Revolution

I’ve learned a lot from Seth Godin – about marketing, about publishing, about being a leader. I read his blog regularly and found this post particularly provocative. What is it we think right now is just right, just about perfect? Or, maybe more to the point of our life in the church: what have we thought for years is just perfect and so wouldn’t dream of changing? And what have we thought was impossible and couldn’t be done? If we had no fear – no concern that it wouldn’t work, or that people wouldn’t like us, or that we don’t have enough money – what would we try.

There’s much in our life of the church that isn’t wrong, it just doesn’t work that well anymore. But because we thought for so long it was right – and maybe it was! – we’ve come to think it’s inevitable, a given. But what if we didn’t worry for now about what once seemed perfect or about what always seemed impossible and instead asked what we believe is necessary now. What if we didn’t accept “the way it always was” and instead asked what God is asking us to dream? What if we didn’t accept the status quo – in our churches, our schools, our families – and instead imagined what revolution God is calling us to? What then?

Let me know what you think. And, in the meantime, enjoy Seth’s post:

The definition of a revolution: it destroys the perfect and enables the impossible.

 

The music business was perfect. Radio, record chains, Rolling Stone magazine, the senior prom, limited access to recording studios, the replaceable nature of the LP, the baby boomers… it all added up to a business that seemed perfect, one that could run for ever and ever.

 

The digital revolution destroyed this perfect business while enabling the seemingly impossible: easy access to the market by new musicians, a cosmic jukebox of just about every song ever recorded, music as a social connector…

 

If you are in love with the perfect, prepare to see it swept away. If you are able to dream of the impossible, it just might happen.