I don’t know if it’s my daily Flintstones vitamins, but I’m getting a bunch of stuff off my chest… and it feels great! So I’m going to talk about words that I’m totally sick of because they’ve become cliches in Christian circles. Here’s the first one:

#1 – Relevant – Pronunciation: re-l&-v&nt/ Function: adjective – Definition: relating to or bearing upon the matter in hand. RELEVANT implies a traceable, significant, logical connection .

Has there been a more overused word in church circles in the last 5 years? I talk to guys who want to plant churches every week and the word I hear over and over is “We want to be relevant.” That should be a given. The question is, “To whom do you want to be relevant?” Because lots of things that one group might consider relevant is totally irrelevant to another.

“David Crowder style worship is totally relevant!” – To whom? Young adults?

“Hymns are totally irrelevant!” – Again, to whom? I can show you thousands that find hymns very relevant.

“Well, I mean the unchurched (another word I’m going to get to).” – What type of unchurched person? Are they young, old, white, black, Asian, Hispanic? What is relevant to one, at times is completely irrelevant to another.

Am I saying we should seek irrelevance? Not at all. I’m just saying that relevance simply isn’t a category.