SCD Ideas

With the death of the Titans three weeks ago, I basically watched the Super Bowl for the ads.  While the Steelers’ win was no surprise, there was an upset in the competition for best TV Super Bowl Advertisement.  This year two unemployed brothers from Indiana, Dave and Joe Herbert, won the top honors in the Super Bowl Ad Meter.  Both in their thirties, the brothers entered a contest sponsored by Doritos who promised a prize of $1 million to the best Doritos video sent to them by customers.  The top two winners also had their commercials aired during the Super Bowl, the most expensive TV time slot in advertising ($3 million per 30-second slot). 

Beating 51 big advertising companies was quite a win for the brothers and probably sent shivers down the spines of advertising executives on Madison Avenue.  Why should companies pay millions for one of their spots, when two nobudies can do it on a dime and a prayer?

This is just one more example of what Andrew Keen talks about in his book, The Cult of the Amateur: How Today’s Internet is killing our culture.  Keen contends that amateurs, like the Herbert brothers, are threatening our most valued cultural institutions.  Blogs, YouTube videos, and webcams let anybody anywhere broadcast their views to anyone everyone.   While book publishers are lagging in sales, companies like lulu, a self-publishing online bookseller, are flourishing as they allow anyone with a manuscript to self-publish his or her book for less than $50.00. 

Which raises a powerful question: who is the editor?  Traditionally editors provided the service of making sure what ever was written, produced, or broadcast was of a certain level of quality.  For example, words would be spelled correctly and put in the right order (grammar anyone?).  They also would push authors to fact check their work to make sure it was accurate.  But with the power of the internet, writers and video artists don’t need a fliter that was caused by the economics of getting something published — today they just need to write and click on the right box to published in a blog or on a website. 

While this is a great threat to some, it also provides an opportunity for the listener.  In the midst of the unfiltered voices truth and genius may be found.  Those nobudies out there might have something to say to all of us.  And that is the dilemma that we find ourselves in today.  A world where anyone can be an author, and where the reader now becomes the editor - sorting out what is true, real, and of value on his or her own.  So as you enjoy your Doritos and dream of winning next year’s contest be aware of the implications.  As we all become the producers of our own content, who will decide what is good, of value, and important for all to hear?

To see the ads go to:

http://www.usatoday.com/money/advertising/admeter/2009admeter.htm

Nightline is one of few mainstream news shows that fairly portrays religious life in America.  This week the spotlight is put on Mark Driscoll, pastor of Mars Hill in Seattle.  Reaching over 8,000 on a weekend, he is delivering a message that is reaching young people in an area of the country that has the lowest worship attentance in the nation. 

One of the more controversial comments from the show states the following: 

Driscoll calls the mainstream church’s portrayal of Jesus “a hippie-Christ. A neutered and limp-wristed popular sky fairy of popular culture that would never talk about sin or send anyone to hell.” According to Driscoll, Jesus was an outcast who didn’t play by the rules.

“Jesus is typically portrayed as very effeminate guy, kind of long, flowing hair wearing a dress, always smiling, [making] pithy Zen statements that read like fortune cookies at a Chinese restaurant,” he said. “And the truth is that he was a construction worker. He was very controversial and got murdered.”

The image of Jesus as a rebel seems to strike a chord because the Mars Hill Church isn’t just growing by leaps and bounds — which it is — but it’s drawing in people who otherwise didn’t have much interest in organized religion.

Discoll’s comments is a challenge to mainstream congregations who are aging and losing young people rather than attracting them.  One thing that comes through loud and clear that what many might see as edgy comes off as “real” to those who are coming to his church.

So what do you think?  Link up to Nightline and watch the interview.  Then come back here and offer a comment.

Link to Nightline: http://abcnews.go.com/Nightline/FaithMatters/Story?id=6711206&page=2

Last nights CMA Awards, broadcast live on ABC, is Country Music’s night to shine. It’s by no accident that many of the award winners thanked the songwriters.  For the singers know, without the songwriter there is no song to sing.

Over the last couple of months I have been privileged to take a songwriters class at the Blair School of Music in Nashville.  Each week a songwriter shares his or her story and helps the class look at the craft of songwriting.  Most of the members of the class are songwriters themselves and in many of the sessions they share their music for critique by the speaker and the class.

This last week Laynge Martin, who has written songs like Elvis Presley’s “Way down” and Trisha Yearwood’s, “I Wanna Go Too Far,” was our speaker.

What impressed me about Laynge was his passion for his craft and his desire to be heard.  Some of his advice could be applied to us all.

About music itself he noted that in movies, music is always used to bring the message home.  At the most dramatic point in the story people sing.  For Layne, “songs are really accelerated meaning.”  This reminds us that unlike any other form of communication, music goes straight to the heart.  Lyrics, melody, and rhythm combine to take the listener to a different place of understanding and insight.  The best song becomes your song because it opens a window into what is really important in life.   

Another comment by Layne has importance for us in everyday communication, that “everything we say has a melody and a rhythm.”  The cadence of our speech is really music without the notes.  The tone of our voice, the words we emphasize, and our inflection constantly tells others the state of our emotions, what is important to us, and where our passion lies.

Daniel J. Levitin, author of The World in Six Songs: How the Musical Brain Created Human Nature says the following: “Music, I argue, is not simply a distraction or a pastime, but a core element of our identity as a species, an activity that paved the ways for more complex behaviors such as language, large-scale cooperative undertakings, and the passing down of important information from one generation to the next.”  In his book he says there are basically six types of songs that have formed who we are as humans: songs of friendship, joy, comfort, knowledge, religion, and love.

I might add to this the following thought: before there was speech, culture, and civilization there was music.  Too radical for you.  If you are a parent, my guess is the first form of communication you formed with your infant child was a song.  Maybe it was a coo or a soft hum.  Whatever it was it made a connection that soothed and comforted.  In a sense you became the songwriter as you formed a bond with your child.

Layne made another comment during our time together that really stuck, “what you do everyday becomes your life.”  Days turn to weeks which turn into months which becomes years.  What you do each day has great implications for what you will become in the future.  What you do each moment matters. 

So the next time you listen to a song remember the muse that lurks in the shadow, for if you listen closely the secret of the songwriter will be revealed.

A look at generations in this year’s elections tells an interesting story. In Making God Real for a New Generation which was published in 2002, I talked about the emergence of a new Youth Boom that would hit in 2006 as the Millennial Generation, those born from 1982 to 1999, entered into their young adult and youth years. Today we are seeing the fruit of that Youth Boom in the election of President Obama. Now that Millennials are age 7 to 26 they are in their Youth Boom years.

When previous generations hit this age mark, transformation in the rest of the society took place. In the 1930s, new technology introduced color movies, comic books, and Big Band Music. Towards the end of the decade, the GI Generation fought in World War II. In the 1950s, the birth of the Civil Rights Movement and the emergence of Rock’n'Roll Music were the hallmarks of the Pioneer Generation. The Baby Boomers ruled the 1970s with the culmination of the anti-War movement and growth of the Women’s Movement. In the late 1980s, the Postmodern Generation saw the collapse of the Berlin Wall and ushered in many aspects that are seen in the Emergent Movement and the growth of the digital age.

Now that the Millennials are coming into their own, key factors are coming into play in the wider society as seen in the election of Obama:

1. 10% of the voters were age 18-24 and 66% of them voted for Obama. In comparison, only 45% of those over 65 voted for the new president.

2. Obama tapped into the youth vote by using their primary means of communication: the Internet and Cell Phones. Notice that major announcements, like the selection of Vice-President Biden, were sent out as Text Messages before given to traditional media. By doing so the Obama campaign sought to create a personal connection with the young voters who supported him. This also allowed him to ask for donations to the campaign using the Internet as well.

3. Obama’s slogan: “Yes we Can,” tapped into the mindset of a generation who sees themselves as ones who want to make a difference in this world. Rather than fear, his message of hope connected with young people who desire a positive direction for the country and the world.

4. Obama also connected to another major aspect of the Millennial Generation, the ability and desire to reach across racial, ethnic, and national lines. A great number of the Millennial Generation are the children of immigrants from countries around the world. A look at the crowds that were seen at Obama’s rallies shows us the new face of America, one that is multi-ethnic and young.

As Millennials make their voice heard the church has much to learn from the Obama campaign.

1. Millennials want to make a personal connection and do so through digital media.

2. Millennials are a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural generation. Churches that will grow and flourish in the future will be ones that reflect their diversity. This is the greatest challenge churches now face as the vast majority of congregations worship in mono-ethnic gatherings.

3. Millennials are attracted to a message of hope and desire to be part of something bigger than themselves to make a difference.

The Millennials are just starting to let their voice be heard. The church, like it has in eras past, has a choice to make. It can listen deeply and look for ways in which God is speaking through the Millennials to challenge us to grow in faith and maturity. It can put up walls and ignore them or forbid practices that seem so unGodly (like dancing, wearing make-up, or watching movies). Or it can ignore them completely, going our separate ways until the Church itself has lost its voice.

My hope is that the church and the culture at large will listen and learn, and look for ways to connect to this new generation as it influences us all.

The U.S. Census has released new information that has great implications on the way we create new churches and transform the ministry of existing congregation.  Here are some facts that get your attention:

 - By 2042 the U.S population will reach 400 million, an increase from 305 million.  In short, we will increase 25% in the next 31 years.

- Also, by 2042 non-Hispanic whites will lose their majority status, much sooner than previously expected.

-  The growth in the immigrant population is much larger than previously reported, with dramatic growth among Hispanics/Latinos and Asians.

The challenge for the United Methodist Church is to gather our resources in such a way that we create new faith communities that connect to this growing population.  Both new churches and existing churches have great potential to connect with these growing populations. 

Next year’s School of Congregational Development which will be in Chicago, Wednesday, July 29 to Sunday, August 2, 2009,  is the next opportunity for congregations to bring teams so they can create the strategies they need to connect with the American reality of rapid population growth throughout much of our country.

Go to the link at USA Today to find interesting charts and information about the growth of the U.S. Population.  Also check out 7 Myths of the United Methodist Church (www.gbod.org/7myths) and Chapter Three: We Have Too Many Churches which talks about the 10 Megapolitians where most of the growth will take place.

Link to USATODAY:

 http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/census/2008-08-14-census_N.htm?loc=interstitialskip