Insanity has been defined as: doing the same things over and over, while expecting different results.
What happens in some organizations, businesses and churches is that we discover something works well, and then we cast it in stone.
The midnight-madness sale, the rock-a-thon, the phone-tree prayer line.
We tried it out, and it worked great–so we commit resources to do it over and over again. It works for awhile, then eventually starts to lose momentum and fizzle. Old business practice was to simply throw more money at it, add more balloons, put some announcements on the radio, and get ready for the crowds to start rolling in. But it didn’t have the same impact it used to have.
In this transition season at Evangel, we’re closely evaluating the things we’ve been doing. Nothing is off-limits. Everything is negotiable. We’re looking for ways to impact our community that go beyond the tried and true.
Food for thought: sometimes the tried and true is just tired and true.
We’re examining the various ministries/avenues we use to make a difference in our community. We want to bring positive, life-giving change to the people we meet and care for, and we realize that the way we do that has to change. of course we believe that this positive, life-giving change has it’s origin in the Kingdom of God–that the Gospel (good news) of Jesus Christ is the only source of a life the way it’s meant to be lived. And that’s what we want to communicate and point people toward. But old methods aren’t working like they used to, so we’re trying something new.
One example from our student ministry is KD Tuesdays. Students face an avalanche of pressures and need to process a flood of messages every day. They’re told they need to look a certain way, have certain things, and behave in a certain manner in order to fit in with the crowd. They get pressure from teachers, parents, friends, and the ever-present media to live up to society’s ideal of life. But when the kids head down that road, they end up finding it’s hollow, empty, and not at all what they were promised.
So our youth pastor (Landon McAllister) has teamed up with Tony Curtis and some other youth pastors in the city to create KD Tuesdays as an opportunity to give students a safe and fun place to hang out, make friends and experience the accepting love of God…all over a bowl (or two) of Kraft Dinner.
It’s really an awesome spectacle, to see students from Leo Hayes High School flock into the community room of the Willie O’Ree Centre every week to encounter people who really care about them, no matter what they look like or what’s going on in their life. It’s something different. It’s not the same old way of doing ‘ministry’. But it’s changing lives, one bowl of KD at a time.
Spring ahead.