"The end

of your search for a friendly church."

No, that one

has been used over and over.

"Where

the distance is worth the difference."

Nope. Overused

to the extreme.

"What

is missing in ch_ _ ch? U R."

Oh, please.

"The small

church with the big heart."

Okay, I'm getting

desperate here. At least that's what I was thinking when I was designing

a new church ad for this newspaper last week.

Church ads

are funny things. Pastors who place ads are trying to convey a message

or an image about their church. They (and I) attempt to present something

in the ad that will single their church out from all the rest of the hundreds

of other churches in the community.

That's not

a bad thing. Most churches really are trying their best to fulfill their

mission and are trying to grow to the next level. It's not always easy

to be original and it's often a difficult task to design an advertisement

that will capture the message and spirit that the church wishes to convey.

When our church

first started, six years ago, a line in our ads announced that we were

"charismatic, evangelical, and liturgical/sacramental." That

generally elicited several types of responses. One was, "Huh?"

It seems that most churches are either "charismatic," are "evangelical,"

or are "liturgical/sacramental," not all three. Folks couldn't

envision how that was possible. Some charismatics thoughts we weren't

charismatic enough and some liturgical/sacramental people considered us

to be not nearly liturgical/sacramental enough. Others had no idea what

any of those three terms meant. To them, we were speaking in unknown tongues

A later ad

proclaimed that we desired to "bring the message, worship and power

of the ancient church to a new generation." Better, perhaps, but

most people, even most American Christians, and most especially Protestants,

are completely and totally ignorant of the ancient church. Many believe

that church history stopped with the death of the Apostle John and started

up again with the birth of their particular denomination or local church.

Not only do many sense no connection to the ancient church, they sense

no connection to any church, including the one they attend. For a goodly

number of these people, it's all about "me, my Bible, and Jesus."

It was about

that time that I did a survey of church ads in the local papers. Most,

I discovered, seemed to be pointed at Christians who were already in a

church. Including ours. Some, to their credit, were not. They were directed

at those individuals and families who had no current relationship with

God or no current relationship with a church family. It's not like the

fishing pond is small, either.

Within a 5.22-mile

radius of our congregation, for example, there are some 5,000 homes. This

means that there are 15,000-20,000 people living within five and a quarter

miles of our building. The vast majority of these people are not active

in a local church. And we are in an unincorporated area, which means that,

for many churches within city limits, the population density is much greater.

So, with this

vast pool of available potential church-goers, why do we pastors spend

so much effort trying to attract people in another church to attend our

church? Habit, most likely. We tend to do what we've always done, even

if it doesn't work.

I remember

talking to one pastor and asking him, "Is your mission to win as

many non-Christians to your church as possible?"

He replied,

with a grin, "No, my goal is to win as many Baptists to my church

as possible. They tend to be better givers."

Hmmm. At least

he was honest.

So, in my dilemma

to write a church ad, I paused and thought about what we shared with our

leaders and congregation that were trying to do at our church. I remembered

that we told our people that we were "building for the future,"

that we were "establishing something for our children and our grandchildren

and for their children and grandchildren."

We bought almost

12 acres of land, which is certainly more than we need right now, and

we built a new building that seats more people than we have right now.

I thought about the struggles of paying for and building a new church

building these last several months. I thought about the sense of pride

and accomplishment when we moved in last November and I thought about

this coming Sunday when an archbishop will come and set the building aside

as "sacred space" for the worship of God. Why did we go through

all this trouble and expense anyway? And then I knew.

I reached for

the keyboard and typed, "We Built it for You - and for your family

and for your friends to have a place to meet God." That's not very

catchy or profound or pithy. But it is the truth. That's our message and

our spirit that we wish to convey.

Oh, and by

the waywe're not trying to win all the Baptists to our church. Even if

they do tend to be good givers.

[Father David

Epps is rector of Christ the King Charismatic Episcopal Church, which

meets at 10 a.m. Sundays at 4881 E. Hwy 34. He may be contacted at 770-252-2428,

at [email protected] or at www.ctkcec.org.]