Leadership editor Skye Jethani is visiting over 20 blogs today to talk about his book The Divine Commodity. In it, Skye interacts with both consumerism's grip on American culture as well as the artwork and life of Vincent van Gogh and connects the two. In the end, he offers a way to break free of the grip of consumerism by practicing several spiritual disciplines.

As part of today's blog tour, Skye answered a question from us related to his new book:

What do you say to the Christian leader who favors applying consumer-driven principles to ministry because they "work?"

I've heard this argument before–both in ministry books and in discussion with church leaders. I usually have to follow up by asking, "Define what you mean by 'works'?" The response is typically something related to increasing church attendance. "We started offering coffee and flexible worship venues and it worked. Our attendance is up 38 percent." Or, "We did a sermon series about having great sex and we had to start a third ...