What should 'Cornerstone' write (in a summary of beliefs)?

Here's the key:  What do you want them to do? ‘Without the imperative, there is no future’: Bledsoe. 

 

 This is important, so I've written something long-ish. ‘Law, Lyric, Evaluation, Fact’: Jordan.

Use these principles:

Dear Cornerstone:

I wonder what Patrick told the Irish, or Ansgar the North—or is that your situation? Are you in the Africa/Jenkins situation of rapid urbanization, in which rural villagers have moved to the city, but want the community of the village, and find it in the church? Or are you in the emotionally burnt-over NY, or the intellectually burnt-over Oxford or Boulder, or (all we all are) the historical memory burnt-over contemporary society?

What do you want?  What transaction are you engendering? Are they buying a box of soap with which to be cleansed, as a first step to maturity? Are you inserting them into the story of redemptive history, are you recruiting a team mate for the Holy War?

Lead with the proof, follow up with the benefits.

People buy cures, not prevention. What disease do they have.

When they’ve read it, what change do you wish it to have made?

Do you want a new community member, someone to play 3^rd violin in the orchestra, a shortstop….what?

Pick someone to be talking to—is the person a college student, a retiree, a young couple with a few children, an executive just transferred to town?

The fellow in ’80,000 churches in 15 years’ targeted priests and imams.  He also had a Gospel shorn of unneeded (and often counter-productive) cultural accretions.  Search the phrase in quotes. http://chuckhartmanhistoryconductor.blogspot.com/2012/10/22-key-points-toward-planting-80000.html

What’s your elevator speech, what you’d tell someone in an elevator in a few seconds after that person had asked you about Cornerstone? 10 seconds.

Can you put it into the framework of JBJ’s Law-Lyric-Evaluation-Fact?

Why do you want THIS person, what’s unique about him or her?  Again, what are the benefits to him or her, what cure do you have, how does only Jesus fill this God-sized hole in that person’s heart?

What BIG thing are you doing for which you need WHAT help? Why? How do you know it’s important? Who told you, how do you prove it?

Why not test?  Do two statements, run them up a flagpole of target audience A and target audience B, and see who salutes?  Then try another statement to use in comparison to the one that works the best? Let your members take the brochures (or message forms, such as links useable in emails, on social media, etc.) and see which works best?

Why are your current members at Cornerstone?  Ask them, video them, or use their written statements to make your comprehensive statement, or video, or radio message.

Look through these free gifts from a master marketer, Jay Abraham, let them shape your efforts: www.abraham.com/gifts.

Let’s run the logical and the chronological.  Your goal is to go to a concert in Chicago. A You’ll need a ticket. B  You want to get there on time, well-rested from a night in a hotel. C You need to get to the hotel the afternoon before, so you’ll need to leave in the AM, D all packed.E   So what do you do.  Having bought your ticket and made your hotel reservations, you pack the night before E, Leave in the AM D, check into the hotel for the night C, get to the concert and present your ticket B, enjoy A.

Or do it eucharistically. Take hold and give thanks. (O Lord, thank you for this time in which we can tell everyone what You have done). Break/restructure and give a new name. (Here are those not in relationship with the Lord that we’ve chosen out, our new readers). Distribute (We make a brochure) with instruction (Read as we give).  They enjoy, Called to come to be Cleansed, Consecrated, Communed, and Commissioned..

Some statements summarized from Abraham, Jay: Risk-Reversal (put the burden on yourself—in selling, that’s a guarantee, a free trial, etc.), Endorsement (Someone the reader respects recommends+). Back-end (what else that they don’t know about now is even better for them (in sales, that’s other parts of your line of products). Not Indirectly, but directly move them to do something (don’t use institutional ads, like a bank—have them get on your weekly update list, or send for a free booklet, etc.—that way you can test responses). Love the new ones, how show it? Test, as above.  Try a couple different ones, and then new ones against the one that does best. What are the Needs of the person with whom you are communicating? Address No One other than the one with whom you are  communicating.  Make it Easy to take the first step. Educate them sufficiently to get them started out of the problem, and you too. Is something Working? (How your present members joined?) Keep doing it.  Why? Give them a reason Why?

+Cialdini, in the highly-recommended book ‘Influence’ lists 6 sources of influence. R-CLASS. Reciprocity, Commitment and Consistency, Liking, Authority, Social Proof, Scarcity.

The Key:  What will Cornerstone be like when this succeeds. Even more, you should be answering the question that might be in the back of the mind of each member of your target audience.  This person might be asking: If I do exactly what Cornerstone tells me, what will I get out of it, and what will Cornerstone get out of it.  Suppose someone is making You a deal.  As a wise businessmen applies the above, he asks: If everything works as you say, what will I get out of it, and what will you get out of it?

What will Cornerstone be like when this succeeds?

Love in King Jesus,

New Charlie

PS: If you can only help 5 new (members, families…) per year, you should be looking for the best 5.  In fact, that could be a headline, and ad for the ad, that gets the attention of the right 5, and in the body of the piece, you can then get Interest, Desire, and Action—what Action do you want these 5 to take?

PPS:  What do you want them to do? ‘Without the imperative, there is no future’: Bledsoe. ‘Law, Lyric, Evaluation, Fact’: Jordan. 

'Change confession form?' and Best Cradle-To-Grave Care Of Souls

A pastor asked for advice about changing corporate confession in worship service.

I wrote:

Dear (Pastor):

For what it's worth, I find that what I memorized years ago in the LCMS is very valuable, NOT for its content so much as for the fact that I HAVE memorized it.

If it were given that most prayers of confession are comprehensive enough, I propose that the fact that it IS memorized, and can be recalled when needed, and can be expanded upon, thought upon with that memorization--THAT'S the important part.

I suggest that if, as I'm thinking you do, you have such a comprehensive prayer, that changing it should only be done for very serious reasons.

I remember that Jeff Meyers once remarked that he had the whole 1941 (?) LCMS service memorized, and still memorized years later.  I think this is very valuable, again, given comprehensiveness. [The ordinaries, the things that don't change from week to week, that's what I'm discussing].

And Leonard Payton's great tape (at the time) on which he said that liturgy is the best care of souls, cradle to grave, and gave the example of the woman in the nursing home who could not recognize her daughter, but who could liturgically worship/participate, that should be taken into consideration.

I've been reading Sacks' 'Musicophilia,' especially tonight the chapter about the man, Cliye Wearing, who could not remember past 7 seconds ago--worse than the case in 'The Man Who Mistook His Wife For A Hat!--but who could remember his musical talents.  IF, I say IF, liturgy is a memorizable piece of music, especially with sung  parts by the pastor responded to by singing--ordinaries--then this is another point in favor of NOT changing, if you have a good one.

And it's a care of souls thing to have sung pastor parts and sung responses, care of enfeebled souls.

And think that if society is a man writ large, how sung history is important. (Yes, I'm working on it! Was it caused by the future, as ERH might be implied by ERH's comment that the past and the future cause the present?)

A thought from pitcher's mound (I didn't play outfield): Think long and hard about changes in the wording, and longer and harder about singing to those you love, your congregation, so that they can sing back....and remember when needed...for the care of souls, cradle to grave.

Love in King Jesus,

New 'Opus 47' Charlie
Amazon link to Musicophila by Sacks: http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=Musicophila+by+Sacks

Comment: Can we stand prosperity? How can we mature unto peace?

I'd say too that, compared to previous times, we are all incredibly RICH in America, just by the fact that there are public libraries, that almost everyone has a device in his/her pocket that gives quick access to a very large portion of the information of the world, etc.  there's no doubt that those with 'money' have always tried to keep down the newcomers--it's a status thing.  But, if McCloskey is to be believed, and the scholarship  seems to be there, the ONLY reason that there has been a stead rise in per capital wealth since 1750is the the bourgeois virtues of the trader/marketer/innovator have been supported, rhetorically and financially, as over against the aforementioned status.  Now that  status seems to me to have become identified with political ower, in that political power is used to keep other down (socialist Kolko 'Triumph of Conservatism' years ago). And war is the health of the state.  Thus, fewer wars, fewer state powers to keep people down. America has been where one could make it big and keep it--but is that true now, as it was? That's the key.  And...Barzun and Creveld and others say that this oppressive piratical infrastructure is failing of both justice and stable money for retirees.  We should be thinking, locally to start, of how to maintain justice and stable money as the state continues declining. Creveld: The Rise and Decline of that State.  That is, had we the empathy we should.  I get NO hearing on this. Peace, Chuck PS: That we can’t stand prosperity…that’s a challenge. A solution? Learn more history, teach it, apply it. Have a vision…

How celebrating The Feast of the Circumcision of Christ may have helped make Big History

How celebrating The Feast of the Circumcision of Christ may have helped make Big History

Short. Oops, not so short!

I started out circumcising Pella’s phallic symbol, and ended up with ‘How To Make Your Communities Better’ aka ‘Pella Square’.  PS is the second in an ERH Big History covenant sequence, and the third in a JBJ Big History covenant sequence.

Background.  Here’s the Wikipedia entry on ‘Feast of the Circumcision of Christ’: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feast_of_the_Circumcision_of_Christ

We were celebrating in on New Year’s Eve, 2005, going into A. D. 2006.

I was in a state of questioning my sanity.

I was going to ask Pastor and Elder.

Why?  We had moved to Pella to get Christian care for Mom. We escaped ‘family’. [Redacted 1].

Brief history: Joined church on July 4. I had the day off, it had been a significant day in our family history.  Mom and Dad were married then in 1936, and we’d moved to Stuart on that date in 1959.

We finally got all moved on Oct. 18.  Louise and I moved to within a few blocks of where Mom was living, in a nursing home/Alzheimer’s unit. Mea culpa in all this. If I had known then what I know now…well, I’m trying with ‘Godparents for Eldsters’ and more.

I call Oct. 18 [Redacted 2]

[I make one significant history statement at the corner of the square, and one in the center of each square.  So far we’ve gone from the southwest corner, July 4, Joining, to the center, October 18, Nuremberg.  This is running together with writing the Heidelberg Catechism on top of the chronology and history. Guilt, Grace, Gratitude, and the 4^th side will add Go Forth, which I have done.]

To finish up Guilt, we move to Mar 3^rd/4^th, A. D. 2005. [Redacted 3]

[Note:  In all of this, Louise was great.  She may remember it differently. She may remember the causes and implications differently. BH is a closed group, nothing sent outside without permission. I give this history so that we can see an example of liturgy, church year, holidays, etc. shaping.  And it is more shaped with each iteration of the holiday.  ERH makes this point/’pont’—bridge in French—in his Universal History course(s).]

So, we turn the corner at St. Wjlesa onto Grace Street in the Heidelberg.

In the center we have ‘Ethics Committee’. ‘They’ thought they were having problems with Mom. More drugs was their solution. We went along, but Louise and a young lady from church did the ‘cares’ the staff was having trouble doing, and  Mom got off the drugs. Nearer the end, she had recovered the imperative. 

First heart problem, living at home: ‘I don’t want to die’.  This was during a discussion at the hospital in Guthrie. Second, during early recovery attempts from broken leg: ‘I don’t want to die yet’.  Third, after off the drugs, ‘Keep me alive.’

Grace Street ends at the celebration of Circumcision.

Going down Gratitude street we have in the center Doctors’ Strike.  At the northwest corner we have Girardean Funeral.  All the abandoning relative praised Mom.

Then we turned south on GoForth+ Street (I remember Pastor Harlow naming it that during ‘counseling’sessions—he remembers it differently). It’s a good name.

As we have ‘GoneForth+, as I have revisited this yearly, with a commemoration that had different guests of honor, it has produced a great ministry/evangelism opportunity that can be used for all the tourists that come to Pella, and for residents.  How To Make Your Communities Better: http://chuckhartmanhistoryconductor.blogspot.com/2011/12/how-to-make-your-communities-better_28.html [Some of the guests of honor: Dr. Stockman in Ibsen’s ‘An Enemy of the People,’ Thomas Szasz, Rene Girard, etc.]

THE CHANGE.  The idea is to trace the history of Pella, on top of the heart of Pella, the Heidelberg Catechism.  At the end, the entrance to GoForth+ Street, we ask how the name of Pella, ‘refuge,’ can best be applied today.  How can Pella have grown in offering refuge.  This is a witness to tourists at Tulip Time, and a uniting question for residents, I pray.

The corners are 1847 (Dutch arrive), 1922/1935-6 (begin sharing with Tulip Time and ‘Souvenir History of Pella), and A. D. 2013 (if it gets started by then). [I don’t know why there is this double underline!!

As with the Mom segment, never mentioned in the proposed brochure, there is history before—in Mom’s case, ‘family’ and in Pella’s case ‘Europe’.

NOW, HOW DOES THIS FIT INTO BIG HISTORY?

I’ve been attempting to Psalmodically Respond in such a way as to conduct (train, , orchestra, electricity) history, as is shown in Psalm 1:1.  God gives us , in effect, in one way of seeing it, the first triplet.  Blessed is the man who walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly.  He show us a response, in effect saying, fill in the blanks.  Walketh not, Counsel, Ungodly. Then what goes with Standeth not, Way….?  Answer: Sinners.  Now try, Sitteth not….?  Seat, Scornful.

I propose that we can [#1 of 3] psalmodically respond by lining out, repeating exactly.  For that, see instructions for building the tabernacle, and the building of the tabernacle.

[#2 of 3] We can respond in Issachar fashion, determining what MUST be done NOW.

[#3 of 3—sodeprehend is the word I coined. Amos 3:7] Or we can say, God builds a house, we should build a house.  Thus, God has shown us the 4-phase sequence in the national revolutions of the West (ERH), as in a great summary in chapter 5 of Gardner’s ‘Beyond Belief’. (I may have obtained the ‘around the square either from his Complete Cross of Reality in the back of BB, or we may have both obtained it from study of ERH.)

My 4 are : Imperative—Enjoy Comprehensive Beauty. Then, Subjective—Pella Square. (See above: How To Make Your Communities Better). Narrative—The Symphony of History, especially Opus 47 (in development): From Creation Speech to New Song, Singing.[General TSOH here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hu38m1EAjrw&feature=channel_page

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iSqBgw03rQo (@ 2 minutes in, history conducted) 

  http://chuckhartmanhistoryconductor.blogspot.com/] Objective (to be taken out in Planetary service) HOST, House of Singing Times, C.E.P.T. Calendar.Engendering.Peace.Tactics.  http://chuckhartmanhistoryconductor.blogspot.com/2012/06/retuned-7x7-pergamoscoram861-calendar.html  Here is ‘rhymed’ many lines/covenant sequences, per: http://members.valley.net/~transnat/erh.html

For the whole ERH analog: http://chuckhartmanhistoryconductor.blogspot.com/2012/11/about-peace-tribe-manual-page-on.html.  ‘About Peace Tribe Manual.’ A proposal for a next institution along ERH lines. Tribe with small enthusiastic groups, but without perpetual war. Chiastic.

For a JBJ 4 step of Law, Lyric, Evaluation, Fact, put TSOH in Lyric.  Here’s the About that I’ve come up with for a next institution:  Godparents For Eldsters, Words 5 and 8 after the waiting of Word 4, with Jeremiah Time. http://chuckhartmanhistoryconductor.blogspot.com/2012/11/about-nursing-home-godparents-for.html and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MTmNj56vF_A&feature=youtu.be and http://godparentsforeldsters.blogspot.com/

CONCLUSION: Liturgy shapes.  So do holidays, when the whole people celebrates one thing, at one time, together. That’s why I wrote the liturgy onto the coram.  And the process was herovolutionary: http://chuckhartmanhistoryconductor.blogspot.com/2012/08/better-herovolution.html

PS: I don’t want this deleted from the files, and I won’t put it out in public, so I make this long post.  I apologize, but it’s worth it. I post on chuckhartmanhistoryconductor.

PPS: [Redacted 4] Consider the 5^th Word.