What does your sign say about your organization? It’s seen by a few or thousands, depending on your location. Would you buy an ad in your local newspaper or magazine and use the space in a way that confuses and/or alienates your audience?

This church used their visual real estate unwisely and I’ll guess that it didn’t motivate too many folks to come to bingo.

This one fails for several reasons:

1. It’s not readily understandable. There are probably still people who do not understand the term comment spam, and why people who do it may or may not burn in Hell. You’ve completely lost that audience from the first word.
2. It’s negative. Hell is about as bad as it gets and that’s what will get remembered about this church. A positive message will make the reader much more inclined to slow down or think of you next Sunday.
3. It’s rude. Comment spammers aren’t necessarily the most scrupulous of folk, but damning them to Hell might not be the best approach.I’ve seen signs with strange acronymns, competition bashing, doomsday predictions and cheesy sayings. None of these things make use of valuable advertising space you’ve already paid for/are still paying for. If you think the slogan is clever or the joke is funny, it’s probably a good idea to run it by someone outside your organization just to be sure.If you’re on a busy street, you could get thousands of impressions each day; something you’d pay dearly for in a popular magazine or newspaper or on a high-traffic website. Use it wisely.

   Next week we will talk about how to do signs well.

   What’s your favorite sign fail?

   Photo credit: D’Arcy Norman

This coming weekend, March 12 – 13, more than 400 young adults from nine states just might raise the roof of the Orpheum in downtown Memphis, as The Rising kicks off a weekend of worship, teaching and service.

What’s The Rising? Their Web site describes it as “a two-day multicultural experience in the urban core of Memphis designed to engage the mind, heart and soul.”

This is The Rising’s second year and director John Bryson is excited about the downtown venue as it “gets young people into the center of our city and they see Memphis in a new light.” Bryson, a teaching pastor at Fellowship Memphis, is passionate about racial reconciliation and he and his team have crafted a culturally-diverse weekend that “represents the diversity and beauty of Memphis” and is the only gathering of its kind in the country.

Read the rest on Memphis Connect

I just posted this on Memphis Connect:

Joe Carson talks with a friend in downtown Memphis

If you were asked to write your eulogy, how would it read?

For Kelli and Dr. Joe Carson, members of The Life Church of Memphis, that question launched a journey that led them from a comfortable suburban life to ministry in neighborhoods that people who look like them generally avoid.

The eulogy assignment was part of a small group Bible study that led the to Carsons re-evaluate their priorities. Kelli recalls. “We asked ourselves, with our kids nearly grown, what will the rest of our lives look like? A continuation of country club, travel, suburban privileged life? Or are we willing to invest in others?” After a month of intensely-focused prayer, the couple decided to sell Joe’s successful Bartlett dental practice to free them up for full-time ministry. It sold quickly and three weeks later, The Life Church’s senior pastor, John Siebeling, asked them to lead the church’s ministry to homeless persons.
Read the full story

I just finished my presentation at Connection2010 conference in Orlando, Florida. We had some great discussion and I was quite impressed with the audience and how open they are to using these tools for ministry.