Conference consumers?

It is around this time each year that the Christian conference season bursts upon us, and thousands of evangelical and charismatic Christians go off to various seaside holiday complexes for worship and teaching, fellowship and fun.

My own experience of these events in the past has been on the whole very positive. It is not often that many of us get the opportunity to hear gifted expositors like John Piper or John MacArthur, or Alistair Begg from the USA. Bible overviews, (usually from gifted young Anglicans), have opened up the Scriptures as never before for some people. Then there is usually some kind of arena in which missionary societies, Christian publishers and community projects have their stalls and capture our interest. Probably most encouraging of all is seeing Christians of all ages, students, young families and elderly, all mixing and praising God together. Wonderful.

I have to say, though, that from the early days of these events I saw a rather different side of things too. Being involved with Evangelicals Now, different ‘marketing opportunities’ were offered to us by the organisers. Necessary though organisation and structure are to these great events, I was made rather too aware of the ‘doing business’ and ‘profit margins’ side of it all. But though I am slightly uncomfortable with that, it is not what most worries me.