Reverend John Udas states:

We welcome the injection of funds but we were clear to make sure our values were aligned and that the sponsorship badging wasn’t too obtrusive.

The church and sponsors are now discussing product placement on the alter and key mentions within the church service. One example is: ‘The Lord’s Prayer is brought to you by Sonar Books, the happy reading folks.’

Reverend John and the new badging:

Called Congregational Counseling it simply involves the pastor using their sermon, prayer time, one on one pastoral encounters, business meetings etc.. to work through their difficulties.

The approach is simple, under the guise of being ‘authentic’ and ‘transparent’ the pastor uses their own stories as illustrations and examples. So a sermon on prayer they would say,

I have been struggling with my prayer life for years, I want to pray more but I am simply too busy. Who has time for prayer? Why should I pray? What is the point? Can I be bothered? So today we are going to talk about how you can be a better prayer.

Sharing your issues in front of your congregation is very freeing and can be done most weeks in most encounters. Another example at a church finance meeting,

I see our finances aren’t going very well this quarter which I really understand as I am struggling myself to pay for our mortgage and the new jetski. Lying awake at night isn’t very healthy and in the same way, worrying about the church’s finances isn’t honoring to a God who provides. God loves me and God will look after me.. and I guess that includes the church finances as well I suppose.

The pastor gives so much to his congregation, it is time the congregation gave something back.

.

To start the ball rolling:

Your issue is serious, let me pray for you: The pastor has no idea how to respond.

Let me share that with the prayer chain: Now everyone in the church and surrounding community will know about your incontinence issue.

Any suggestions for new ministries?: If you come up with an idea, you will then be asked to staff it and fund it.

I think its time I went on a special prayer retreat: The pastor needs a break.

And a special section specific to church worship:

Nice sermon pastor: I didn’t listen.

Wow that was a creative message today pastor: I have absolutely no idea what you were talking about.

That sermon was good!: I fell asleep only once.

That sermon was amazing!: The preacher told a funny joke.

That sermon was very moving: We are leaving the church.

Preacher says, ‘Can you give me an Amen?’: Preacher wants to know if the congregation are awake.

I invite the Children to leave for Sunday School: At last we will get some peace.

I welcome your suggestions in the comments section.

Pastor Peter commented,

I Praise my Lord and thank the generous folks for this new Jet. It is an affirmation of what God has called me to do, to preach the Good News of God’s provision to the poor of the world.

Funding for the completion of a new local soup kitchen was put on hold to fund the Jet, but as Elder John commented, ‘the poor people in Africa are very important to us, they don’t get government handouts.’

Pastor Peter’s first mission crusade is this July where he will be spending 3 days in Malawi, Kenya and Sudan, mostly speaking at people about how God can provide for those who really want it. His message is titled, ‘Jesus is your banker: time to withdraw’ which is available for a fee at: www.pastorpeter1.com Following the crusade visit he and his wife will be recuperating in the Bahamas for a couple of weeks.

Pastor Peter and his beautiful wife Tina-Lou-Ann with their new ministry to the poor Jet.

]]> http://churchianity.wordpress.com/2008/04/06/private-jet-donated-for-ministry-on-the-move/feed/ 3 churchianity http://churchianity.wordpress.com/2008/03/31/job-vacancy/ http://churchianity.wordpress.com/2008/03/31/job-vacancy/#comments Mon, 31 Mar 2008 16:46:43 +0000 churchianity http://churchianity.wordpress.com/?p=25 ]]> This in on the email:

“Dear Hairy Platypus, I love your blog! In particular the name, the content is poor but the name is great.

We recently received the very sad news that our much loved church pastor, Felix Unky is leaving, he feels God is calling him to write a popular book so he can make enough money to buy a large ministry house on the coast.

So we are on the hunt for a new pastor. Please could you post the following advert?

Wanted: Dynamic Pastor to take the church to the next level

The Jupiter Hill Church is looking for a new dynamic Senior Chief Supreme Pastor. We are a church of 3,500 but have plans to grow that to 1.2 million by the end of the year. The Pastor has to be:

Remuneration is very competitive and includes the latest iBook, IPhone, iPod and iWonderful.

To register an interest please email: beautifulpastorsearch@jupiterhillchurch.com “

So I was very excited to learn that a new translation is out that directly targets the middle class. It is called The Middle Class Message. And is free of all the challenging material thus making it more acceptable to middle class folks.

An example of this stunning contemporary translation:

Matthew 19:3-9:

Some Pharisees came to him to test him. They asked, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any and every reason?” “Haven’t you read,” he replied, “that at the beginning the Creator ‘made them male and female,’ and said, ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh’? So they are no longer two, but one. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate unless things are getting a bit hard and they really have no idea how to communicate with each other and he finds her parents unbearable, and she is tired of his excessive snoring”"Why then,” they asked, “did Moses command that a man give his wife a certificate of divorce and send her away?” Jesus replied, “Moses permitted you to divorce your wives. But it was not this way from the beginning. I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for marital unfaithfulness, different life goals, constant arguing over which new BMW to buy, or a clash over the colour scheme in the kitchen and marries another woman isn’t very sensible.”

Or

Matthew 19:16-21 :

Now a man came up to Jesus and asked, “Teacher, what good thing must I do to get eternal life?” “Why do you ask me about what is good?” Jesus replied. “There is only One who is good. If you want to enter life, obey most of the commandments, but generally be nice to people.” “Which ones?” the man inquired. Jesus replied, ” ‘Do not murder but feel free to support war on terrorists, do not steal, although this doesn’t include downloading off the net, honor your father and mother unless they are really annoying,’ and ‘love your neighbor as yourself, though chances are you don’t know who they are.. so don’t worry too much about this one.’”"All these I have kept,” the young man said. “What do I still lack?”

Jesus answered, “If you want to be perfect, go, write a cheque for a small token amount and send it to a local charity, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me… when you have a moment that is.”

I recently had the pleasure of catching up with world famous Christian author: Rick Rabbit-Warren about his massively huge best seller: Preposterously Driven Life.

HP: Rick thanks for your time, you are a bit of a hero of mine.

R R-W: I just want to start by saying that yes I am rich from book sales, but I give most of it away to desperately needy causes such as other less capable churches than mine.

HP: Great! So tell us about Preposterously Driven Life.

R R-W: Well it is particularly aimed at Christian leaders and those in Christian ministry. The idea is that I lay out the rules for being successful in ministry. The first preposterously driven principle is to work non stop and refuse to take breaks. It works along the lines that if you don’t do the task, no one will.

HP: Won’t that lead to burn-out?

R R-W: For the weak back slider sure. The second principle is to portray a perfect exterior and cover up any ugly secrets. Those in the congregation need to believe the Pastor is just fine.

HP: That doesn’t sound very truthful.

R R-W: The fact is, if people really found out what sort of person their pastor is, they would leave the church. And who wants that?

HP: Ahh yes so wise.

R R-W: And then I discuss what I call the four Ds: obsess over Detail, Demand perfection, don’t Delegate and Definitely be hard on yourself when you make mistakes.

HP: How are you hard on yourself when you make a mistake? Is that often?

R R-W: Never, well not that I would tell you. But if I was to make a mistake.. I would basically tell myself that I am useless, load up on guilt and expect myself to be simply amazing at everything I do. I find this is really a boost to my prayer life.

HP: Well thanks for your time today, I sure learned a lot.

……………

For more information see: www.preposterouslydrivenlife.com

Amazing new research into the habits of Christians shows that a majority of western Christians absolutely love reading the Bible. In this extensive piece of research 9 out of 10 respondents reported that they read the Bible for at least an hour every day. They also stated they always acted on what they had read in the Bible.

Top church Pastor, Rob Bell Ringer comments,

The same research also reports that 98% of congregations are happy with their Pastor, stating they spent all week both excited by what their pastor was going to preach on, but also processing in detail what the pastor had shared the previous weekend.

………..

To see the full report go to: www.ifonly.com

What was both interesting and surprising is that the Archbishop is quite the dancer. Not just your standard sway while driving your car kind of dancer, but more of a leap in the air and perform the splits while smiling type.

It was interesting at one point, through the use of a ribbon, he was attempting to gather all of us into a unified group in the center of the dance floor – which he failed at spectacularly. The problem was he talked about getting us all together in the center, but he seemed quite happy for us to be all over the place, doing our own thing.

The other startling thing was the amount of hair spray he used – two and a half cans; and that was just for his eyebrows.
.

Recently I had the pleasure of interviewing noted Church Management guru, Barry Whocares (see image on right) on his famous Church Volunteer Management Model:

HP: Thanks for your time, you are an important and busy man.

BO: Agreed.

HP: Tell us about your model.

BO: Well I have wrestled hedgehogs in the Amazon and have the scars inside my nostrils to prove it. Wanna see? (I politely decline). I have also written three best seller books including: Get off your pew and be like me which is available through Amazon for $16.95; though for a limited time if you purchase 100 you get a 5% discount.

HP: Err thanks, getting back to your model.. tell us about it.

BO: It is called the Battery Church Volunteer Management Systems Approach Model or BCVMSAM for short or if you like even shorter acronyms, BCVMSA. The basic idea is that you view volunteers like batteries: once the volunteer is tired, or ‘used up’ then you discard them, or to be more gentle about it, move them on.

HP: Move them on?

BO: Well I discerned that one of the major issues in managing volunteers was when they burnt out they became useless and their performance dropped.

HP: Wouldn’t it be better to manage them in a way to avoid burn out? Give them regular breaks, encourage them with presents and acknowledge them in front of the church?

BO: (Laughs) They are only volunteers, we are not talking about real staff here.

HP: So what are the challenges with your Battery Model?

BO: BCVMSAM thankyou. The main issue is having a good supply of batteries to keep the ministry going. This requires the application of the Guilt Method which I devised. This involves making sure that the congregation knows membership has to involve a role in the church. We don’t just want people coming to church to be fed. Church isn’t about listening to God and sharing within community, it is about doing work, being busy.

HP: You have some interesting thoughts, thanks for sharing.

BO: Agreed.

For more information see: www.BatteryChurchVolunteerManagementSystemsApproachModel.com