This process became real to both the staff and students of the School of Marketing and Research held recently at the Kona Campus. The Lord clearly called us to go into the local community and find out what the people looked like. Not just the color of their skin, their age and where they were educated, but also how they felt and what they believed. We were to find out their needs and their concerns, we had to find out where they itched and hurt and then report back to the pastors and leaders of churches in the target area to help them strategize for church planting and congregational growth. It was a fascinating process and very exciting to see the growth and change take place in all of us during the twelve week school.
Some students are somewhat apprehensive about the curriculum when they first arrive.
I think the best way to understand the importance of redeeming this discipline is to look at the conversation between God and the prophet Habakkuk also as a process. In Habakkuk chapter two the prophet is told by God to first get the vision and then to make it plain. In the University of the Nations we have a great place to learn how to make a vision plain, in the Leadership Training School. Here students are trained to take the vision God has given them, develop the rationale based on need, identify strategic objectives and develop a detailed scientific ministry plan. That is the realm of marketing, or maybe you understand it better if I call it communication management.