Oscar v. Marketing in the Church

One of the interesting things about Urbana is that we get speakers from all over the world. This makes for some uncomfortable situations at times.

Not all of them are big fans of the United States, for example. Others aren't fans of capitalism, or at least how people in their country are on the short end of how Wal-Mart provides (always) extra low prices.

One speaker from Africa, Oscar Murio, made a passing comment about the need for Americans to give up on their marketing and branding techniques in their missions work. He proposed (not in so many words) that these were idols of our own strength, being brought into God's work, and thereby a distortion of the work that we were called to do.

This caused a buzz among some of us in InterVarsity staff-land. We're in a season as a national movement of using more and more organizational strategies from the business world in an attempt to do our work better.

I think that there are a handful of responses to Oscar's challenge:

1. He's right to call American missionaries out on exporting too much American culture without thoughtful engagement with local culture. This has historically been our worst atrocity, although I would offer that we're smarter and more thoughtful now than at any point in history.

2. He's also right that Americans often come in thinking that we know all the answers, have everything to offer and nothing to learn from indigenous peoples.

3. I would suggest that Proverbs commends us to pursue wisdom--and that there is wisdom to be found and put to use for God's work in many, many different places--everything from indigenous peoples to the world of secular business.

Sloppy organizational behavior is not more spiritual than good organizational behavior. Bad organizations do not honor the peoples they are called to serve, the missionaries they are sending, and the donors who are giving. Good and wise organizational thinking, used correctly, blesses all of the above.

4. Further, there are plenty of missionaries (none, of course, who would be reading this) who are not doing good work. They need to be equipped to do their work better and they need to be held accountable. Some of them need to be encouraged to seek different work.

Good organizational culture helps with genuine accountability, thorough equipping, and wise evaluation of people, context, and calling.

5. At the same time, there cannot be a one-to-one transmission of business/marketing practices to the church. Somewhere in there, there has to be a death and resurrection, a purging and a redemption.

I'm not always exactly sure what this looks like. But I would suggest that at the very least this means that we submit all plans and ideas and concepts to the Lord, walk with integrity, humility, and righteousness as we look for wisdom wherever it may be found and put it to use in the service of the Lord.

6. Lastly, as I've suggested before, there's a difference between using and trusting.

Psalm 19 says "some may trust in horses and some may trust in chariots, but we will trust in the name of our Lord." My guess is that David's army included horses and chariots. But these things, David says, are not his trust, they are not what provide victory.

God provides the victory. Most often he uses things like horses and chariots. In really unique situations, he commands his people to forgo the use of these things.

But most often God uses normal stuff--money, invitations, books, blog posts, even marketing strategies--to get his work done. And he calls us to use these things, and not to be used by them.

That's a holy tension, and it's hard to live in faithfully. But there's a holy and proper using that remembers that these things are the Lord's, and he is the one doing the blessing of them for his purposes.