For far too long the church of Christ has labored under all sorts of almost superstitious taboos. The unhappy result? Church growth has been stifled. This month, our club is going to attack some of those growth-inhibiting boxes into which we have placed ourselves as we ponder a little item found in . . .

I like to confess my ignorance right up front - and I have boatloads of it to confess. I don’t know a thing about catchy new ideas for new congregations. But I try to learn as I encounter new approaches. And learn I did as I browsed through my online newsletter back in February.

"The Super Bowl is this weekend and one lucky woman in Maryland is ready! All first-time guests who visited Cross Pointe Christian Church (Waldorf, MD) Jan. 8-29 were entitled to enter a drawing for a new home theater system including a multimedia projector, stereo VCR, and HDTV projector screen. Regular attenders who brought a guest could also enter the drawing. Donna Bass, who visited the church for the first time this past Sunday, entered the drawing and won the prize."

Come to church for a chance to win BIG PRIZES! You know this will work in our culture. It works at department stores, automobile dealerships, and all manner of merchandisers. So you think it will work for churches. And apparently, it did. According to the "lead pastor" of the church:

"The drawing created a buzz in the church, and we did see a number of first-time visitors from the event. Currently we run around 40 people on a Sunday morning, and this event brought in about 20 first-time visitors, so we see it as a huge success."

Now before you say, "That’s a lot of expensive stuff to give away for just twenty first-time visitors," you should consider the statistics of the matter. They were able to attract half the number of their congregation of new visitors in just one month. Sure, it doesn’t sound like much for a church of forty, but imagine what that will be when this congregation hits five hundred!

Of course, new, small congregations might have difficulty funding a give-away like this. This particular congregation, we are told, was started in part by closing another church, selling that church’s assets, and using those to start this new congregation.

It’s just innovation, according to the lead pastor, who said, "As a three-month-old church, we are continually looking for new and creative ways to get the name of Cross Pointe out into the community." And I say, "It worked!"

While this clearly was a good idea, perhaps it is an idea that could be even better. So let’s try to think through this and make some suggestions for improvements.

First of all, why not give everyone who attends church a chance at big prizes? Why limit those eligible for prizes to first-time visitors? There are probably a lot of lazy "Christians" who would drag themselves out of the house once a week for a chance at big prizes. So our first suggestion is: don’t restrict the participants in the church prize program. Remember - everybody loves prizes. If prizes will bring in first-timers, prizes will help retain old-timers.

Here’s something else: I know that whenever I see those ads asking what prize I would like to win, I always think the cash would be better than the new home entertainment system. With cash, you can decide how best to reward yourself. So another suggestion is: keep the prizes cash. Big screen TVs and such things have to be purchased and delivered, but cash is cash. It could even be a direct deposit to the accounts of the winners. I bet a lot of people would come to church for a chance at cash.

But why make it just a chance for cash? Why not give everyone who attends church a cash prize? I know this sounds like paying people to attend church, but try to think outside the box here, please!

But now a problem presents itself. How long can you pay everyone for coming to church without depleting all your funds? We can’t just keep closing churches and selling the property. Eventually, that pyramid scheme would break down.

Of course, we could keep taking up offerings, but this is not likely to solve the problem. Would people be stupid enough to put more into the collection plate than they were being paid to attend? (Never underestimate the power and extent of stupidity. Consider our welfare state. But even stupidity has limits.)

Having thought about this for some time now, I have a "final solution" to offer for consideration. Perhaps prizes for everyone isn’t the best idea after all.

Instead, we could have numbered offering envelopes available which church goers could use to make contributions to the church. Why would people who need to be paid to attend church put money into the offering, you ask? Well, because each envelope would have a little perforated, tear off, slip that each "giver" would retain. Then at the end of the meeting, as sort of a grand finale to the announcement time, there would be a weekly drawing for a cash prize for one or two lucky, that is blessed, players, er, I mean, givers. Just make sure the prizes are substantially less than the total take - oh, I mean, offering. That way, the house - that is, the church - always wins - or I should say, always has a positive cash flow.

With this, church attendance problems are solved. People will come to churches in droves to "take risks" - after all, everyone now says that Christians should take risks. And those "risks" will pay for themselves and for the expenses of the congregation. Think of it - everyone wins!

I know this will work, and work very well. There are riverboats in Indiana, a whole city in Nevada, someplace in the east called Atlantic City, and many state governments that are devoted to it, because people love it.

So I say, why not use those things to which people are devoted to help increase their spiritual devotion? Come on, now, think outside the box.

A Little Concluding, Very Unscientific, Postscript: I often think I am just making this stuff up to make points using silliness. But in this case, I am nearly behind the curve. I just read a Chicago Tribune report on a Pentecostal Church that is giving away $25 to first-time attenders at their meetings. They are close, but that is costing them a lot of money. My system, should they decide to accept it, would be self-financing. While I don’t think anyone would really do it, you never know. There is a LOT of strangeness out there!