Marketing the best brand – ever
Religiousness: devoutness; extremely conscientious; piety
How can the value of religiousness and marketing be a part of the same post?
Religion gets a bad rap.
Just focusing on Christianity, we can point to endless failures in the religious world. The Christian brand has been getting a beating since the beginning of time. Christians mess up. All the time. Nothing new here. It’s the same-old-same-old.
Denominations slip up, rise and fall. Pastors and leaders in their circle of Christ followers ruin their brand through bad judgment or just everyday sin. Hey – even the first humans chose the wrong tree, destroyed their chances and got kicked out of the best place ever created.
However…
There are God-fearing people who have made a good impact on the Christian brand – they’ve been devout, conscientious and lived a life of piety. (In case you’re wondering what piety means: righteousness; reverence and devotion to God)
The first and foremost has to be Jesus. Speaking in purely marketing terms, He is the brand.
There’s a slim book with a story by James A. Francis called, “One Solitary Life” (with reflections by Ken Blanchard). It starts out like this:
He was born in an obscure village, the child of a peasant woman…
After 28 pages the story concludes with the idea that no human in the entire world has affected mankind as much as Jesus Christ, regardless of his humble mortal circumstances. After Christ Jesus we have all his disciples – the apostles. They lived a pious life and died devout. Their writing and works are found in a book that continues to be a best seller – in all its versions: The Holy Bible.
A sampling of other individuals whose lives made significant contributions to the brand of Christianity and the value of religiousness:
Saint Francis of Assisi – Lori and I were watching a Rick Steve’s travel program where he visited Assisi, Italy and explored the life of St. Francis. St. Francis, born in 1181, gave up his privileged and wealthy life to lead a life of poverty. The Catholic Church was affected by his actions, and an order of religious men continue to do good work today. But if you’re not Catholic, how has this man influenced the brand of Christianity today? Have you ever seen a Nativity scene – a crèche – at Christmas? The beginning of Nativity scenes is ascribed to St. Francis of Assisi because he wanted to bring the story of Christ’s birth to the people.
George Frideric Handel – Three weeks – that’s how long it took this man to compose the 260-page musical Oratorio, The Messiah in 1742. The composition changed his financial life (he went from being in debt to dying a wealthy, celebrated man), but more importantly this musical work continues to be performed regularly. The Messiah is a 3-part Oratorio where first the birth of Jesus Christ is prophesied; in the second part Christ is exalted for his sacrifice; and the third heralds Christ’s Resurrection. Countless recordings exist. The Hallelujah Chorus (from The Messiah) is sung by choirs of every caliber. The Messiah is sung in performance halls all around the world at Christmas and Easter – still today – 250 years after its creation. Whether the conductor or the singers or the audience are Christians – the music remains a glorious representation of the life of Christ.
(The Hallelujah Chorus is found at 1:15:18 if you want to hear it…)
Another positive musical influence is Fanny Crosby – she wrote more than 9,000 hymns – most of which are sung yet today. She met and had influence on the presidents of her day, and continued writing hymns until her death in 1915.
Billy Graham –This man has traversed the world evangelizing the Gospel of Christ and lived a life of religiousness. As the first “tele-evangelist”, his sermons are still on television, and his children and grandchildren carry on the mission. Even the library – created as a walk through the Graham’s life – is an evangelistic masterpiece. When Lori and I visited in March 2013, we signed up to receive their promotional pieces. I marvel at how they market their mission – the pieces are powerful. The Billy Graham Evangelistic Association’s current focus is on reaching Americans with a message of hope.
Religiousness and Marketing
The best any Christ follower can do to promote the brand of Christianity is to live a life filled with devoutness and piety, being extremely conscientious.
Except for Jesus, all the humans highlighted here were not perfect. And for sure, all Christians will continue to mess up.
But the beauty and simplicity of Christianity remains the message of redemption and salvation – the reason Jesus Christ, the son of God, was born, suffered and was crucified, died, then arose from the grave, returned to His Father in Heaven, and promised to come again to take home his bride.
Perhaps, the open invitation for salvation is the real marketing message of Christianity.
Today’s value was selected from the “Devoutness-Purity” category, based on the e-book Developing Your Differentiating Values.
