Saturday, March 22, 2008

The new site

The new site.

A few years ago I was asked to create a press release for a CEO of a company. My client wanted me to write something extolling how dedicated to being honest about sales results this particular CEO was. The only problem was that she wasn't.

She was known for being a bit blurry when it came to the reality of the sales the company was generating. The press, the stockholders, the employees, everyone that knew this lady was going to see right through my press release and instantly think, "No way am I listening to this lady. I know her past."

What I wanted to do, which was eventually rejected, was come out with the truth. I wanted to disarm the readers by opening up with a statement that said, "In the past, numbers have not been my greatest strength." If I said that, all the readers would have to pause before throwing a rock at us. In essence I would have removed the biggest objective they had to reading the rest of the press release.

The same thing happens with Christianity.

We do some things really well and we do some things less than really well. But when we pretend we're perfect, people see right through it and won't believe anything else we say. And that's the point of this project. I want to be honest and upfront and hopefully a little funny about the issues the church and Christians struggle with sometimes. I want to say, "Whoa, whoa, please don't judge me or God by Christian radio." I want to admit the times we've dropped the ball on issues or ideas that people called to love their neighbor should have knocked out of the park. I want to engage all my friends that aren't Christians that don't go to church in an honest, open conversation. I want to blow up misconceptions and preconceptions about what it means to be a Christian.

That's why I created, www.stuffchristianslike.net

The good thing is that doing something simple and small like this won't take away from my other two sites. The entries on the new one are about 100 words each and more importantly I hopefully won't be writing them all. For the first time in my blogging experiment, I want to open up the posts to other people. Got an idea about "Stuff Christians Like?" Email me or post a comment. If it fits the theme of the site I'll put it up and give you all the credit. And make no mistake, I took this concept directly from a wildly popular secular site that uses the same approach. Read "#1. Putting a God Spin on Popular Secular Ideas" to see what I'm talking about.

Or, read one of these things that I think are Stuff Christians Like:
#8. Singing "Friends are Friends" forever at the end of church events.
#5. Bootleg cookies.
#3. Reading "love is patient" at your wedding.

p.s. lots of folks are doing similar sites right now in response to the site that spawned this idea. Some might be worth checking out too.

3 comments:

Brenda said...

love your newest - it's interesting to me that all the entries seem to be posted in January? why you hide your light under a bushel? why not let it shine, let it shine, let it shiiiine earlier? ahhh ha ha ha

But seriously, I go to a pretty non-traditional church and I see sooooo many of those first 20 all around me. My faves? Using "bless her heart" to doctor up some good gossip or a good dis. And Calling Satan The Enemy... I think we should go a little Harry Potter and call him "he-who-shall-not-be-named". Of course, REAL Christians don't read Mr Potter's stories so they wouldn't get it would they?

Anyway, keep it up - as always, yours are the first blogs I check each day.

Anonymous said...

When you stopped sending e-mails I missed everything you were doing, but an on-line friend linked to your new site. She made a clever comment that fingered you right away (in my mind - something that indicated your content might be a little risky) before she asked you a question and used your name -CLINCH. You once told me you had pages upon pages of unused ideas, before your devotional site was up -
I'm glad you've been able to spring into action a little more.
I really like "STUFF CHRISTIANS LIKE"

AND

I'm glad I'm not the only cynical parent out there. (lock-ins)


Michaele

john said...

what about

using/playing the trust game (folding your arms and falling backwards, hoping someone will catch you) at camp to demonstrate our need to trust God.