By Jim Jewell and Rusty Pritchard, co-founders, Flourish
[This article is from a series of weekly ministry ideas on the Flourish Blog called Cultivating Community].
Flourishing churches are those that draw people to God, encourage balanced spiritual growth, grow healthy families, care for their communities, and communicate the gospel to those outside the faith. A big part of flourishing is stewardship. In recent years, strong financial ministries have encouraged churches and families to be good stewards of their money, and have provided advice, tools, resources, and practical tips for them.
We think churches need similar help in the area of environmental stewardship. Some churches doubtless pursue environmental action because they are merely following the culture. But for Christian ministries, being green is not a fad or a fashion. It can’t be about politics or posturing. Biblical environmental stewardship must be about caring for creation in a way that’s deeply rooted in faith and that testifies to the Creator himself. Here are eight ideas for your church:
Go Deep
Start with Scripture, not with a focus on political issues or even environmental problems. Politics and science are constantly changing, but God’s word is constant. Read what the Bible says about caring for creation and the people who depend on it.
Give Thanks
Plan a church emphasis around creation care in the Thanksgiving season, when churches have historically celebrated with gratitude the harvest of crops. Peter Illyn, of the Christian environmental ministry Restoring Eden, says “Thanksgiving is a much more natural time to focus on God’s good earth than secular holidays like Earth Day.”
Keep the Sabbath
Perhaps the most radical thing a church can do in the area of environmental stewardship is to commit to keeping the Sabbath. The scriptures about Sabbath-keeping make constant reference to rest and care for the land as well as for people. God rested on the seventh day of Creation to enjoy His good handiwork. Spending time with family and friends and enjoying the free outdoors is an act of resistance to the pressures of materialism and consumerism.
Get out!
Along the same lines, encourage the children (and the adults) in your church to spend at least an hour a day outside. Al Mohler, President of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, says, “Christians should take the lead in reconnecting with nature and disconnecting from machines.” Inspire families in your church to turn off the TV, computer, and video games and to help their kids have more “green time” than “screen time”.
Clean up
Pick a local park, stream, or streetscape littered with trash and vandalism, and have a cleanup day. You can find a link on our website to a network of Christians in Conservation called A Rocha (Portuguese for “the rock”); among other useful resources, they have a downloadable guide for how to organize a community clean up. By joining together, they say, “we can visibly demonstrate to our communities that God actively cares for his creation and so do we.”
Reach Out
You may never have been to an Earth Day festival, but the unchurched people in your community have. It’s the fastest growing secular holiday, and it’s a great outreach opportunity. Visit one this year, and make plans to have an outreach table next year, witnessing to the Creator who made the good earth the attendees are celebrating. We can help with a guide to tabling at such an event. Or host a film viewing at church for the local community, with a great nature film or a film about food, health, or sustainability. We help provide discussion guides for films.
Do a church energy audit
Let the youth group help do an initial church energy audit (we can help provide a guide), based on your last year’s utility bills and a facility inspection, and let them use next year’s cost savings for their summer mission trip. Or get professional help, like Prestonwood Baptist Church, a megachurch in Plano, Texas, which did a major energy overall and saved more than $1 million on utilities and water.
Be inspired
You can meet other pastors and church leaders who are growing their ministries and caring for creation by connecting online. Sign up for our monthly newsletter, which bring you the best of Flourish magazine and our online content, and take time to become a member of Flourish. Your support enables us to continue building a network of churches who are caring for creation and their neighbors, and who are restoring the witness of the 21st century church.
Jim Jewell and Rusty Pritchard are the co-founders of Flourish. A version of this article appeared in Ministry Today magazine.
Green Christians: Eight Starter Ideas for Churches Who Care about Creation
Excerpts from DETOX by David Putman
“We must be born again from our religion, from our self-imposed yokes, from the weight of our burdens. It isn’t easy, but the result is a chance to break free from the weight we have borne and live in the freedom and simplicity of Jesus.” Page 10
“There is power in the word journey when we use it to describe our relationship with Jesus. That’s why part of my rethinking has involved going back and rereading the Gospels over and over again.” Page 49
“The tendency to control is especially dangerous to someone as religious as I have been. When others don’t’ live up to my moral standards, I want to impose restrictions and guidelines so that they can be taught and changed.” Page 89
“Loving like Jesus is the ultimate expression of love—there is truly no greater love. He loved through the darkness and loneliness of being betrayed by his own creation, and he loved through the hurt that came with seeing his followers fail him.” Page 104
“You can’t follow Jesus and not love your enemies, [but] loving your enemies always costs. Don’t think it doesn’t.…Loving our enemies is a form of righteousness and always leads to some kind of persecution.” Page 129
“If we are gut-level honest with ourselves, it is not unusual for Christians to build religious walls that keep out those who live differently. We can even use our churches to build these walls—instead of being the church that attracts and embraces sinners, we build church buildings that keep sinners out.” Page 138
“When we take the mission of making disciples seriously, it’s a sobering reality that I’m going to reproduce what I am….This is why it is so important we have a clear understanding of what it means to be a follower of Jesus, along with a clear understanding that our ministry overflows from this understanding and relationship.” Page 173
“If we are to witness the work of God in the church today, we must put away our divisions and petty religion in favor of bringing the church together. There is only one banner under which we can all fit—Jesus—and there’s room for all of us.” Page 215
For an interview with David Putman or to book David as a guest, contact Jim Jewell at (678) 458-9837, jjewell03@msn.com
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David Putman, author of the new book, DETOX
Bio Sketch
David Putman
Author of DETOX
David Putman is executive pastor of Mountain Lake Church in Cumming, Georgia, north of Atlanta. Before writing Detox, Putman was the co-author of Breaking the Missional Code, and author of Breaking the Discipleship Code.
A church planter throughout his ministry, David is co-founder of a church planting organization called churchplanters.com. He is recognized as one of the catalysts of the current church planting movement. He’s been the founding pastor of two churches, and he has coached and trained church planters around the globe.
David loves his family, motorcycles, writing, and hanging out with friends. He says:
“I am a big time family man. I have two awesome kids. My son serves with the 82nd Airborne and recently served in Afghanistan. I’m really proud of him, but I’m really tired of war. I’m praying for peace on earth. My daughter and I are just alike only she’s a good looking version. My wife really is the best person I’ve ever met.”
Prior to his pastoral role at Mountain Lake, David served with the North American Mission Board (SBC), where he developed the Nehemiah Project, a church planting strategy that was used to launch hundreds of church planters in North America.
In 1991 he was a contributing author to Church Planting at the End of the
Twentieth Century by Charles Chaney, writing the chapter, Getting Off to a Big Start. He served as one of the editors and authors of Seven Steps for Church Planting, one of the North American Mission Boards flagship resources.
David lives in Cumming, Georgia, with his wife Tami, their daughter Amanda—who plays collegiate tennis, and their son Dave—who serves in the U.S. Army as a Forward Observer with the 82nd Airborne.
For an interview with David Putman or to book David as a guest, contact Jim Jewell at (678) 458-9837, jjewell03@msn.com
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New Book: DETOX for the Overly Religious
Detox, by David Putman.
B&H Publishing Group. Release date: Jan. 1, 2010
“Finding Jesus is All About Losing Your Religion”
Author David Putman Explores the Path
for Following Jesus Away from Toxic Religion
ATLANTA, Jan. 5, 2010-- In his new book, Detox, church planting expert and Atlanta-area pastor David Putman begins with what may seem like a quip: “Christians should lose their religion.” But he’s really quite serious. Putman says the biggest barrier many people encounter in their search for a meaningful relationship with God is that they are “overly religious” and have allowed the veneer of religion to deter them from simply following Jesus Christ.
Detox, released by B&H Publishing Group on January 1, 2010, provides an easy-to-read 23-step “detoxification devotional” to help wean readers from their dependence on rules and empty religious traditions and to explore the simple-but-profound journey into a relationship with Jesus.
The 23 steps are presented in three sections: Living Like Jesus Lives, Loving Like Jesus Loves, and Leaving Behind What Jesus Leaves Behind (more followers).
Living Like Jesus Lives
Simplicity
Rethink
Come
Seeing
Journey
Frozen
Blessed
Margin
Control
Loving Like Jesus Loves
Cup
Perfume
Sinners
Enemies
Friend
Samaritan
Forgiveness
Leaving Behind What Jesus Does
Study Course
Disciples
Go
Purpose
Hospitality
Temple
Oneness
Each chapter ends with questions for reflection individually or as a group.
For an interview with David Putman or to book David as a guest, contact Jim Jewell at (678) 458-9837, jjewell03@msn.com
Leaders of the Evangelical Generation #45 Steven Curtis Chapman. Lyricist and Musician
[I am working on a project that may become a book on the most influential evangelicals leaders of our generation, since 1976, and the impact they've had on the church and their times. I will introduce them briefly on this blog from time to time].
#45. Steven Curtis Chapman. Lyricist and Musician b.1962
If anyone in Christian music could accurately say “I wrote the songs” it would be Steven Curtis Chapman, the most honored songwriter and one of a handful of the genre’s dominant performers in the last 20 years.
Chapman received Christian music’s Dove Award for Songwriter of the Year every year from 1989-1995, and again in 1997 and 1998. He was also honored as Male Vocalist of the Year in 1990, 91, 95, 97, 98, 2000, and 2001; and Artist of the Year in 90, 91, 93, 95, 97, 2000, and again last year, 2009.
In fact, Michael W. Smith and Steven Curtis Chapman are the most honored artists in Dove Awards history.
I met Steven Curtis Chapman on the way to prison. In 1994 I had negotiated an agreement with Chapman’s representatives for Prison Fellowship Ministries to be main sponsor of his “Heaven in the Real World” national concert tour. [Heaven in the Real World was one of two albums to go platinum (sold more than a million copies) for SCC.] 
Steven had become interested in Chuck Colson and his prison ministry work and call to faithfulness, and had included a Colson voice over on the album Heaven in the Real World’s title song. As part of the sponsorship agreement, Steven would perform in several Prison Fellowship in-prison outreach programs, PF would gather names of mostly young people at concerts and get promotional space in the CDs, a concert hand-out and other places, and the SCC team would receive a sizeable amount of sponsorship money—six figures—from PF.
It was fairly revolutionary for a conservative organization such as PF, and although it was difficult to measure the impact on the organization, it was probably helpful all around—particularly providing more youthful names for the organization’s aging donor list.
It was on the way to one of the prison programs that I met Steven, flying to the area together, sharing a van. It was the first of many visits with a young musician who seemed to get younger with every passing year to stay popular with young audiences.
While stardom has had a bad influence on numerous Christian music stars, Chapman has always impressed with his authentic and consistent life and work. I found that to be true as he sang and spoke with energy and compassion to both arena crowds of tens of thousands adoring fans and to a few hundred often-stone-faced prison inmates—some of whom shared the faith and others who were just looking for a few hours outside their cell blocks.
It was a trip into the belly of one of the nation’s prison beasts—I believe it was in Indiana—that led to Chapman’s striking and inspirational song: “Free.”
Back in the news in the last year with the tragic death of his youngest child, who was hit by the family car in their driveway. He’s handled it was characteristic honesty and class, and some of the passion of the time is evident in his new album, Beauty Will Rise. He spoke about the tragedy and the album recently on Good Morning America.
Jim Jewell
Renewal Becomes Part of Christians for Environmental Stewardship
Renewal, the organization of young evangelicals concenrned about caring for the environment, announced Friday night that it has become part of Christians for Environmental Stewardship, which now includes three distinct minstries that focus on young peope: Restoring Eden, Creation Care Study Program, and Renewal. Its a good move that will provide some stability to Renewal, which is seeing turnover of its young leaders. CES is headed by longtime activist Peter Illyn, who operates Restoring Eden; and Chris Elisara who runs CCSP, the terrific overseas study program for collegians.
The First Ten PR Secrets for Non-Profits: #4 Be Authentic
When you engage in public relations as a non-profit organization, every move must be strategic and thoughtful. The road to visibility can be long and arduous, and there is nothing more important than your integrity and your reputation. For more than three decades, we have been providing counsel and service to organizations and public figures in the Christian and non-profit sectors. We’ll unfold ten things we’ve learned.
#4 Be Authentic
Public confidence in charitable organizations is vital to assuring vibrant future for the work these groups do to address the world’s most important problems. The primary challenge of the public relations function that supports these organizations is not to spread information or to trick the public, but to encourage integrity and fortify the resulting good reputation.
That’s why I hate when people (including some in the profession) call public relations work “spin,” which gives the impression that PR practitioners are an impediment to the truth, rather than advocates and purveyors of truthfulness. (Of course, some are not. There are unprofessional clods in every profession.)
Unfortunately, public confidence in charities remains at contemporary lows. A March 2008 survey conducted by Brookings shows:
1. Charitable confidence has not risen significantly since it hit bottom in 2003. As of September 2002, 37 percent of Americans reported having “not too much” confidence in charitable organizations or “none at all.” As of March 2008, 34 percent gave the same rating.
2. Americans remain skeptical of charitable performance. Only 10 percent of the Americans interviewed in March 2003 said charitable organizations did a “very good job” spending money wisely; 17 percent gave the same rating to running programs and services, and being fair in decisions; and 25 percent gave the same rating to helping people.
3. The considerable drop in the ratings of helping people poses a serious challenge to the sector’s distinctiveness as a destination for giving and volunteering. As of October 2003, 34 percent of Americans said charitable organizations did “very good” in helping people; in March 2008, only 25 percent gave that same rating. This statistically significant drop is the most troubling finding in the survey.
4. Estimates of charitable waste remain disturbingly high. As of March 2008, 70 percent of Americans said that charitable organizations waste “a great deal” or “fair amount” of money. This figure has risen 10 percentage points since October 2003. Although Americans estimate that big business and government waste even more money, charitable organizations seem bound and determined to catch up.
Confidence in organizations must start with good governance. The public relations team can contribute by supporting the following:
• Be authentic in your characterizations of problems and your ability to address them.
• Encourage investment in performance, to be sure you can do what you want to do and say you will do.
• Match or exceed promises with performance—under-promise, over-deliver.
• Use realistic and common sense language rather than just flowery and visionary language in describing what you will accomplish.
• Don’t spin. That’s not the job of public relations, despite the way it is often characterized.
Reputation influences all the goals you set—gaining access for your programs, capturing both the attention and loyalty of donors, attracting and retaining the best employees, and finding strong program partners. Reputation also is a critical factor in how well you can weather a crisis.
While this may seem obvious to some, the best way to maintain a good reputation is to be authentic in your programs, public statements, fundraising, and financial practice. Tell the truth. Don't present your organization as more than it is, and don't try to be more than you can support with quality.
Jim Jewell
Happy White Elephant
We're going to have a Christmas party with our small group this Thursday, and per tradition we'll be having a "white elephant" exchange. An exercise in re-gifting. But where did the term "white elephant come from?
One of our small group friends, John (actually there are three John's in our small group; we call them 1st, 2nd, and 3rd John) wrote yesterday to provide an explanation:
White Elephant
The term derives from the sacred white elephants kept by Southeast Asian monarchs in Burma, Thailand, Laos and Cambodia. To possess a white elephant was regarded (and is still regarded in Thailand and Burma) as a sign that the monarch reigned with justice and power, and that the kingdom was blessed with peace and prosperity.The tradition derives from tales which associate a white elephant with the birth of Buddha, as his mother was reputed to have dreamed of a white elephant presenting her with a lotus flower, a symbol of wisdom and purity, on the eve of giving birth. Because the animals were considered sacred and laws protected them from labor, receiving a gift of a white elephant from a monarch was simultaneously both a blessing and a curse: a blessing because the animal was sacred and a sign of the monarch's favor, and a curse because the animal had to be retained and could not be put to much practical use, at least to offset the cost of maintaining it.
Now we know.
Jim Jewell
Gerson: The scandal is about bad scientists, not global warming
Mike Gerson hits the right notes on ClimateGate. The scandal hurts scientists but has little to do with the real evidence of global warming.
Time Out for Bad Behavior? A Balanced Analysis of ClimateGate
As climate change skeptics yearn to make bad behavior by some scientists into ClimateGate, and climate change pessimists try to look the other way in the face of bad publicity, my friend and colleague Rusty Pritchard, the president of Flourish(and a Christian, economist, and scientist), provides a clearheaded and even humorous analysis of the stolen-yet-troublesome email scandal.
Jim Jewell
The Gift of Good Land by Wendell Berry in Flourish Magazine
On the 30th anniversary of its writing, Flourish magazine is publishing Wendell Berry’s The Gift of Good Land, a penetrating examination of the Christian stewardship of God’s creation.
It is a wonderful counterpoint to much of the silly politics and commentary leading up to the Copenhagen summit, and it is a profoundly spiritual challenge that provides deep questions about the faithful and responsible life, questions that serve the Christian far more than anything we will read in the papers and blogs in the days of Copenhagen.
In The Gift of Good Land, Berry writes:
The difficulty but also the wonder of the story of the Promised Land is that, there, the primordial and still continuing dark story of human rapaciousness begins to be accompanied by a vein of light which, however improbably and uncertainly, still accompanies us. This light originates in the idea of the land as a gift—not a free or a deserved gift, but a gift given upon certain rigorous conditions.
It is a gift because the people who are to possess it did not create it. It is accompanied by careful warnings and demonstrations of the folly of saying that “My power and the might of mine hand hath gotten me this wealth” (Deuteronomy 8:17). Thus, deeply implicated in the very definition of this gift is a specific warning against hubris which is the great ecological sin, just as it is the great sin of politics. People are not gods. They must not act like gods or assume godly authority. If they do, terrible retributions are in store. In this warning we have the root of the idea of propriety, of proper human purposes and ends. We must not use the world as though we created it ourselves.
Manhattan Declaration: A Remarkable Statement with PR Flaws
The Manhattan Declaration on life and marriage is a remarkably articulate and balanced statement presented by a broad and influential coalition of evangelical, Catholic, and Orthodox Christians that rarely agree publicly. It is an important declaration that may, nonetheless, disappear in public consciousness because it will be effectively stereotyped and dismissed as an irrelevant screed of the extreme religious right.
The inspiration and one of the writers of the statement was my friend Chuck Colson, whom I served as chief of staff and public relations counsel for many years. He didn’t ask me about the content of the Manhattan Declaration or the public relations aspects of its release. After the fact, I will offer my unsolicited critique: I enthusiastically agree with the former and have concerns about the latter.
I found the declaration to be wonderfully expressed and unemotionally solid. I’ve added my name to the online signers and I hope we see far more than the goal of one million signatures. (168,000 have signed in the first week). If you share these convictions, be sure to go to the site and add your name.
The fact that many of us are tired of contending for the same issues over and over makes little difference as to whether we as a church should continue. As the statement makes clear, we must continue as a matter of conscience. However, we are most powerful not in our not in a call to arms, but a call to knees; not culture war but personal sacrifice. The statement is superior to previous efforts because it shows more humility, more context, and a more diverse group of signers.
I was encouraged by this statement in the Preamble:
While the whole scope of Christian moral concern, including a special concern for the poor and vulnerable, claims our attention, we are especially troubled that in our nation today the lives of the unborn, the disabled, and the elderly are severely threatened; that the institution of marriage, already buffeted by promiscuity, infidelity and divorce, is in jeopardy of being redefined to accommodate fashionable ideologies; that freedom of religion and the rights of conscience are gravely jeopardized by those who would use the instruments of coercion to compel persons of faith to compromise their deepest convictions
On life issues, the writers were wise to indict both political parties:
Our commitment to the sanctity of life is not a matter of partisan loyalty, for we recognize that in the thirty-six years since Roe v. Wade, elected officials and appointees of both major political parties have been complicit in giving legal sanction to what Pope John Paul II described as "the culture of death." We call on all officials in our country, elected and appointed, to protect and serve every member of our society, including the most marginalized, voiceless, and vulnerable among us.
I found this to a great statement on abortion because it acknowledges our responsibility to the unborn and the born, to mother and child alike.
We will be united and untiring in our efforts to roll back the license to kill that began with the abandonment of the unborn to abortion. We will work, as we have always worked, to bring assistance, comfort, and care to pregnant women in need and to those who have been victimized by abortion, even as we stand resolutely against the corrupt and degrading notion that it can somehow be in the best interests of women to submit to the deliberate killing of their unborn children. Our message is, and ever shall be, that the just, humane, and truly Christian answer to problem pregnancies is for all of us to love and care for mother and child alike.
On marriage:
The drafters took the most care to construct its position on same-sex marriage. It was refreshing to read the contention that same-sex marriage is a symptom rather than the cause of the erosion of marriage, and its arguments for a restoration of a strong culture of marriage aside as foundation for the opposition to same-sex marriage.
Its strongest paragraphs:
We confess with sadness that Christians and our institutions have too often scandalously failed to uphold the institution of marriage and to model for the world the true meaning of marriage. Insofar as we have too easily embraced the culture of divorce and remained silent about social practices that undermine the dignity of marriage we repent, and call upon all Christians to do the same.
To strengthen families, we must stop glamorizing promiscuity and infidelity and restore among our people a sense of the profound beauty, mystery, and holiness of faithful marital love. We must reform ill-advised policies that contribute to the weakening of the institution of marriage, including the discredited idea of unilateral divorce. We must work in the legal, cultural, and religious domains to instill in young people a sound understanding of what marriage is, what it requires, and why it is worth the commitment and sacrifices that faithful spouses make.
The impulse to redefine marriage in order to recognize same-sex and multiple partner relationships is a symptom, rather than the cause, of the erosion of the marriage culture. It reflects a loss of understanding of the meaning of marriage as embodied in our civil and religious law and in the philosophical tradition that contributed to shaping the law. Yet it is critical that the impulse be resisted, for yielding to it would mean abandoning the possibility of restoring a sound understanding of marriage and, with it, the hope of rebuilding a healthy marriage culture.
We acknowledge that there are those who are disposed towards homosexual and polyamorous conduct and relationships, just as there are those who are disposed towards other forms of immoral conduct. We have compassion for those so disposed; we respect them as human beings possessing profound, inherent, and equal dignity; and we pay tribute to the men and women who strive, often with little assistance, to resist the temptation to yield to desires that they, no less than we, regard as wayward. We stand with them, even when they falter. We, no less than they, are sinners who have fallen short of God's intention for our lives. We, no less than they, are in constant need of God’s patience, love and forgiveness. We call on the entire Christian community to resist sexual immorality, and at the same time refrain from disdainful condemnation of those who yield to it.
On civil disobedience: The willingness to sacrifice freedom for convictions set this apart from previous efforts. It is not so much combative as confessional as it draws on the writings of Martin Luther King, Jr.:
Going back to the earliest days of the church, Christians have refused to compromise their proclamation of the gospel. In Acts 4, Peter and John were ordered to stop preaching. Their answer was, "Judge for yourselves whether it is right in God's sight to obey you rather than God. For we cannot help speaking about what we have seen and heard." Through the centuries, Christianity has taught that civil disobedience is not only permitted, but sometimes required. There is no more eloquent defense of the rights and duties of religious conscience than the one offered by Martin Luther King, Jr., in his Letter from a Birmingham Jail. Writing from an explicitly Christian perspective, and citing Christian writers such as Augustine and Aquinas, King taught that just laws elevate and ennoble human beings because they are rooted in the moral law whose ultimate source is God Himself. Unjust laws degrade human beings. Inasmuch as they can claim no authority beyond sheer human will, they lack any power to bind in conscience. King's willingness to go to jail, rather than comply with legal injustice, was exemplary and inspiring.
Because we honor justice and the common good, we will not comply with any edict that purports to compel our institutions to participate in abortions, embryo-destructive research, assisted suicide and euthanasia, or any other anti-life act; nor will we bend to any rule purporting to force us to bless immoral sexual partnerships, treat them as marriages or the equivalent, or refrain from proclaiming the truth, as we know it, about morality and immorality and marriage and the family. We will fully and ungrudgingly render to Caesar what is Caesar's. But under no circumstances will we render to Caesar what is God's.
What Manhattan Lacks
What was introduced as a manifesto, and received great coverage in conservative media, would have had far greater impact in wider circles if it had been more strategically framed and communicated. Chuck Colson knows how to gain support for a cause, and his fingerprints are all over this project, but it has the feel of a project that needed another month of work; not so much the content of the statement, but the planning and implementation of its release.
1. It lacks proper inter-church framing: More should have been made of the fact that charter signatories included nine Roman Catholic archbishops and the primate of the Orthodox Church in America, as well as many other Catholics and Orthodox. Together with some of the “bishops” of the evangelical church, this is truly remarkable and should be further trumpeted as a historical coalition of church leaders. The only framing came from Laurie Goodstein, who say this as “an effort to rejuvenate the political alliance of conservative Catholics and evangelicals that dominated the religious debate during the administration of President George W. Bush.” If we do not frame our intentions and actions, good journalists such as Goodstein will do it for us.
2. It lacks evangelical community framing: The statement is being positioned as an effort of the religious right; but that is a simplification. Charter signatories included Ron Sider, perhaps the dean of the evangelical left, as well as others who are rarely seen as solidly in the right camp: Peter Kreeft, Tim Keller, and David Neff. These leaders should have been highlighted, and far more leaders in the evangelical middle and left could have been recruited to sign this statement, strengthening its appeal.
3. It lacks prominent women. The signatories include women (although not many), but it did not feature them at the press conference or as spokespersons. Women should have been in the vanguard; they are valuable to these causes; and could insulate the effort, particularly on the abortion issue.
4. It lacks young leaders. Where are the young people who should have been charter signatories? As my colleague Jonathan Merritt wrote in Newsweek: [The signers] “Included no notable evangelicals under 40. Perhaps this was mere oversight but it is one that will be both notable and damaging. Had this effort been a multigenerational one, it would have been inspiring and meaningful in a way that a declaration with the intent to "educate" is not, regardless of its sincerity.”
5. It’s too long. The tragedy of this declaration is that it will be not be read and it will be distilled—as are most messages in our society—to status updates and sound bites, and snide summaries by those who haven’t read its contentions. The statement is masterfully written, moderated and nuanced where it is should be, and powerful in important places. The news release championed the 4,700 words; the problem is that this will take 168 tweets to communicate its contents.
6. There was already a Manhattan Declaration—on climate change, no less. A Google search would have avoided that little problem.
One evangelical friend’s intemperate comment: “We need to speak against this blather.” Did this friend read the statement or just the headlines?
The Manhattan Declaration is an important statement for these times, but it should not define the whole of Christian mission. No Christian can look the other way as life and marriage are threatened, but no Christian should be focused only on these two issues.
Jim Jewell
Managing Partner
Rooftop MediaWorks
President Lincoln's Thanksgiving Proclamation (1863)
The year that is drawing towards its close, has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from which they come, others have been added, which are of so extraordinary a nature, that they cannot fail to penetrate and soften even the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever watchful providence of Almighty God.
In the midst of a civil war of unequalled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign States to invite and to provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has prevailed everywhere except in the theatre of military conflict; while that theatre has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies of the Union.
Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields of peaceful industry to the national defence, have not arrested the plough, the shuttle, or the ship; the axe had enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege and the battle-field; and the country, rejoicing in the consciousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years, with large increase of freedom.
No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy. It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and voice by the whole American people.
I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to his tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquillity and Union.
In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand, and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed. Done at the city of Washington, this third day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the independence of the United States the eighty-eighth.
By The President: Abraham Lincoln
Leaders of the Evangelical Generation #47 Phil Vischer
[I am working on a project that may become a book on the most influential evangelicals leaders of our generation, since 1976, and the impact they've had on the church and their times. I will introduce them briefly on this blog from time to time].
#47 Phil Vischer. Cartoonist. b.1966
Primary among the recognized responsibilities of the parents, teachers and, and story tellers of every generation is to educate and socialize their children, and to explain their understanding of the meaning of life, the virtues and truths of their faith, and the principles necessary to thrive in this world and to grasp the hand of the God who transcends time.
Since 1993, one of the principal communicators of religious culture to the children of the nation has not been huge organizations such as Awana Clubs or Child Evangelism Fellowship, the home school movement, or even the Sunday schools, but Bob the Tomato, Larry the Cucumber, and their vegetable cohorts at Veggie Tales—the creations of a bright but quirky Bible college dropout from southeast Iowa, Phil Vischer.
This may seem like an overstatement, but rarely has a line of programs or products dominated a field as thoroughly as Veggie Tales shorts and films (now more than 31) did the children’s religious education/entertainment since 1993.
Christianity Today reported:
“Before the singing vegetables of VeggieTales hit the scene, there had never been a Christian video series that sold 25 million copies. There had never ever been a fully computer-animated feature (Pixar's Toy Story was still two years away). And there had never ever, ever been Christian-produced entertainment so funny and smart that viewers did not realize they were receiving moral instruction.”
Veggie Tales was introduced to the world as productions of Big Idea, founded in 1989 by Vischer and his college firend, Mike Nawrocki. The company officially launched in 1993 with its first Video, Where's God When I'm S-Scared?.
Vischer was born and raised in the southeast Iowa rivertown, Muscatine, the second of three children of a prestigious but tormented Christian family. His paternal grandfather was a founder of the Bandag tire company based in Muscatine, and his maternal grandfather the longtime director of the Okoboji Lakes Bible and Missionary Conference (Christian and Missionary Alliance). His mother is a professor at Wheaton College. Phil tells his personal story in Me, Myself & Bob.
I spent my middle and high school years living across the street from the Vischer family, and Phil’s parents were my youth group leaders at Mulford Evangelical Free Church. I remember young Phil, 12 years my junior, as Flip--a longtime nickname he was happy to abandon as he grew older. When Phil began making films, those of us who knew him well were not at all surprised by the off-beat humor or cartoonish voices. They were simply an outgrowth of Phil’s persona. Our only surprise was how rapidly Veggie Tales exploded in the Christian marketplace (not surprised because the products were poor but because, as Jesus found, a prophet is without honor in his hometown).
The discussion of creating culture and penetrating existing cultural forms is often a heady exercise of sociologists and missiologists. But for at least a brief and shining moment, they were led by vegetables named Bob and Larry.
With a danger of oversimplifying, it may be safe to say that Vischer found maintaining a large production company took different skills than creative great stories and characters. In 2005 Big Idea was sold as it faced bankruptcy and a distribution lawsuit. Veggie Tales lives on and Vischer still works with the company on a contract basis, writing scripts and performing many of the voices for new Veggie Tales productions. He has also started a new creative shop called Jellyfish Labs.
The First Ten PR Secrets for Non-Profits: #3 Be Relevant
When you engage in public relations as a non-profit organization, every move must be strategic and thoughtful. The road to visibility can be long and arduous, and there is nothing more important than your integrity and your reputation. For more than three decades, we have been providing counsel and service to organizations and public figures in the Christian and non-profit sectors. We’ll unfold ten things we’ve learned.
#3 Be Relevant
Not everyone can be involved in hurricane relief or aid in a war zone, or connect to the latest technological wonder, but no one in ministry should go about business as if the hurricanes and wars don’t happen and people aren’t fascinated by techology. If it is to be a go-to source of information, an organization must stay in tune with the topics in the nation's headlines and the buzz in the national conversation.
In addition to making you a more viable media source, this is certainly important for program relevance, and also to help you present your story to your constituency. Connections between your story and current news must be true and plausible--the tie-in cannot appear to be forced. But remember that the more relevant, the more likely there will be interest, coverage, and support.
So stay in touch with the world unfolding around you and describe how you relate to it. Connect your work with issues, problems, and cultural signposts that are already capturing the attention of the people important to you.
Jim Jewell
The Evangelical Generation: It Hasn't Led to Decline
[I am working on a project that may become a book on the most influential evangelicals leaders of our generation, since 1976, and the impact they've had on the church and their times. I will introduce them briefly on this blog from time to time. Here are some thoughts on what remains after a generation of evangelical prominence].
Reports of Our Death Exaggerated
Don’t believe what you hear about the decline of the evangelicals.
There isn’t a more potent force in American life and society than active, believing evangelical Christians, marked by their vibrant faith, clear expression of their beliefs, biblically informed habits, and selfless and life-altering ministries. Where can you find these believers? They’re everywhere–in every town; nearly on every block. Their numbers are increasing and their involvement in all aspects of national life and policy is growing and morphing and infiltrating like a viral storm.
Are evangelicals in decline, as posited by Rodney Clapp in Christian Century? He writes:
Evangelicalism is in] deep trouble because it faces a significant cultural and generational shift. Identifying itself with the wedge tactics of the political right, which is now falling (at least for a time) out of power, the movement cannot easily shake the image of being primarily negative and destructive. Indicators show that it is losing attractiveness not only among unconverted fellow Americans, but among its own young.
More significantly, evangelicalism is in deep trouble because the gospel really is good news, and reactionaries are animated by bad news, by that which they stand against. Undoubtedly Jesus Christ faced and even provoked conflict. But he embraced conflict as a path or means to the health and liberation—the salvation—of the world. And he hoped for salvation even, perhaps especially, for his enemies. If evangelicalism is innately reactionary, then it can follow Christ only by being born again.
Clapp pretends that the evangelical church is the same as the vocal evangelical politic whose public voice has been dominated by its most conservative leaders. As a former senior writer at Christianity Today, he knows better; but the feigned confusion serves his purposes here.
The faithful and vibrant American Christian church that is evangelical in its beliefs, either as defined by Barna or by Gallup is very different from the evangelical politic. While the two configurations align theologically and indeed in some key areas of public concern [Clapp calls them wedge issues], they are very different and the thriving church at worship, at life, and in service transcends and routinely ignores the residents in the White House and on Capitol Hill.
I have learned in 31 years consulting with Christian ministries and causes that while many activists wish that local evangelical churches and their members would be politically active, the vast majority of them are not. Although they vote in high numbers, evangelical Christians are not particularly political and their churches rarely use facilities and services to advance any political positions.
I know this is extremely difficult to believe for people whose understanding of evangelicals comes only from media, which portray evangelicals as heavily involved in partisan and issue politics.
There are evangelicals who are very active in politics. My wife, Debbie, and I have been quite active in partisan and cause-related political action. But we are the exception, and friends and family often turn to us for readings on the political environment. Our level of political involvement is extremely rare among our church friends and our strongly evangelical families.
The levers of institutional power and notably the microphones and gateways of communication of the evangelical politic have been controlled by politically oriented conservative evangelicals for some time (often to good effect, in my opinion, but certainly not always).
The power of these leaders is waning as they age—many are in the 70s and 80s–and as the next two generations begin to be heard. These new generations are open to many new areas of public concern, and yes they are generally more open to at least a new tone on issues such as gay rights. I agree that if the NAE board was dominated by one generation removed from the present leadership, Rich Cizik would still be working the halls of power for the association.
But to suggest that young evangelicals are politically and socially to the left of their forebears on most issues is wishful thinking by those who would benefit from that shift. It’s much more complex than that, and on abortion, polls show that young evangelicals are more pro-life than their parents.
While young evangelicals are more concerned about the environment than the previous generation, this is hardly a swing to the left. As I have said previously, a green evangelical does not a liberal make.
For a number of years the public relations firm I was with represented Jerry Falwell as public relations counsel. We saw over and over how Falwell was featured and interviewed by mainstream media about topics on which he clearly was not the most qualified evangelical spokesman. Jerry never met a microphone he didn’t love, and media loved to portray him as the face and voice of American evangelicals.
Of course he wasn’t, nor are many of the current common voices of the evangelical politic. But they are presented as such, even as writers such as Clapp portray their declining influence as evangelical decline.
In the recent national survey that found a decline in the number of people who call themselves Christian, the reach of evangelical belief spread. One in three people in the country now consider themselves to be evangelical Christians. But note the following from the study itself (I couldn’t find this in any media reports)–
[The study] “reveals the dimensions of a significant trend in “belief” among the 76 percent of contemporary Americans who identify as Christians. These respondents were specifically asked “Do you identify as a Born Again or Evangelical Christian?” No definition was offered of the terms, which are usually associated with a “personal relationship” with Jesus Christ together with a certain view of salvation, scripture, and missionary work. As the table shows, 45 percent of all American Christians now self-identify in this manner and they account for 34 percent of the total national adult population. What is significant is the recent spread of Evangelicalism well beyond Christians affiliated with those groups that are members of the National Evangelical Association so that millions of Mainliners and Catholics now identify with this trend.”
The CNN story on the study said:
The survey also found that “born-again” or “evangelical” Christianity is on the rise, while the percentage who belong to “mainline” congregations such as the Episcopal or Lutheran churches has fallen. One in three Americans consider themselves evangelical, and the number of people associated with mega-churches has skyrocketed from less than 200,000 in 1990 to more than 8 million in the latest survey.
If there is national evangelical leadership, it has shifted to the megachurches, but it is largely pastoral, not political.
Certainly, all is not well. There is work to do on the image of evangelical Christians, as explored by Gabe Lyons and Dave Kinnamen in UnChristian. Their introduction:
Christians are supposed to represent Christ to the world. But according to the latest report card, something has gone terribly wrong. Using descriptions like “hypocritical,” “insensitive,” and “judgmental,” young Americans share an impression of Christians that’s nothing short of . . . unChristian.
Groundbreaking research into the perceptions of sixteen- to twenty-nine-year-olds reveals that Christians have taken several giant steps backward in one of their most important assignments. The surprising details of the study, commissioned by Fermi Project and conducted by The Barna Group, are presented with uncompromising honesty in unChristian.
But those who follow Christianity closely know that the true heartbeat of evangelicalism isn’t behind microphones or plying the halls of Congress. If you pay attention, you hear the heartbeat of evangelicalism:
• In the villages of Angola, where Christians involved with Living Waters International have provided clean water to thousands of people in recent years in a country where 56 percent of the people don’t have clear water.
• In an abandoned building that now serves as a school and clinic for rescued child soldier girls just north of Gulu, northern Africa, where young woman and their babies born in captivity are given the basic building blocks of new lives they never thought they’d see by a group of Christians operating under the name ChildVoice International.
• In a series of gers—round teepee-like structures—in northern Mongolia, where Christians in a group called LifeQwest houses hundreds of orphans that they swept off the brutally frigid streets of Mongolian cities to literally save their lives and give a future vision to children of an ancient people.
• In the homes of staggering Atlanta neighborhoods, where Christians in the Charis Community Housing group help families purchase and care for homes in ways that will help them recover from the foreclosure crisis that has hit the inner cities far worse than the cushy suburbs.
• In a large churchyard garden in Boise, Idaho, where a retired Christian farmer helps dozens of church volunteers grow fruits and vegetables, “producing and giving away over 20,000 lbs. of produce, feeding approximately 1281 families, representing around 4108 individuals.”
• At an unimpressive building on New York Avenue in Washington, D.C., Christians at The Salvation Army’s Harbor Light Center take in down-and-out drug addicts and rather than just getting them off drugs, they get them into a new relationship with Jesus Christ—and the recidivism rates are dramatically better than run of the mill recovery centers.
The heart of American evangelicalism beats in places and ministries such as these, and hundreds and hundreds of thousands of other places in this country and around the world.
We see faithfulness in small group meetings in the homes of millions of Americans that are opening their Bibles and searching together for the way God wants them to live their lives. Yes, the heart beats in worship in churches blanketing the country—most small, 75-200 members, and in some very large. People eschewing an extra hour of sleep on Sunday morning to point to their Creator and give praise and to listen to a minister trying to help them in their walk with God.
Don’t believe that evangelicalism is fading. It’s changing to be more relevant to the problems of a new time, just as it has for millennia. And its political power rises and falls and stagnates. But bellicose commentators and lobbyists are not the church, and they never have been. Prescient observers know that. Many just won’t tell you.
Jim Jewell
Leaders of the Evangelical Generation #27: Bill McCartney. Man's Man
[I am working on a project that may become a book on the most influential evangelicals leaders of our generation, since 1976, and the impact they've had on the church and their times. I will introduce them briefly on this blog from time to time].
#27 Bill McCartney. Man’s Man. b.1940
In October 1997, well over a million Christian men crowded onto the Washington Mall to sing, pray and listen to inspirational and emotional charges to lead godly lives as fathers, husbands, and leaders. Promise Keepers’ Stand in the Gap (SITG), perhaps the largest religious gathering in American history, was a historic phenomenon and the high water mark of Promise Keepers and the career of its president, Bill McCartney.
There are millions of men and families who benefited from McCartney’s courage and the unwavering biblical teaching in the masculine stadium settings and from in–your-face teaching of the Promise Keepers stadium events. There had never been anything like 50,000 men gathering in a sports stadium to celebrate their faith and hear hard teachings about the way they should lead their lives as Christian men. SITG was the culmination of these events; like 100 stadium events at once.
In many ways, Bill McCartney was the personification of PK, and its dramatic history is a reflection of the red-hot persona of the former high-level football coach and his stubborn single-mindedness. The heights to which the PK movement soared and the speed of its ascent may be without parallel, the drama of which is matched only by its nearly total collapse within two years of the Washington gathering.
Promise Keepers is a symbol of evangelical conquest of one of its greatest problems—the failure to reach and persuade men—and a sad symbol of bad management based on careless theology.
A few days before the great SITG gathering, I took Bill McCartney to Washington television studios to do network television interviews, including a memorable time at ABC News. The sheer size of SITG made it impossible for media to ignore, although they were clearly inclined to dismiss a religious gathering on the Mall, where dozens of groups hold large rallies every year. Since McCartney was the straight-talking founder of the group and a former coach of the national champion Colorado football team, there was strong interest in interviewing him.
One interview was on ABC Nightline with Ted Koppel, which was taped in the afternoon and aired at late night. While the interview was fine and fair, the memorable part of the visit was prior to the taping. We arrived well in advance of the interview and we were relaxing in the comfortable chairs of the green room. McCartney was reading his Bible when Koppel entered the room and greeted us warmly. “What are you reading?” Koppel asked, and McCartney reviewed the passage that he was studying. Koppel listened thoughtfully, then added: “Let me share with you a little of my daily reading in the Torah.” At which point he pulled a copy of the scripture from his briefcase, read a few passages and had a brief discussion with McCartney about spiritual truths.
I’d taken Christian leaders into hundreds of news offices and green rooms over the years, and I’d never had a mainstream news anchor sit for a personal discussion, open the scripture and discuss spiritual things. I’d always found Koppel to be a serious, fair, quality newsman. This experience gave me a new level of respect.
It was part of a remarkable week in Washington for McCartney, Promise Keepers, and the evangelical movement in America.
Jim Jewell
Leaders of the Evangelical Generation: #4 Bill Bright
[I am working on a project that may become a book on the most influential evangelicals leaders of our generation, since 1976, and the impact they've had on the church and their times. I will introduce them briefly on this blog from time to time].
#4 Bill Bright. Evangelist (1921-2003)
The call came into the public relations firm late one afternoon in early 1999, and although Campus Crusade was not my account, the account executive wasn’t in, and I was the ranking executive on duty, so I took the “important call from Crusade.” The director of communications, our contact, was on the line; he breathlessly asked me to hold for Dr. Bright.
Campus Crusade founder and president Bill Bright was on a mission. As the end of the millennium loomed, he was increasingly burdened with the challenge to bring millions more people to faith in Christ. While it seemed as though every church and Christian group in the world had a campaign to fulfill the Great Commission before 2000, Bright also had a personal plan.
“Let’s find Noah’s Ark,” Bright said, and I stammered some agreeable words, uncertain of what he actually meant. He meant just that. His conviction was that the people in the villages of Turkey knew the whereabouts of the remnants of the ark; all we needed to do what make it worth it to them to tell us. Bright had decided that we’d run ads in the major newspapers of Turkey and offer $1 million to the person who would provide us with inconvertible evidence of the ark’s location and remnants.
Bright had the same reason for this long shot scheme that compelled him through decades as head of Campus Crusade—to provide evidence that would bring millions of people to faith in Jesus Christ. He figured that if we could provide failsafe modern evidence of one of the Bible’s best know stories, it would convince skeptics around the world that the Bible is an accurate historical record. And that would result in their trust of Scripture and their commitment to the biblical Jesus.
And so we did. Our PR firm was the only contact because Bill Bright and Campus Crusade were to remain anonymous. We wrote and designed a compelling ad with the help of our friends at The Puckett Group, who found a Turkish translator and tapped into the international advertising services necessary to place ads in the newspapers of Turkey.
This earnest effort brought drawers full of packages with long descriptions of places and proofs, with grainy pictures and even video. We couldn’t produce any more certainty than many other teams of filmmakers and authors and researchers could throughout the centuries. The project deadline arrived without conclusive evidence and all that remained to be done was to continue writing polite responses to dozens of wishful treasure hunters in Turkish villages for months that followed.
Perhaps the best result was another glimpse into the hopeful and sincere heart of one of evangelicalism’s most energetic and respected champions of mass evangelism. Bill Bright introduced not only the massive college evangelism effort, Campus Crusade, but also tools and campaigns that—although sometimes derided as simplistic and incomplete—nonetheless brought millions of people to Christ. These campaigns became pervasive symbols of evangelical marketing of the time—such as the Four Spiritual Laws (1965), the I Found It campaign (1976), and The Jesus Film (1979).
Bright, born in Coweta, Oklahoma, described himself as being a "happy pagan" in his youth. He graduated from Northeastern State University in Tahlequah, Oklahoma with an economics degree. In 1944, while attending the First Presbyterian Church, Hollywood, Bright became a Christian. He immediately began intensive biblical studies which led him to graduate studies at Princeton and Fuller Theological Seminaries. It was while he was a student at Fuller that he felt what he regarded as the call of God to help fulfill Christ's Great Commission (Matthew 28:19) by sharing his faith, beginning with students at UCLA. This gave birth to the Campus Crusade for Christ movement.
During the decades to follow, Bill Bright and his wife, Vonette, remained faithful to this work, and the ministry expanded greatly. Campus Crusade now has more than 27,000 full-time staff and over 225,000 trained volunteer staff in 190 countries.
The First Ten PR Secrets for Non-Profits: #2 Be Different
When you engage in public relations as a non-profit organization, every move must be strategic and thoughtful. The road to visibility can be long and arduous, and there is nothing more important than your reputation. For more than three decades, we have been providing counsel and service to organizations and public figures in the Christian and non-profit sectors. We’ll unfold ten things we’ve learned. Today: #2 Be Different.
#2 Be Different
A crucial question that you need to ask yourself is: “What sets us apart?” Why would an individual be involved with our organization instead of someone else doing similar things, or similarly laudable things? Why would media take note of us instead of someone else? What would a volunteer, a donor, or a reporter say is unique about our organization?
A term coined by a popular marketing book was “differentiate or die.” In the consumer world they call this unique element the unique selling proposition (USP). Non-profits need to create a unique proposition, as well, and although you are not selling products, you are persuading people to your cause or position. To gain the right to do so, you will often need to show a very busy public why they should listen to you rather than someone else.
Jim Jewell
Leaders of the Evangelical Generation: #8 W. Stanley Mooneyham
[I am working on a project that may become a book on the most influential evangelicals leaders of our generation, since 1976, and the impact they've had on the church and their times. I will introduce them briefly on this blog from time to time].
#8 W. Stanley Mooneyham: Humanitarian. 1926-1991
With today’s ubiquitous calls for Christians to respond to human needs around the world, it is difficult to remember the days when evangelicals didn’t see the connection between physical and spiritual needs in a holistic outreach. W. Stanley Mooneyham was a giant in moving the church to “come walk the world” and respond to the great needs of body and soul.
Mooneyham was a passionate maverick who, as the second president of World Vision International after its founder Bob Pierce, became an advocate for international aid and the first real star of television fundraising for the hungry and suffering children and families of the world. During his tenure, Mooneyham took the organization from an annual budget of $7 million in 1969 to $158 million with a worldwide staff of 11,000 when he left.
He really gave his life serving the poor. The ravages of the diseases he encountered in constants trips to the cesspools of the most impoverished areas of the world led to the failure of his kidneys in 1991, when he died at 65. The trauma and lure of almost constant international travel, as well as the emotional roller coaster of a life spent immersed in Southern California hedonism and Third World squalor, took a toll on not only his health but also his family. His marriage ended about the same time his days with World Vision did.
During Mooneyham's tenure as president, he directed the relocation efforts that helped Vietnamese boat people. It was an involvement typical of his time at World Vision. He was advised not to pursue the venture, which he called Operation Seasweep, and there was no place to take the boat people rescued on the high seas. But Stan threw caution to the wind, bought a World War II landing craft, outfitted it, and sent it to the South China Sea.
That’s when I met Mooneyham. In 1978 I was beginning my first job, as a writer for World Vision, and in after just seven months on the job I was sent to Asia to document the maiden voyage of Operation Seasweep. I hadn’t met Mooneyham during my early months at WV, but he wasn’t about to have me writing about the mission without a good talking-to.
When I arrived in Singapore, I was summoned to Stan’s hotel, where he lectured me on treating the poor and suffering with respect. And he didn’t want my copy filled with wonder at how “different” these people were.
That year, we rescued 228 Vietnamese boat people from the Thai pirates and the deathly surges of the high seas. Within two years, the world was shamed by the boldness of World Vision’s leader and the U.S. Navy was picking up these refugees.
Mooneyham was a special assistant to Billy Graham before joining World Vision. He was one of the first practitioner of telethons and direct-mail campaigns to raise funds and was not afraid to use emotional appeals. Responding to criticism of his methods in 1978, Mooneyham said: "We are accused of emotionalism, but hunger is emotional, death is emotional and poverty is emotional. Those who wish to make it all seem neat, clinical and bureaucratic are the ones falsifying the picture, not us."
Mooneyham was the seventh child of a cotton sharecropper in Mississippi. He joined the Navy and served in the South Pacific during World War II. He told The Times in a 1981 interview that he became a Christian because of the war. He graduated from Oklahoma Baptist University on the GI Bill. Mooneyham joined the Graham evangelical crusades as a media liaison worker in 1964 and became advance planner for Graham evangelism congresses around the world. It was in some of those foreign lands that he saw what he described as "the awesome human needs" and joined World Vision.
Jim Jewell
The First Ten PR Secrets for Non-Profits
When you engage in public relations as a non-profit organization, every move must be strategic and thoughtful. The road to visibility can be long and arduous, and there is nothing more important than your reputation. For more than three decades, we have been providing counsel and service to organizations and public figures in the Christian and non-profit sectors. We’ll unfold ten things we’ve learned. Today: #1. Be One Thing.
#1 Be One Thing
Most organizations at their birth have a shining new idea and a vision for changing the world. A solution that people are willing to get behind. The founders seek to right a wrong.
Far too often, success in the journey toward that vision breeds branches in the road.
The first principle of successful non-profit public relations is to Be One Thing. Remain focused on one product, mission, ministry, or cause. We have found that the same impulses and drives that cause a visionary to begin and develop an organization often lead that founder to expand the non-profit brand by addressing additional areas of need.
This isn’t unique to the non-profit world, of course. Companies with some of the most successful consumer brands have tried to use the brand equity not just to increase the product’s market share, but also to expand what the brand represents.
Brand extension is the enemy of clear and strong identity, whether it happens at a mission or with a consumer product.
Watch for #2.
Jim Jewell
FRC Testimony to the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission
By Robert Schwarzwalder
Senior Vice President
Family Research Council
November 12, 2009
Co-Chairmen McGovern and Wolf, Congressman Smith and Members of the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission, thank you for allowing the Family Research Council to submit testimony on China’s human rights record.
In one sense, it is difficult to know where to begin. The catalog of China’s human rights abuses is so extensive that to highlight only several areas is to imply that the others are less significant. This is not the case.
Since the Maoist take-over of mainland China in 1949, tens of millions have perished under the wheel of totalitarian Communism. The exact number is difficult to quantify, but conservative estimates place the number into the 40 millions; the actual number may exceed 100 million.
We cannot truly mourn these losses without working actively to prevent additional brutality in our time. For that reason, Family Research Council will highlight two aspects of the Chinese government’s long pattern of inhumane treatment toward its own citizens that are of particular relevance to the work and ministry of our organization: its ongoing persecution of Christian believers and China’s “one child,” coercive
abortion policy.
The most authoritative study now available indicates that as of 2008, there are roughly 40 million Protestants and 14 million Catholics living in China. Of the latter number, about 10 million worship in churches not recognized by Beijing due to the Communist government’s antagonism toward Rome. Of the Protestants, substantial numbers worship in “unregistered” house churches. 1
What is the fate of these faithful men and women, productive citizens who want only to worship according to their consciences and in fidelity to the mandates of their faiths? Consider a small selection of the findings of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, a bi-partisan federal agency, in its 2009 annual report on China:
In May 2008, the Beijing Police raided the unregistered Shouwang Church and ordered the members to leave and stop meeting. The Shouwang Church has tried to register with the local government, but their application has been denied repeatedly because their clergy was not trained by the officially recognized Christian association. Unregistered Catholic priest Wang Zhong was sentenced to three years imprisonment for organizing a July ceremony at a new church that was legally registered with the government. Provincial authorities in Sichuan also interfered with the humanitarian activities sponsored by unregistered house church Protestants following the May 2008 earthquake. Two Protestants from Henan Province were detained and questioned about their efforts to help earthquake victims; they were held for about a week and ordered to pay a hefty fine for engaging in illegal religious activity. 2
As the Members of this panel know, lengthy books could be written about individual cases of religious persecution by the Chinese government. These not only clearly violate international accords of which China is a signatory, but more profoundly they do injustice to men and women of all ages, some quite young, others very elderly, whose only crime is to believe in the Creator of life and desire to worship Him according to biblical lights.
With respect to China’s “one child” birth policy, the three decades-old policy – euphemistically called “strategic family planning” – has resulted in untold numbers of coerced abortions, many on late-term unborn babies, and now by the Chinese government’s own admission, “there are 37 million more males than females now in China. Within the 0 - 15 year age group, there are 18 million more boys than girls.”
The massiveness of China’s forced abortion policy and its sheer brutality has not discouraged the Communist government from sustaining it. According to recent comments by Zhang Weiqing, minister of the National Population and Family Planning Commission, “The current family planning policy, formed as a result of gradual changes in the past two decades, has proved compatible with national conditions. So it has to be kept unchanged at this time to ensure stable and balanced population growth.” 4
Sadly, President Obama has chosen to waive the historic Kemp-Kasten prohibition that denies federal funding to organizations or programs that “support or participate in the management of a program of coercive abortion or involuntary sterilization” and provide $50 million to the United Nations Family Planning Fund, some of which will go to assist Chinese officials who will further facilitate compulsory contraception, forced abortions, and even prison terms for women who have more than one child. 5
“Nothing stamped with the Divine image and likeness was sent into the world to be trodden on,” said President Lincoln. This is the essential meaning of our Declaration of Independence, that God has created all of us equal and bestowed us with “certain unalienable rights,” the foremost among them the right to life.
This principle is true for Americans and Chinese alike, and should be reinstated as essential to America’s relationship with China’s government and its gruesome human rights policies.
Thank you again for giving the Family Research Council the opportunity to submit this testimony.
1 “Facts about Numbers of Christians in China,” Dr. Werner Burklin, www.gospelherald.net, Dec. 9, 2008
2 U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, 2009 Annual Report on the People’s Republic of China, p.5
3 “China has 37 million more males than females,” People’s Daily Online, July 10, 2007. www.english.people.com.cn
4 “China Sticking with One –Child Policy,” Jim Yardley, New York Times, March 11, 2008
5 “Conservatism's Future in Foreign Policy,” by Family Research Council Senior Fellow and former U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Human Rights Commission Ken Blackwell, The Washington Times, Sept. 9, 2009; FRC News Release, “FRC Commends Effort to Protect Pro-life Riders, Prevent Taxpayer Funded Abortions,” Feb. 25, 2009
Leaders of the Evangelical Generation #28: Millard Fuller
#28 Millard Fuller. Builder. 1935-2009
[I am working on a project that may become a book on the most influential evangelicals leaders of our generation, since 1976, and the impact they've had on the church and their times. I will introduce them briefly on this blog from time to time].
On February 17, 2009, I received a letter from heaven, and while it certainly seemed odd, it was the news that an old friend had died that shocked and saddened me. I grieved for the dear wife and family of a truly great man.
Millard Fuller, the founder of Habitat for Humanity and the Fuller Center for Housing, died Feb. 3 at the age of 74. It appears it was a heart attack, which was a surprise for a razor thin man of drive and energy. I didn’t see any news stories on his passing; perhaps you didn’t either.
I had sent Millard a letter about the new ministry we’re involved in called Flourish, an effort to energize Christian churches around the right priorities of creation care. He received my letter on January 27 and dictated a gracious response (remember when people routinely exchanged letters; how quaint). His secretary transcribed the letter and mailed it to me on February 5, with the notation: “dictated by Mr. Fuller and transcribed after his death.”
Our firm, Rooftop MediaWorks, worked with Millard and Linda Fuller soon after a late-in-life crisis, when Millard was forced out of his position as the leader of Habitat, the organization he and Linda had begun, by the board he had chosen. [When you spend much of your life in the public relations business, as I have, you often meet people at times of crisis.]
It was an ugly parting, and I first talked with Millard about it when I wrote a news piece for Christianity Today on the separation. My research left me troubled by the board’s rough treatment of Millard, so when I saw that he and Linda were continuing the ministry of providing low cost housing through a new organization, the Fuller Center for Housing, we offered to provide public relations services—which we did for the next several months, introducing the new group to the world.
When I learned yesterday of Millard’s passing in this odd and unexpected way, my first thought was that when he was pushed out of Habitat at the age of 70 he should have stepped back and enjoyed his accomplishments and bounced some grandkids on his knee. Maybe that would have prolonged his life. But instead he chose to continue serving people who suffered because of substandard housing. He believed in serving his God and his neighbors in this way, which he called the Theology of the Hammer.”
So Millard died, figuratively, with a hammer in his hand, and although his life could have been longer, I doubt that it could have been much richer.
People like Millard Fuller are great not because they are flawless or all-wise. Great people like Millard Fuller do great things by challenging themselves to do ever more, by motivating everyone in their path, and by trusting in a Greater God.
We owe Millard much and we do well to emulate him. At very least, in his honor we should pick up a hammer this year and help some folks who cannot help themselves.
That Beauty May Flourish
"We all have our own internal lists of what we call beautiful. My list would include my captivating wife, the bright eyes of my newborn daughter, the layered contours of a mountain range, the pulse and drama of a rocky shoreline, the power of a pounding waterfall, the bounty of a vegetable garden, the autumn explosion of a brilliant tree-lined lane, and even the sculpted, balanced architecture of a well-planned cityscape."
With new beauty about to be added to my life--the birth of a third daughter very, very soon--my further thoughts on beauty and the care of creation are featured today on the Flourish blog (they highlight thoughts from my one son, Michael).
Jim Jewell
The Evangelical Generation: 50 leaders who shaped a generation of evangelical influence
I'm writing material for a new project, which may turn into a book, exploring what I'm calling "The Evangelical Generation."
This will look at a generation of evangelical emergence and influence in American life, explored through the lives and public impact of individuals who I will identify as the country’s 50 most influential evangelicals from 1976 through the present.
The book will also cite the contributions of many churches, organizations and efforts that have helped define evangelical witness and presence during this generation, but have not had one of the 50 influencers at the helm. I’ll also include observations on some of the individuals who are likely to lead evangelicals in the generation to come.
I have met with, worked with, served as a public relations consultant, or been an employee of at least half of the 50 that I have provisionally identified for inclusion. On the list: Nine are deceased and at least 12 are over 70. The selection isn’t from a poll or a professional study—they are my choices based on many discussions and on my own experience working in the evangelical subculture since 1978. I have seen many of them in action through my positions at World Vision, Prison Fellowship, The Trinity Forum, The DeMoss Group, the Evangelical Climate Initiative, and Flourish, and at the public relations firm I have run since 2002, Rooftop MediaWorks. I’ve been a writer for Christianity Today and a regular observer and writer on the intersection of faith and culture.
And I can relate many firsthand experiences with many of these leaders, including forceful, poignant, and hilarious moments.
My thesis is that in terms of real church growth, spiritual influence, world impact, and cultural involvement, the generation since ‘76 is the most consequential evangelical generation in American history. My purpose is not to paint a rosy picture of evangelical leaders or exaggerate their influence, but to capture this impact on a generation that began in 1976, when Jimmy Carter presented himself as a born-again president and Chuck Colson’s book Born Again was among the best selling of all books that year. I hope to illuminate the personality of these extraordinary modern figures, highlight their strengths and idiosyncrasies, and explore their interplay with a changing American culture. The presentation of these 50 leaders will make the case that there has not been a more vibrant force or political influence on this generation than the evangelicals.
Who should be on the list?
Jim Jewell
Eating thankfully and mercifully this Thanksgiving
After watching an excellent overview of the intersection of faith and the humane treatment of animals called Eating Mercifully, produced by the Humane Society of America's Animals and Religion division, I'm beginning to examine how we can eat only meat that is raised humanely. It's hard work and it costs more. Watch the video and you'll try, too.
This all has me asking about what to do at the biggest meat treat of the year, the Thanksgiving meal. There are not many turkey producers who are treating their birds humanely. I found an article on one, marketed under the name POPS FARM. Looking for more.
Think hard about this one; watch the trailer; get the video. Start the journey.
Jim Jewell
SPEAKERS FROM DEVELOPING WORLD BRING INTERNATIONAL PERSPECTIVE TO CLIMATE CHANGE CONCERN
Restoring Eden’s ANKLE DEEP IN REALITY Tour Features Christian Leaders from Uganda, South Pacific
LA CENTER, WASH., Oct. 30, 2009 — Christian leaders from Uganda and the South Pacific will talk about impacts of climate change being experienced in their nations, as part of the Ankle Deep in Reality tour in six Midwest and Southeastern states, October 30-November 18, 2009.
The tour, sponsored by the Christian education and advocacy group Restoring Eden (www.restoringeden.org), features Rev. Tafue Molu Lausam, a Christian pastor and activist from the South Pacific island of Tuvalu, and Sara Kaweesa, who works with the Christian conversation group A-Rocha in Kampala, Uganda,
The tour will begin in Chicago on October30 and will include events at Christian colleges, seminaries and churches in Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, and Washington, D.C.
“The climate change policies of the industrialized nations are destroying innocent people elsewhere in the world, especially in the small low lying island countries in the Pacific,” said Rev. Lusama. “I must carry on this advocacy work to the global church until the world hears and decides on a positive, coherent and meaningful deal for stopping climate change and the tragic impacts that are threatening our very survival.”
Tentative Tour Schedule
Southeastern Tour
Nov. 3 Charleston, SC Church Event
Nov. 4 University of South Carolina
Nov. 5 Charleston Church Event
Nov. 6 Columbia, SC
Nov. 9 Eastern Mennonite Univ., Harrisonburg VA
Nov. 10 Duke Seminary, Durham, NC
Nov. 12 Vineyard church, Raleigh, NC
Nov. 17 Washington, D.C.
Midwestern Tour
Oct. 30t Wheaton College Wheaton, IL
Oct. 31 Goshen College, Goshen, IN
Nov. 1 Christ United Methodist Church, Dayton/Kettering, OH
Nov. 2 Columbus Vineyard, Columbus, OH
Nov. 3 Taylor University, Upland, IN
Nov. 4 Valparaiso College, Valparaiso, IN
Nov. 5 Huntington College, Huntington, IN
Nov. 6 Calvin College, Grand Rapids, MI
Nov. 8 Ann Arbor Vineyard,Ann Arbor ,MI
Nov. 9 Notre Dame University, South Bend, IN
Nov. 10 Anderson College, Anderson, IN
Nov. 11 Ashland College, Ashland, OH
Nov. 12 Wilmington College, Wilmington, OH
Rev. Tafue Molu Lusama
Rev. Tafue Molu Lusama is from the island of Tuvalu in the South Pacific, was raised as a Christian, and earned his theology degree in Samoa. He pastored congregations throughout the South Pacific before becoming the program officer for Peace and Justice in 2002. As part of his position, Rev. Lusama studied in Taiwan for a Master of Arts in Religion, where he wrote a thesis on the theological perspectives of climate change. As part of his current advocacy work, Rev. Lusama established the Tuvalu Climate Action Network in 2006. As chairman, he represented Tuvalu in important negotiations in Kenya and Poland. In addition, Rev. Lusama has been appealing to the industrialized countries to consider Tuvalu’s very survival from their daily individual decisions to their political decisions.
Sara Kaweesa
Sara Kaweesa is based in Kampala Uganda, where she leads A-Rocha Uganda Initiative (ARUI), a Christian conservation organization. Sara earned a Masters of Science in Forestry in Vienna, Austria and holds certificates in climate change from outstanding agencies such as Tearfund, UNEP, Oxfam GB, IIED, IPC Denmark and a host of others. Sara travels throughout Uganda and Africa taking the message of creation stewardship to Bible colleges, pastors, elders, church congregations and to local communities in both rural and urban settings. She also works to help local people work as best they can to prepare for and mitigate the damage the changing climate is having upon their survival. Sara is also a lay pastor at the Makerere Full Gospel Church where she serves in the ladies ministry.
Peter Illyn/Restoring Eden
Rev. Peter Illyn is the executive director of Restoring Eden (www.restoringeden.org), a network of people working to become a grassroots movement within the church dedicated to encouraging faithful stewardship of the natural world as a biblical, moral, and wise value.
Raised in South Carolina as a Russian Orthodox, Peter Illyn graduated from Rhema Bible College where he earned credentials as an evangelical minister. He spent nine years serving as a pastor in Foursquare churches in Portland, Oregon and Yakima, Washington. Peter returned to school for an undergraduate degree in marketing. Upon graduation, as a sabbatical, Peter took two llamas on a four-month, 1,000 mile trek through the Cascades, which set the long-distance record for llama packing. According to Peter, “I went into the mountains an evangelical minister, but I came out an environmental activist. I believe God made a good earth and I am called to be a good steward; to protect the fruitfulness and connectedness of creation.” Peter worked as the Northwest representative for the Evangelical Environmental Network and for Target Earth before starting Restoring Eden in 2001. Restoring Eden, Illyn says, makes hearts bigger, hands dirtier, and voices stronger by encouraging Christians to learn to love, serve, and protect God's creation. The organization’s people are involved in nature appreciation, environmental stewardship, and public advocacy.
To interview Tafue Lusama, Sara Kaweesa, or Peter Illyn, contact Debbie Payton at dpayton3@msn.com; (770) 831-7572.
50 Million Christians--In India
Key Christian leaders in India are reaching their nation, according to the Billion Soul network. In the last 30 years, the Christian population has swelled from less than 24 million to almost 50 million people, at a rate of almost 400,000 new converts per month.
Billion Soul writes:
The Indian Church has some of the most faith-filled people in the world. They have taken ownership of the Great Commission and believe it is possible to finish it in this generation. These leaders have set a goal to plant more than 500,000 churches with more than 100 million people coming to Christ. We are watching before our eyes the emergence of the largest Christian community in the world—in India.
Global Conference for Unreached People Groups to Feature J. Hudson Taylor IV, Philip Jenkins
The Finish Line Conference at Church of God HQ, Oct. 27-28
ORLANDO, Fla., Oct. 15, 2009--J. Hudson Taylor IV, great grandson and namesake of the pioneering missionary to China, will head an impressive list of speakers at The Finish Line, a strategic conference on evangelism and church planting to be conducted at the Church of God World Headquarters in Cleveland, Tennessee, October 27-28, 2009. The conference will focus on the networking of church leaders in order to reach the "unreached people groups" throughout the world.
Philip Jenkins, Distinguished Professor of History and Religious Studies at Penn State University and author of The Rise of Global Christianity and The Next Christendom, is a featured speaker. Jenkins has received a great deal of attention for his recent work on the changing face of the church and the explosion of Christianity in the global south.
The conference is the second in The Finish Line series of summits. The first conference, in January 2006, brought together nearly 100 leaders to hear presentations by Elmer Towns, Jack Hayford, James Merritt, and David Mohan. The Finish Line series is guided by a five-point structure for building a strong network worldwide developed by Dr. Paul Walker, former Overseer of the Church of God: relationships, resources, research, recommendations, and reports.
Other presenter at the summit will include:
• Douglas LeRoy, the World Missions Director for Church of God, Cleveland, Tennessee
• Suliasi Kurulo, founder of World Harvest Centre in Suva, Fiji
• Raymond Culpepper, General Overseer of Church of God, Cleveland, Tennessee
• Alex Abraham, foremost expert on unreached peoples of India
• Alex Mitala, Chairman, New Birth Fellowship (20,000 churches), Kampala, Uganda.
• James O. Davis, Cofounder of Billion Soul Network
• Gustavo Crocker, Eurasia Director of the Church of the Nazarene, Switzerland
• Alexey Ledyaev, founder of New Generation Churches, Riga, Latvia
• David Sobrepeña, founding pastor Word of Hope, Manila, Philippines
This international summit is by invitation only. Candidates should contact the Billion Soul Network at events@Billion.tv
Media Note: To arrange an interview with conference organizers or speakers, contact Debbie Payton of Rooftop MediaWorks at dpayton3@msn.com or (404) 245-8500.
How Can I Say There is No God When All Around Creation Calls
"How can I say there is no God when all around creation calls," sings Brian Doersksen as you view amazing BBC Planet Earth footage in a video produced by The Branch Church in Texas.
Take a break; watch this video on the Flourish Blog. It's a worship experience; a visual and audio illustration of Romans 1:20.
Leading Evangelical Climate Change Critic Apologizes
Global warming denier and the lead evangelical debater on the topic apologized for extreme and distasteful promotional copy printed about his workshop at the Family Research Council Values Voter Summit this weekend.
Rusty Pritchard and I attended the workshop; Rusty writes about Cal Beisner's mea culpa (and his gracious words).
--Jim Jewell
ChildVoice Helps Heal Two Former "Wives" of LRA's Jospehy Kony
Among the previously abducted child mothers at the ChildVoice center in Uganda are two former wives--kidnapped at ages 8 and 10--of LRA leader Josephy Kony. Article on the girls in The Guardian in the UK, and soon on BBC.
Likely the Most Diverse Christian Pastors’ Conference in History
More than 40 Christian leaders and pastors from every continent will teach evangelistic and networking strategies at what certainly must be the most denominationally and internationally diverse pastors’ conference in history: Synergize 2, January 19-21, 2010 in Orlando, Florida.
The speakers represent some 115 million congregation members in their local churches and organizations. The Synergize 2 Pastor Conference presenters will teach on mobilizing leaders, multiplying disciples, and maximizing ministries.
The diversity starts with the co-sponsors: Leon Fontaine of Winnipeg, Canada; James O. Davis of Orlando, Florida; Suliasi Kurulo of Suva, Fiji; and Jonathan Falwell of Lynchburg, Virginia.