Seems like communication isn’t that big a deal in churches after all.
The seminar this Saturday has been cancelled because even though there are at least fifty churches in the area, only three people registered for it.
I'm not upset because all this work I've put in has gone to waste. I can always reuse it for some other seminar.
I'm upset because people don't seem to understand the importance of communicating.
A similar seminar on children's ministries saw a few hundred people registering. A seminar on communication resulted in three. This is ridiculous.
It's because of this lack of communication in churches that misunderstanding like this happens.
It's not about patting ourselves on the back. It's not about blowing our own trumpet.
It's simply about letting people know who we are, what we believe and not remain hiding in a corner with our heads buried in the sand.
No wonder people think we're a cult, that we're weird and constantly mistake us for some other Christian denomination.
People simply don't know who we are because we're not telling them anything!
Then we complain people don't understand us.
Then we complain that nobody turns up to things we organise.
Then we complain that nothing ever happens in our church.
If nobody can be bothered to learn about communicating, how are people expected to hear?
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5 comments:
It might be that the SPD (note ignorance of style guide!) tend to 'spin' their information however they want.
And it might be the turnover in SPD communications personnel says that the messenger gets shot too often.
So IMHO communication to SPD is a waste of time, and communication from SPD is twisted in the warmest fuzziest way - certainly the truth (I would hope) but certainly not always the whole truth (I know!)
I think structural communication was killed off back in the early 2000's when GC (sorry - style guide infringment again) killed off the official online Adventist community. In those days you could get onto the Adventist CompuServe forum and chat 1-1 with the GC president. Check out www.adventistforum.com to see the unofficial offshoot of the compuserve forum. The powers that be are now attempting to close even this one down. Shame!
Sorry Melody, this is not a go at you. It's a go at history which just seems to repeat itself.
*sigh*
There seems to be some kind of hoo-har going on in the West Indies at the moment with people pointing fingers about the Adventist church being a cult.
People forget it's not about communication *within* the church, but also with people who aren't church members, or were once, or just generally people "outside" of the church.
Some church members seem to assume that they know everything anyways, or that what they know is general knowledge and therefore it's not really that important to share it with others.
That totally ignores the fact that communication is important to build and keep healthy relationships with others, whether it be on a personal level or a public level! Share and share alike...
bilbo - no offense taken, i'm just a little shocked that communication to the spd (ha! I'm ignoring my own guide!) is seen in such bad light!
If there is anything you feel that I can do to change this, please let me know.
On another note, what I was actually talking about is not so much communicating to the spd, but actually having the local church communicate with the public.
The power lies in the people. They're the ones who are in a better position to interact with the masses. Not the spd.
But until they see the importance of speaking the media's language and engaging the media, it's not going to happen....
della - completely agree. it's a frustration I constantly face. My passion lies in communicating externally, but most of my work seems to revolve around internal communication.
preaching to the choir is needed at times, but i would certainly like to see us engaging others more...
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