Changing Church Logos

2010 March 09

by Tyler

Lisa Smith (known to many of you as “Stretch Mark Mama”) wrote a comment on this post from a couple weeks ago, and what she said has stuck with me since then. Here is the last part of her comment:

“Growing a church the organic, one-convert-at-a-time way is tough and requires a well thought out (prayed out) plan. It’s much easier to change a logo than it is to change a life.”

Changing lives and walking with people through their journey of life is a slow process (definitely worthwhile though). It takes a two-way relationship, an open communication, and trust. None of which are built in any short-term length of time.

I don’t have a problem with big churches (heck I work at one). They are usually big because they have been effective at reaching people where they are at. But often big churches get sucked into a numbers game of always needing to grow.

Success is then often dictated not by the impact of relationships and individual life change, but how many people are coming, whether they have been impacted or not.

What do you think about Lisa’s comment?

Filed under: the rest...

Mary

Very true! Life change should be the goal and not an occasional byproduct, as I’m afraid it is in many churches in the US.
http://www.mattgavenda.com Matt Gavenda

I definitely hear where she’s coming from with that comment. And I agree with you Tyler in that personal relationships are hard. From what I’ve seen, it seems to be rather difficult for big churches to stay effective with everyone in the church. There’s just too many people, not to say smaller ones do it that much better. But a large church is just easier to hide in. I like the idea of a church having it in their mindset that if they get to a certain size that they break into multiple churches and have people go to a church near their neighborhood. I know this can be a stretch for some areas but I think the principle is good.
http://thoughtsaboutnothing.com Kyle Reed

I think she hit it right on.
I think the reason for this is that we can measure the “success” of a new logo, but not of a changed life.
We can ask people what they think of the new design, and get positive feedback on our work, but walking through life with someone is a lot more difficult and confusing.
http://chadsblog.net Chad Harvey

Interesting… I would say that small churches probably get caught up in the numbers game more than most large churches, though. Small churches often seem to have some strange self-righteous attitude about not having as many people at their church. As if that is the way it is supposed to be done. Or, they go to the opposite extreme and they feel inferior to big churches and are constantly trying to replicate what they see at Willow Creek, Saddleback, Mars Hill, etc…

Large churches are usually large because somewhere along the line they figured out how to minister to people in an effective manner. They also typically had a vision for influencing more people.

(I work at a small church, so don’t think I’m hating on small churches… just offering my thoughts)
http://www.jasonyarborough.com Jason Yarborough

Keeping suit with the concept of Image; I have encountered numerous churches whom in their effort to appear “trendy” have seemingly gotten more caught up with Image than People. Obviously the old saying goes Image is everything, but how much are we willing to sacrifice for a brilliant logo/image before we sacrifice having beautiful people?
http://www.stretchmarkmama.com Stretch Mark Mama

She is particularly brilliant, I will agree.

(Oh, I jest.)

—

I wish I could say I have more experience with “life change” than I do with “logo change.” Hence the comment.
http://manofdepravity.com Tyler

I think we all wish that, but the honest truth is that we all tend to prefer something easy (logos) over something time consuming and difficult (life change).
http://manofdepravity.com Tyler

Great thoughts Chad.