The Visual Church Blog

I’ve been reading through Phil Cooke’s new book titled, “Branding Faith”. I feel like I know him. We’ve had this conversation many times before, even though I’ve only met him in person once. The book challenges the Church to learn to “brand” themselves in a postmodern culture. What does that mean? Branding is simply “the art of surrounding a product, organization, or person  with a powerful and compelling story”.

It used to be that the Church was the dominate influence on culture. Today, Corporate brand is shaping our ideals and consciousness. Statistics show that on average 10% of a two year old’s vocabulary will consist of a corporate brand. Amazing! The most recongnizable character for most young children has red hair, wears big long shoes and has red lipstick. Ronald McDonald is more famous than the guy who came to save the world.

Is this not sobering? Will we as believers take notice and at least consider doing something different? Are we too far gone to listen to the lost voices calling out for clarity in a world full of thousands of noisy and meaningless messages each day?

Here’s one place to start. Are we answering the right questions? I love this quote that Phil includes in his book from Billy Graham. It absolutely captures the heart of the issue.

“A generation ago, the question was, “What is truth?” Today, the question is, “What’s the point?” BILLY GRAHAM

What a snore? No, just kidding. Actually it was very inspiring. The first session I attended had Phil Vischer the creator of Veggie Tales speaking. Did you know a good friend loaned him $60,000 to produce the first show? Most of the companies he approached to under-right the children’s series with talking vegetables  laughed at him. Boy, did they miss out. As of last count, more than 50,000,000 copies of Veggie Tales have been sold all over the world.

As many of you know, the company that produced Veggie Tales, Big Idea, went bankrupt. Wow! Was that a devastating blow? Yet, through the experience the Lord got a hold of Phil’s heart and challenged him to put God first. Jesus actually allowed Big Idea to be brought down just to make sure Phil’s heart was in the right place. Now, don’t go writing me letters. There’s always more to the story than that, but over the course of the evening the one point that he challenged us with is to focus our energies on what God wants and not on the “impact” of our ministry. Our greatest contribution to the Kingdom will come out of our relationship and focus on Jesus.

You can learn more about Phil here - Phil Vischer 

Needles to write, there was a lot more that happened at this years NRB. Let me leave you with this. There is a changing of the gaurd from the older generation of static talking head TV evangelist to motion picture online reality based programming. Story will win out in the coming years. We as followers of Jesus must hone our craft at telling great story about the human experience. This is where we will speak into our culture and captivate the hearts of those around us. We need to be provocative and spur dialogue. Get them to ask the questions, so when they ask us for the answers they’ll actually listen. Did you know that Jesus used parables to weed out the ones who weren’t ready for the message? Have you ever noticed how many times the disciples had to ask him what he meant? Why is that? Read it for yourself. I’ll post on this topic at another time.

I’ll end with this quote from Phil. “Be attached to God’s mission.” 

I was having a coffee chat with a pastor the other day and he told me how excited he was to watch the upcoming Super Bowl. He wasn’t picking a football team though. Rather, he was anticipating some great commercials. How bizarre? All year long we do everything we can as we watch TV to avoid and skip over commercials. Yet, here’s a pastor who doesn’t watch much football and he can’t wait to sit down and view commercials over the four plus hour Super Bowl broadcast. Why is that?

My suspicion is that he’s not alone. The 2006 Super Bowl was the most watched TV show since 1996 with 90.7 million viewers! Advertisers paid an average of $2,500,000 to broadcast a 30 second spot. Remember, that doesn’t count the cost to produce the commercial. Even women, traditionally not your average football couch potato, tuned in to the total of well over 34 million.

Why are we as a culture so enthralled with Super Bowl commercials? I’m not sure who’s going to win the Super Bowl, but I can share two thoughts as to why we love to watch. Well, besides those of us who are actual football fans. Super Bowl commercials resonate with people, and the language of moving pictures engages the heart and mind. We are addicted to a good story, and the companies that produce them know how to speak our language. Each commercial is developed and written by a team of professionals who constantly study and research their viewers. They know everything from what their favorite color is to their financial situation and even their coffee drinking habits. Hello, Starbucks!

Hollywood literally has changed the way a movie script ended based on negative focus group feedback. In the movie, There’s Something About Mary , Ted hires a private investigator to find Mary, his high school sweetheart so he can re-connect with her. Wackiness ensues as Pat, the guy Ted hired, winds up becoming interested in Mary himself and tries to keep Ted away from her. The original script and screening ended with Mary and Ted getting together only for Mary to decide to keep things on a friendship level. Well, that didn’t sit well with the women that the studio brought in as a target focus group. So, they changed the ending to where Ted and Mary get married. Now that’s listening to your audience.

How does a movie connect with our heart and mind? Any story that is true or even slightly true to the human experience connects with us. The more that story mirrors a situation we are in or have recently gone through the greater we are engaged by it. We actually to some degree live it as the story plays out. You know what I’m talking about. People talk about the latest TV episode with their friends around the water cooler as if they are relating a real experience with their friends. The Office is a recent phenomena that has really developed a following. Steve Carrol plays the boss of a dysfunctional office staff. Each week we live out common workplace issues through the characters of the show. We hear their inner thoughts about each other as if it was a reality TV show and real life. Inside our minds, we have our very own private theaters where we live out a film or TV show. We choose sides. We get mad at the antagonist. We cheer on our hero. We cry. We laugh. We physically jump when startled.

I just don’t have enough time to get into the science of it, but suffice to say our bodies release hormones and endorphines just as if we were actualy experiencing what we were watching. It’s as if we are in the movie.

Jesus loved to tell stories. I believe that part of the reason he chose the time and place and culture he did to break into human history is because story was a part of common communication in the Hebrew culture. His carefully crafted stories were designed to bring people to the point of decision where they had to choose what they believed. He also used story to weed out those who weren’t really serious about following him. Jesus knew that a person who’s heart was not listening would not be open to the truth. Super Bowl commercials are written for this purpose. They hope to plant a memorable seed in your head about their product or service. They want to influence your decision making, your thinking.

What’s the point? It’s my argument that since Super Bowl commercials are so well tuned into to our culture they reflect the heart and minds of our culture. So if Super Bowl commercials are so successful at capturing our attention maybe we in the Church can learn from them? Is it possible that we might be more effective in illustrating and explaining the Gospel if we study and get to know our audience as well as an Ad Agency? Can we find a way to move more towards story based content rather than talking head? These are questions I hope we continue to wrestle with. In the meantime, watch and enjoy the Super Bowl. Oh, and by the way, go Patriots.

It’s the same old thing every year. About this time we realize that C Day is just around the corner, and we ain’t got everything done yet. We pound away at work to get things done so we don’t have to work on our vacation. Every commercial has a holiday twist to it trying to get us in the mood to spend our money all the while under the guise of ’tis the season to give.’. Each night we count the days left with our kids and wonder if we’ll survive.

Is this what it’s become? Are good intentions enough to make up for traffic jams, shopping injuries, paper cuts from wrapping gifts, the endless nagging “mommy I want that.”, and the drain of the final 12 day dash to the the finish line? Has Christmas been diluted down to a baby Jesus ornament on a Christmas tree?

I remember hearing someone that could easily be labeled as a Christian bemoaning the fact that due to tight finances they wouldn’t have hardly any gifts under their Christmas tree this year. He said, “It’s just so sad that we won’t be having much of a Christmas this year.”. You get my point, right?

Now what? Remember the manger scene? I mean the one that we portray to the world. Cute little white Caucasian baby Jesus lay cuddled in clean blankets in the soft hay. Mary and Joseph, peaceful and brimming with joy look at their Savior. Gentle beasts silently laying nearby. Clean-shaved shepherds stand around holding knarly wood staffs, and three really smartly dressed guys kneel with expensive gifts to give. It’s lovely and safe. Nothing to worry about. Sure.

In reality, the first Christmas was probably a total nightmare for Mary and Joseph. Imagine about 9 months ago Mary was ecstatic and pondering in her heart the amazing revelation given to her. Now she lay in a dark and damp and cold cave in labor pains. Joseph I imagine was totally bewildered. I mean his wife is pregnant and he had nothing to do with it. After somehow working through the public humiliation of trying to explain things, here he is traveling around the countryside trying desperately to find a place to sleep for the night. They were homeless, and more than likely had little to no money.

Could I go on? Of course, but you are getting my point. It was anything but Silent Night. Amidst the chaos of the first Christmas the Kingdom of God was advancing with force. In my mind there must have been relentless blood being shed in the spiritual realms as Satan began to realize that this was it. Remember hundreds if not thousands of baby boys would be murdered in their mother’s arms in about two years of Jesus birth once king Herod realized that he had been tricked and could not discover the newborn King’s whereabouts.

Yet, the presence of the Self-Existent One was not to be diminished. His glory was probably the only thing that sustained the two young parents. In Luke 2:19 we read about Mary’s response as the shepherds went around the countryside telling everyone about the angels appearing and proclaiming the coming king to all the people in the surrounding area. It says, “But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart.”. In the middle of chaos she reflected on all that had been said and was occurring. Her perspective was on God and this amazing gift of life He had brought into the world through her womb. Her faith was not based on the craziness of the world around her, nor the desperate living conditions they found themselves in. Her faith was in the One who would deliver.

Where is your faith? Have the trappings of the American Christmas season captured your attention? Are you waiting for a special visitation from angels? Or, is your faith in the One who sent His Son to live, die, and rise from the dead so that you might have life? Is your Christmas just the same old blah, blah, blah, or is it a time to reflect on what the Almighty has already done out of the abundance of His infinite love?

There are many different renditions of Jesus. Some are realistic, some are abstract, some we just aren’t sure how to classify them, and of course others aren’t worth the time to look at. Maybe you remember seeing flannel board Jesus smiling and holding a little child?

How about the one where Jesus is knocking on the door of a home? So, which one is correct?

As media professionals and amateurs we must make decisions about how we represent the Son of the Living God. The writer of Hebrews tells us that “The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word.” (1:3). Now how in God’s green Earth are we suppose to live up to that standard?
How about starting with prayer? The Bible tells us he was just your average everyday ordinary looking guy…okay that is my paraphrase. Research the history of that time and that culture which Jesus lived. A great book to read is “The Jesus I Never Knew” by Phillip Yancey Our modern culture views Jesus as tame and timid. Phillip reveals through in depth study and careful observation of that culture and the life of Jesus that he was a radical - an extremist. He revolutinized the way people saw God and understood Scripture.
In the end, I believe that all true art will represent the reality of this life and give us small glimpses albeit sometimes out of focus of the Kingdom to come and the King we serve. But true art comes with a price. It requires a disciplined life that learns to reverance the Father and honor the Son. Obedience is the key. Obedience opens the doorway to hearing God’s voice and knowing His will.
So the next time you set out on a project that requires illustrating Jesus, consider all this he was, is, and will be. Ask the Lord himself to reveal himself to you, and wait for his revelation. Yet, don’t forget that we do have a record of his life in the Bible and even in other historical documents. Jesus is the historical Messiah after all. In all you do, do it for the glory of God the Father and to further the coming of His kingdom.

You are here. Actually, you are not exactly here, but you are somewhere close by. Maybe just around the corner? Russia? The Netherlands? A coffee shop in San Diego, or possibly at your desk in your office. Like I said, you are right here. At least, your brain is. And really that’s all we need here at The Visual Church blog.

So come one, come all. Just don’t show up without you. That would be mindless.

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