Are Christians influencing our world, or are we being influenced by the culture?

·         Has the Church lost its prophetic voice?

These were some of the issues raised and discussed at the recent Association of Christian Media conference in Johannesburg, which drew together 121 delegates from sixty different organisations.

Seasoned South African newspaper editor, Mondli Makhanya told the delegates how he saw the situation – that since 1994, Christians had retreated from influence. He challenged Christians to present a biblical

response to issues such as poverty and inequality, race and racism, morality, crime, social cohesion,gender issues etc. He encouraged delegates to rise to the challenge of being salt and light in our society.

Patrick Kuwana, Zimbabwean businessman and founder of Crossover Transformation spoke of the 3 to 15% required to shift culture. The content of our message just needs to line up with what God is saying.

The main conference speaker was internationally known writer and speaker, Phil Cooke (www.philcooke.com). Phil is an amazing guy – a working producer from Hollywood

with a Ph.D. in theology! Phil was accompanied by his wife Kathleen (kathleencooke.com), herself an actress, businesswoman, writer and speaker. Together they gave us tools to be effective gospel-communicators, with topics like “Mobilising Media Ministries for Nation-wide Strategies”, “Trust as a Basis towards Transforming People and Society” and “Who’s influencing you? Who are you influencing?” There was a gentle reminder that at one time the Church was the main patron of the Arts, and leading scientific discovery.

 

Digital media have opened exciting new windows to tell what God is doing and Christians are doing amazing, creative things in the media. We were inspired by short videos produced by Philcooke Pictures.

The ACM, representing all the main Christian radio stations, TV stations, magazines, internet and content-providers, certainly has a 3 to 15% reach in South Africa. The challenge is to grow that reach, and to make it more effective. A key component is to support and encourage Christians who are working in main-stream media.(If you know any, please encourage them to link up with the ACM.)

The conference encouraged us to ditch our Christian ghetto mindset. Let’s be like Jesus by doing unexpected, amazing things, as seen in the gospels. For more information on the conference content, go to www.acm.org.za .