I listened to an interview with Mark Driscoll, lead pastor of Mars Hill Church in Seattle. He said, and I quote (loosely), “Most churches target 30- to 40-year-old women and that’s why our churches are 60% women.” Fair enough, but he didn’t end there. He went on to say that even the guys that are in these churches are kind of chics. This is why his church targets 25- to 30-year-old males because they want to be a manly church. So much could be said there but we’ll stick to the issue of the “who.”

Willow Creek was pretty famous for targeting 35-year-old businessmen when they planted their church. Rick Warren at Saddleback pretty much did the same thing. Ummm… it worked! Driscoll goes on to say that his church is 70% male or something like that. His targeting of a certain who is working as well.

I just wonder if you really need a who?

Is a “target audience” really necessary when one is planting a community?
Maybe more importantly, is a “target audience” really the most faithful thing to a scriptural proclamation of the Gospel?

These are just some of my questions when I think about the who of community planting. It seems to me that Christ died for the entire world, all of humanity. Is starting with a who in mind a way of saying one kind of person is more important or more valuable? I think I somewhat understand the argument that to have a target audience is smart because you are able to focus your efforts and limited resources on the needs of one particular people group. But I’m not convinced.

An authentic community probably can’t just be a bunch of dudes that look alike, vote alike, and drive the same kinda car or something, can it? I think part of the beauty of community is the diversity, the different voices, and assortment of ages, cultures, economic positions. An authentic Jesus-following community would be the par excellence of inclusive places. At least those are my idealistic idea at this point in the journey.

What do you think? Does a community planter need a “who” to start off with?

Give me some of your thoughts? Your pros and cons on the issue.

I look forward to hearing!

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The who, what, when, where, and why of community planting…

August 15th, 2008

I could plant a community 6 months from now, a year from now, or 10 years from now… who knows. But I am thinking a lot these days about the who, what, when, where, and why of ministry, specifically community planting ministry.

// WHO? Who is the “target”? Who are we hoping benefits from this community?

// WHAT? What kind of community is this going to be?

// WHEN? When is this going to happen? When is the right time?

// WHERE? Where do i plant this community?

// WHY? Why am I doing this? Why am I planting rather than just pastoring or something else?

All these question can go a million ways. Probably over the course of this conversation I will take them a million ways but over the next week or so I will start to ask these questions and I hope to get some helpful feedback from you!

Grace and peace
Erik

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