I would love context on this quote because I can see Mr. Bell going two different directions on it. Or rather, I can see one perspective but I may have another opinion. There are plenty of examples of churches who haven't adjusted their strategy as their demographic changed but we don't know about them because they don't exist anymore.
Justin Wise
· 1 year ago
A: Here's the larger context from the blog that I cited in the above post:
"One of the things that is strongly critiqued in this last chapter is a consumer approach to church, especially when that makes a church an exercise in niche marketing for a specific subculture or cultural group. As Bell and Golden stress that doesn’t look like the new humanity talked about in Ephes. 2 that Christ died to create. They put it this way-- “A church is not a center for religious goods and services, where people pay a fee and receive a product in return. A church is not an organization that surveys its demographic to find out what the market is demanding at this particular moment and then adjusts its strategy to meet that consumer need.” (p. 161). The question is what does it look like to break ourselves open and pour ourselves out for the world, as Jesus did. A church’s authority in the world comes from its Christ’likeness is in essence what they are saying."
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Does that clear it up at all?