At year 20 of its life cycle, Taycan Church of Newport Beach has finally achieved a total behavior quotient such that it can reliably rise above the charge of hypocrisy and represent itself as the hope of the gospel in the world.
In a bold move that pushes the church beyond theology and into the deepest areas of cultural need, Taycan Church has been tracking the overall behavior quotient of their church for 20 years, believing that Christian behavior has been so bad that the world cannot hear the gospel.
Said pastor Jerome Stevenson, “Jesus told us to peach the gospel at all times and sometimes use words. We finally realized that what matters is not what Jesus did as a dry point of historical reference or declarative theology, but what is happening through us now. How have our hearts and hands changed as a result of experiencing Jesus? Most Christians make the gospel unbelievable by their lives.”
The pastoral team of Taycan church has developed a detailed missional algorithm that tracks tithe contributions, time spent in devotional activities, service activities, church attendance, care for the planet and disenfranchised groups, along with various other good Christian behaviors, and then measures for negative behaviors like greed with money, rage driving, racism, drinking alcoholic beverages too much on weekdays, watching bad things on electronic devices, failing to recycle, and so on. The system then assigns a value for each parishioner. The aggregate score must then rise above the minimum score that pastoral experts have established for "generally good secular behavior." And Taycan church has finally risen above the minimum score.
"Now what Jesus did can finally make sense to the watching world," said pastor Stevenson. "Jesus inspires us to be our best selves, and at Taycan at least we are finally seeing the difference he can make."
Critics have noted that some of the reason that Taycan's total aggregate score improved over the past 20 years is that the truly sinful people left the church for churches that teach the old understanding of the gospel, but that is merely unsubstantiated speculation. Pastor Stevenson is confident that his church has by all metrics improved to the point that Jesus is alive and well in the superior collective of Taycan Church.
