Craig Groeschel:  Edginess or Effectiveness?

Orginally published on Thursday, June 21, 2007 at 6:20 AM
by Todd Rhoades

Craig Groeschel from Life Church had a great post over at his blog yesterday on whether a pastor should try to be edgy or not. It fits in really well with some of the posts we've had here at MMI the past couple weeks (starting with the Chuck Swindoll post on vulgarity). Craig writes: "In the past, I occasionally tried to be edgy just for the sake of being edgy. I thought there was some value in shocking people. While I still agree that it is important to grab and hold people’s attention, I think passion for Christ is more appealing than “edginess for edginess’ sake.” Today, my goal is not to be edgy, but effective..."

He continues:

Some of the videos in Satan’s Sex Ed were considered edgy. But to me—and I think most of our church would agree—they set the stage for the whole message. You can’t judge the effectiveness of the video without seeing it within the context of the message as a whole.

You might ask, “When is edgy effective?” We did a video in the second week of Satan’s Sex Ed that talked about how “sex is sticky.” That phrase is edgy. But it was very effective. In the video we showed me sticking tape to a bunch of people. Each time it picked up part of the person. But after awhile it lost its stickiness. That’s edgy and effective.

Be careful when considering something “on the edge.” We might have “freedom in Christ” in some areas. But we mustn’t let our freedom become a stumbling block for others.

But what about ‘crude’ language?  Read on here...

Any thoughts?

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Hi... I'm Todd Rhoades. I'm a Christ-follower, husband, father and I love to connect leaders with other leaders. Hopefully you'll find something here at MMI you like and will return often. If you want, you can find out more about me or follow my every step on Twitter.

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