I was heart broken to read about these types of Churches and the message they are sending out.Welcome to the megabusiness of megachurches, where pastors often act as chief executives and use business tactics to grow their congregations. This entrepreneurial approach has contributed to the explosive growth of megachurches--defined as non-Catholic churches with at least 2,000 members--Helping churches grow is a business in itself. There is even a publicly traded company, Kingdom Ventures (otc: KDMV - news - people ), whose sole mission is to help faith-based organizations get biggerIf that doesn't help, they may steer folks to a new book they are about to publish: PastorPreneur, which is hitting Christian book stores this month. The book teaches pastors to think like entrepreneurs; for instance, encouraging them to set up strategic partnerships with nonchurch groups and to use event marketing to draw in new members. For a lesson in marketing, religious leaders would do well to study the success of Bill Hybels and his Great Barrington, Ill.-based Willow Creek Community Church. In 1975, he and members of his student ministry went door to door asking residents what kept them away from church. Hybels then crafted his services to address their concerns, becoming one of the first pastors to use video, drama and contemporary music in church and encouraging a more casual dress code. "Hybels really showed that churches can use marketing principles and still be authentic," says Michael Emerson, a Rice University sociology professor who has studied megachurches. Willow Creek, which has a staff of 500 full and part-time employees, is renowned for its conferences and seminars that teach other churches how to market themselves as well as for its "buzz" events, featuring well-known personalities such as country singer Randy Travis, NASCAR Champion owner and former Washington Redskins coach Joe Gibbs and Lisa Beamer, widow of Sept. 11, 2001, hero Todd Beamer--all intended to attract nonchurch goers. As for the services themselves, Lakewood makes sure to put on a grand show. It has a 12-piece stage band, a lighting designer to set the mood and three large projection screens. The technology will be even more spectacular when it moves into its new home in the former Houston Rockets' stadium "We really want it to feel like a concert," says Duncan Dodds, Lakewood's executive director. Something is working: Church attendance has grown from 6,000 in 1999 when Osteen became pastor to 25,060 today. The main theme of one of these mentioned megachurches is "Find the champion in you" and "you were born to win". It is exactly like going to a motivational speaker, reading Zig Ziglar or Tony Robbins- except God is thrown in there too.I am alarmed at how deceiving this all is. It sounds so good and looks so good. This is what makes it so greiving. Thousands of people flocking to hear what's good about themselves and how to be a winner- what about repentance, what about the sovereignty of God?I can only pray that the Lord will allow good seeds to be planted in non believers at these places and then will continue to grow them somewhere else.Look at these numbers:Church Attendance* City, State Pastor Lakewood Church 25,060 Houston, Tex. Joel Osteen World Changers 23,093 College Park, Ga. Rev. Creflo Dollar Calvary Chapel of Costa Mesa 20,000 Santa Ana, Calif. Pastor Chuck Smith The Potter's House 18,500 Dallas, Tex. Bishop T.D. Jakes Second Baptist Church 18,000 Houston, Tex. Dr. H. Edwin Young Southeast Christian Church 17,863 Louisville, Ky. Bob Russell First Assembly of God 17,532 Phoenix, Ariz. Dr. Tommy J. Barnett Willow Creek Community Church 17,115 S. Barrington, Ill. Bill Hybels Calvary Chapel of Ft. Lauderdale 17,000 Fort Lauderdale, Fla. Pastor Bob Coy Saddleback Valley Community Church 15,030 Lake Forest, Calif. Dr. Rick Warren
