Chris Brogan has a fascinating post, Communications in a Post Media World. He begins by saying,
When Google is the front door, the side door, the hidden key under the mat, the cash register, the finder of everything we ever lost, and everything we wished we’d lost, what comes next? When everyone is a newspaper, a magazine, a TV station, a radio station, a conference, a curator, an educator, a business owner, a shopkeeper, what do we have? When you and I are the creators, the consumers, and the collaborators of this media, what does this mean to us?
The gatekeepers are still out there. Neither you nor I can write for the New York Times or put a film up on the BBC. We can’t just bind up our book and stick it on the shelf at Waterstones or Chapters. We can’t waltz into any giant corporation and offer up our products.
Maybe we’re just preachers and nonprofit types. Maybe we just want to reach people like us in all this noise. How do we connect? This might just be the wilderness of a million signals, the atomization of the world’s voices, the fall of the tower of Babel. Again.
Check out his entire post, as it is a great challenge for us to think how communication has changed, and how we must re-think how we can communicate more effectively in what he describes as a “post media world.”
I really like the term that he (and some others) is using. As a former college pastor, and a current youth ministry/pastoral care mentor/trainer I have been thinking about communication using a slightly different term.
How do we communicate in a postmodern world? Some will debate whether or not there is such a thing as postmodernity. Others will see it as simply a tool, philosophy, theology, ethos that one can choose, or choose not to gravitate towards. I happen to believe that postmodernity is real (I know some of you are saying duh..haaa), and that it’s not an option for us to decide whether or not we will or will not think of how to communicate more effectively to it. It’s not just a worldview, but its in the air we breathe…you don’t have to like it, but with that in mind, I’m wondering how communication has changed in a postmodern world?
If we are in “post media world” as Brogan and others suggest….and if postmodernity is alive and well, then how can we use the technology, the social media tools, and craft a message, story, communication that reaches those who we are trying to reach?
I don’t have a detailed answer to give you. You might have one, and I hope you share. But I’m definitely thinking through the rapidly changing world that is brought on by the reduction of hierarchy through social media tools, and what implications that has (especially for those of us in ministry) for us as we think about communicating the gospel in a noisy world. If we all have the ability to share and communicate a message, just not personally, but online, how do we effectively communicate it without getting lost?
Which begs a bigger question that I was thinking about after reading Brent Thomas (@brent_thomas) Tweet the other day.
In a “post media/postmodern world” are we telling the right story effectively? Are we even telling the story? Is the gospel story more attractive than the other competing stories? And are we expecting only pastors, clergy, ministry leaders to communicate the story, or are all of us communicating the story of how God has transformed our lives?
Last, what do churches do when they are no longer the front door to the gospel? Do we even realize that the physical building isn’t the front door anymore, but that the online world is the front door? If you don’t have a strong presence, or aren’t telling a good story online, which is the front door–will you be able to bring people from the online world, to the physical front door of the church?
not so sure i agree with the tweet by @brent_thomas… but i understand the thoughts behind it… because certainly the people of God are NOT attractive… and that’s probably our greatest strength. if we feel like we have to “beautify” a pretty “gross” story of a god man crucified… i think we do it a disservice. we know, as believers, the message to be very attractive, but to an outside, it’s just plain “foolishness”.
but, i understand the thought.
I agree with John that the “tweet” doesn’t necessarily mesh with the rest of my theology of the gospel. It seems that as we are called to self-denial, suffering, and giving up our rights that it might not be super attractive to anyone. On the other hand, I think it was Rob Bell (though I may be off) who supported the idea that Christianity, the teachings of Jesus, is still the best way to live. Forgiveness instead of vengeance, love instead of hate, joy instead of bitterness, etc…
Living somewhere in that tension seems to be where we should be. If that makes any sense…
John:
Yo, what’s up? I hear what you are saying…and I know Brent well. And I don’t think he, or I met, clean up the message..make a crucified God more attractive. I think the paradox in making the gospel story more attractive is that it is so different..that it is so “other worldly.” That it doesn’t make sense that a God, would send His Son into the world..to walk humbly, to give of His life and die for our sins.” That doesn’t make sense, which is the beauty of it, and something that the other stories we are offered on a daily basis can’t compete with…grace, redemption, forgiveness, truth, etc.
So we don’t need to clean the story up..which I don’t think you are saying we need to do…but are we telling a good story? Or have we just let the story, and our story be muted by the noise?
Does that make sense?
Brent can speak for himself..I don’t want to put words in his mouth. But I think he’s wondering if our lives are any different to the world around us…that if we truly lived as Christ followers, the “aroma” would be an attractive story, an alternative story to the worlds.
Thoughts?
John/Jon:
I think we are all saying the same thing.
The gospel story doesn’t need to be cleaned up, etc.
It’s an amazing, radical story…
But do we live truly live out that story…if we do, then I think it bursts through the noise..that it is a more attractive alternative to other stories.
Brent: Maybe you can tell us what you meant by that Tweet? Yo may have meant one thing, but I definitely was thinking of another thing possibly.
If I faithfully followed Christ…walked in humility, laid down my life for others, lived out the fruits of the Spirit…practiced in my daily life the teachings of the Sermon on the Mount…then my life would be an attractive story that would hopefully point others to Christ…or it would at least give me the opportunity to tell the story of what God has done for me.
rhett
Rhett,
thanks for clarifying. Have you ever read Dostoevsky’s “The Idiot”? That book is a good example of how someone who lives counter intuitively (like Jesus) can attempt to transform a culture…
Rhett,
thanks for clarifying. Have you ever read Dostoevsky’s “The Idiot”? That book is a good example of how someone who lives counter intuitively (like Jesus) can attempt to transform a culture…
Jon,
I have not read The Idiot, which is a shame since I love Dostoyevsky. That is still one of his larger works I have not read…but others have made the same statement about that book as you just have. I think that will be my next fictional read.
rhett
“If the message isn’t attractive……” Really?
“For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing.” “The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers so that they cannot see the light of the gospel that displays the glory of God.” (Paul)
“The Idiot” truly lived the Christ life. But it wasn’t very attractive to others. That’s why everyone in the novel called him ‘idiot.”
I think there is a linguistic element here that ends up making us all talk over each other.
I think that in the foolishness of the cross there is an attractiveness that draws people…and attractiveness is probably not a good word in the way I was using it. Maybe an appeal….there is something so paradoxical about a crucified Christ….it is a story like no others…that I think it literally attracts people…draws people to follow Christ and lay down their lives for Him. So we could say that the message isn’t attractive…rather foolish….but in that paradox, in that life that Christ offers…people are attracted to that even amidst the foolishness.
I don’t think anyone is saying we have to polish up the Christian message, or clean up the cross. I think there is the “aroma” that Paul talks about that draws people to Christ, especially when His followers are living it out…that’s the attraction…
rhett
I like that last summary Rhett. Thanks for clarifying…even if you had to do it 3 or 4 times!
Tim, that was the point I was making about “The Idiot,” only perhaps coming across more subtle. The characters in the story indeed view Myshkin as an “idiot” yet there is also something, to steal Rhett’s jargon, entirely paradoxical about living that way that becomes attractive…that was the point I was attempting to make.
I like that last summary Rhett. Thanks for clarifying…even if you had to do it 3 or 4 times!
Tim, that was the point I was making about “The Idiot,” only perhaps coming across more subtle. The characters in the story indeed view Myshkin as an “idiot” yet there is also something, to steal Rhett’s jargon, entirely paradoxical about living that way that becomes attractive…that was the point I was attempting to make.
Rhett,
Good post. I have realized that not only telling a powerful story through our online presence is important, but discerning what searches/key words are bringing people to our site in the first place.
Brogan’s blog has been so insightful for me as well.