Return of the Tentmaker - The Longtail in the Church

Will the church learn the power of the Long Tail?

If you're not sure what I mean click on Long Tail.

The current church model supports the big head, the front platform, the single mission, the main event. The model filters, surpresses and is often blind to innovation among the masses (hoi polloi). While many churches find ways to transcend the model - the model still rules.

The Long Tail is comprised of radical transparency (click to read the recent Wired Magazine article) and a collaborative platform. This collaboration thing, however, is really new. My generation thinks of collaboration as collegiality (getting along, good vibe). Its really an unconscious emmersion into highly interactive peering. I see and watch it when kids play their online multi-player games and work together looking for glitches and hacking the code.

We don't peer. We don't have the instincts for peering. When we try it we are highly self-conscious. We still lean toward managing and directing. That's not a bad thing - it is just not peering. The problem with managing and directing is that the innovation goes through the single filter/bottleneck. Peering is better able suited for complex, interactive and changing systems (like out world). Managing and directing is suited for a fairly predictable platform with a playbook of pre-set strategies and tactics. Its football in a world playing basketball.

Back to the Long Tail. There is more innovation and world changing power sitting in the pews every Sunday, parked in neutral, while the platform does its thing.

The Return of the Tentmaker is an event to kick the long tail into gear. The current model will continue - and has more good work to do. However, there is an incredible pool of untapped Kingdom power lodged in the tail. We'll show you how to get your tail into gear.

Mark your calendar: May 4, from 10AM to 5PM.

Location: Irving Bible Church (click here - for directions)