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Last week on American Idol, Elvis made a startling return to the stage. OK, I'm not one of those who thinks Elvis is alive and living in a convenience store in Montana. What I'm talking about was the amazing technical feat of having a digital image of Elvis appear "live" on stage performing a duet with Celine Deon. If you didn't already know he had gone to his reward, you'd have been convinced that Elvis was standing on that stage. Which makes me wonder how such technology might one day impact churches? For example, with all the emphasis today on "video venues" and projecting one pastor's sermons into multiple sites via video projection, why not go the next step and project a digital image of that preacher right onto the platform? It's bound to increase offerings in those other sites, don't you think? Better yet, we won't have to lose the great preachers to retirement or even death -- we'll just project their image and let them preach till Kingdom come. (That also solves the problem of replacing a popular preacher -- you just keep him preaching via digital video and save all that salary!) The next frontier will be projecting a better-looking image of ourselves. Just tinker a bit with that digital image, and soon preachers will be able to project themselves onto the platform with a full head of hair and 50 pounds lighter. Preaching with "authenticity" may soon have a whole new dimension. Michael
Duduit, Editor Click here to visit "I Was Just Thinking" (Michael's blog) for insights and observations about faith and culture issues. Recent topics: Where are the grown-ups?
Pulpit plagiarism not new, but it is growing In the April 17 issue of The Christian Century, Tom Long talks about the tradition and expansion of plagiarizing the sermons of others: "The stealing of sermons is nothing new, of course, and the legends of such mischief abound. Typical of the genre is the story of Ernest T. Campbell, now retired as pastor of New York's Riverside Church. He was once invited to fill the pulpit of a church in a distant city, and he chose to preach "Adam's Other Son," a creative sermon on the biblical character Seth, one which bears the unmistakable mark of Campbell's style and which Campbell had published in a sermon collection. As he preached that Sunday, however, he had a sense that something was awry. "My sermon," he said later, "was landing like marbles on a tile floor." After the service, he was told that a young associate pastor had preached the same sermon nearly word for word the week before. No wonder the congregation had sat in shocked silence, convinced that the celebrated guest preacher had stooped to pilfering another pastor's material. "Pulpit plagiarism may not be new, but there is plenty of evidence that the practice is spreading and that the kerosene on the fire is the Internet. Not only are thousands of sermons available for the snatching on church Web pages, but scores of commercial sites hawk complete sermons, illustrations, outlines, images and PowerPoint accompaniments for a fee. The proprietors of these sites are aware, naturally, that their customers may have a flicker of conscience over downloading sermons, so several sites include words of reassurance. 'We know you may be worried about plagiarism,' they essentially warble, 'but the authors of these sermons want you to use them. And besides, these sermons are designed to stimulate your imagination as you create your own sermons. You'll still be doing the work.' . . . "But the Internet is not only the supplier, it is often the police officer too. More preachers may be stealing sermons these days, but more are also getting caught in the fine mesh of Web crawlers and search engines. Four years ago, early on a Sunday morning, the parish nurse at the National City Christian Church in Washington, D.C., ran an Internet search on the sermon title that her pastor had announced for that day, only to find a sermon with that exact title on the Web site of a church in Manhattan. She carried a printout of the New York sermon with her to worship, and sure enough, she heard the same sermon from the National City pulpit that morning, almost word for word. This was the first evidence of what turned out to be a long-standing pattern of pulpit plagiarism on the part of the pastor, and its discovery threw the congregation into turmoil. "Because of the prominence of this church and the pastor, that controversy made national news, but there have been numerous other, less-publicized local occurrences where preachers have been caught in the pincers of Google or Yahoo. Almost every community has a story of a church torn apart and a pastor embarrassed, if not dismissed, over "borrowing" sermons. In the future, churches may well adopt the strategy of many colleges and universities, which have begun to combat plagiarism with powerful new software programs, such as Turnitin, that comb through extensive databases as well as every nook and cranny of the worldwide Web, comparing student papers with possible sources and sleuthing out similarities in language. There may come a time when pastors seeking new calls or appointments will have to pass their sermons under the watchful eye of such software, as a kind of plagiarism background check." Long analyzes the current trends in this area and offers some helpful ideas for drawing on the insights of others without "stealing" their sermons. (Click here to read the full article.) http://www.christiancentury.org/article.lasso?id=3195
Pastoral leadership requires overcoming fear In their book Go Big (Abingdon), Bill Easum and Bil Cornelius talk about how they had to overcome their own major fears in order to be effective in the mission to which God had called them. "When Bill E. left the pastorate to begin consulting he was so scared to get on an airplane that he had to take tranquilizers. To deal with his fear, he took flying lessons and became a certified pilot and now has flown over 3 million miles. "Why did we do whatever it took to overcome our fear? Because the mission is more important than any fear we might have. Every leader is afraid of something (or someone) and that something is usually the limitation to his or her leadership so he or she does whatever it takes to overcome it. What's standing in your way? . . . "One of the most frustrating things about being a pastor of a growing church is that the tools you have to learn to grow the church to one level won't work at the next level. As soon as you go to the next level, God asks you to turn in those tools and learn some new ones. You just got good using those tools and now they don't work anymore. Now you have to pick up new tools that are uncomfortable to you. Don't be afraid to learn a whole new way of leading." (Click here to learn more about the book Go Big.)
More church plants needed "The world is seeing greater divergence in church planting today, from megachurches and multi-site churches to house churches," according to Ed Stetzer, missiologist and senior director of NAMB's (North American Mission Board) Center for Missional Research. Yet Stetzer believes that much more is needed, as an article in The Christian Post (April 23) explains: The last time the United States saw a major church planting movement was in 1795-1810, according to Stetzer, when 3,000 Baptist and Methodist churches were planted on the Western frontier. "I am struck by and disappointed in some ways by how little is going on [in church planting]," said Stetzer in an interview featured on the Church Planting Network. "We need to see a whole lot more going on. . . . I think we've bought into this sense in North America that the goal is to have a big church, grow a big platform, get a certain fame that comes with that. I think we need to change the scorecard. We need to . . . be churches that are multiplying, impacting communities [and] that are sending people away -- sowing and reaping." Although new models, approaches and conferences have emerged over the last several decades, still the American culture is "less reached" and even those who go to church are "less committed," said Stetzer. As churches adopt prevailing culture models, Stetzer believes church planters have a natural tendency to jump into cultural relevance more than biblical fidelity. Although that isn't a bad impulse, there needs to be balance, he noted. "How can I help Christians to not just think of themselves as consumers of religious goods and services and churches as vendors of religious goods and services but how can we challenge believers that God called [us] . . . to really engage in the full mission of God," the missiologist said, indicating that he has been burdened by this. "God's people are called to do something more than run an institution and propagate an organization. They're to live the Gospel in their lives. I just don't think many people are getting that message." Nevertheless, with hopes of seeing more transformative and impacting churches, Stetzer sees a surge of interest in church planting today and believes that it may be the beginning of another church planting movement. (Click here to read the full story.)
Three 'Preaching Truth' conferences set for May A new series of Preaching Truth in a Whatever World events are planned for May 2007. These one-day preaching conferences explore strategies for effective biblical preaching in a postmodern world. Led by Preaching editor Michael Duduit and a variety of guest speakers, these conferences offer a valuable time of insight and refreshment for those who proclaim the Word. Preaching Truth conferences will be held in the following cities: Columbia,
SC -- May 8 For more information or to register, call (800) 288-9673, or visit the website at www.preaching.com/truth
ILLUSTRATION: Doctrine H. Edwin Young shares the following: "Charles Shultz, in his cartoons, once painted a little picture of Lucy and Linus in their home looking out a window at a thunderstorm. Lucy, in typical candidness, said, 'I hope it doesn't rain and rain until the whole world is flooded.' Linus came back with, 'Don't worry. In Genesis 9:13-14 God promised Noah that He would never again send a flood that would cover the whole earth and He put the rainbow in the sky as a promise that this would be true.' "Lucy sighed and said, 'That sure makes me feel a whole lot better.' Linus replied, 'Sound doctrine has a way of doing that.'" (submitted by Franklin Kirksey from the book Jesus Author and Finisher: Messages on the Person of Jesus Christ, compiled by Morris Chapman; click here to learn more about the book)
ILLUSTRATION: Burden, Surrender J. H. Jowett concludes his sermon on Exodus 33:14, entitled 'The Abiding Companionship,' with this personal story: "An aged, weary woman, carrying a heavy basket, got into the train with me the other day, and when she was seated she still kept the heavy burden upon her arm! 'Lay your burden down, mum,' said the kindly voice of a working man. 'Lay your burden down, mum; the train will carry both it and you.' "Aye, that's it! 'Lay your burden down!' The LORD will carry both it and you! 'I will give thee rest': not by the absence of warfare, but by the happy assurance of victory: not by the absence of the hill, but by the absence of the spirit of fainting. 'I will give thee rest.'" (from Steve Eutsler; Citation: J. H. Jowett, The Silver Lining)
ILLUSTRATION: Aging, Direction As a senior citizen was driving down the freeway, his car phone rang. Answering, he heard his wife's voice urgently warning him, "Herman, I just heard on the news that there's a car going the wrong way on Interstate 77. Please be careful!" "Are you kidding?" exclaimed Herman. "It's not just one car. It's hundreds of them!"
"The secret of being a saint is being a saint in secret."
On the preacher's bookshelf . . . Looking at some interesting books on church leadership: Using the analogy of the human body, Thriving Churches in the Twenty-First Century (Kregel) explores ten interacting systems that make up a healthy church body. Written by Gary L. McIntosh and R. Daniel Reeves, the book deals with issues like the pastor's spiritual life, spiritual disciplines, team ministry and much more. Bill Easum and Bil Cornelius have written Go Big: Lead Your Church to Explosive Growth (Abingdon), a call to pastors to prepare themselves and their church for growth. (See the excerpt above in this issue.) In The Missional Leader (Josey Bass), Alan Roxburgh and Fred Romanuk help us understand how to create a context within the church that moves toward missional transformation. They offer a strategic change model that can be adapted for different churches. And in the rare leadership book written by one author instead of two, Lyle Schaller offers new insights for leading churches in the 21st century in his book From Cooperation to Competition (Abingdon). Once again Schaller proves he is among the best at advising churches and their leaders.
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ILLUSTRATION: Imitation, Urgency Two gas company servicemen, a training supervisor and a young trainee, were out checking meters in a suburban neighborhood. They parked their truck at the end of the alley and worked their way to the other end. At the last house a woman looking out her kitchen window watched the two men as they checked her gas meter. Finishing the meter check, the supervisor challenged his younger co-worker to a footrace down the alley back to the truck to prove that an older guy could outrun a younger one. As they came running up to the truck, they realized the lady from the last house was huffing and puffing right behind them. Naturally, they stopped and asked her what was wrong. Gasping for breath, she replied, "When I see two gas men running as hard as you two were, I just knew I'd better run too!"
"If you live with a lame man, you learn to limp." (Plutarch)
Top 7 Signs Your Pastor Needs a Vacation 7. His first words to the congregation on Sunday morning are "All right, listen up you heathens . . . " 6. He falls asleep during his own sermon. 5. He shows up for Sunday service wearing Bermuda Shorts and a Tank Top. 4. Every time his pager goes off, he shouts, "Why can't they just leave me alone?" 3. Announces baptismal services will be at the Grand Canyon. 2. You go to his office for counseling and pour your heart out to him and he says, "Sounds like a personal problem to me." 1. For the past two months he has preached the same sermon every Sunday.
And finally . . . We started with Elvis -- we might as well finish with him as well. For years, couples have been able to go to Las Vegas to get married in an Elvis-themed wedding chapel. (What I've always considered a promising start to a life of marital bliss.) Now, however, you won't even have to go to Vegas. Greg Jaqua -- a Michigan-based Elvis tribute artist and "minister" (ordained by the Universal Life Church) -- has started performing Elvis weddings in his mobile wedding chapel, according to an April 28 AP article. So far he has performed three weddings as "Elvis." Jaqua has been making his living as an Elvis impersonator for about 12 years, and saw the mobile wedding chapel as a way to supplement his income. Now he is combining the two interests. He asserts, "We bring a little of the Vegas experience to them." What happens in Michigan stays in Michigan. At least we can hope.
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