I liked Scott Goodson’s What Is Your Brand Against? post today in HBR so much that it leapfrogged the whole stack of other things I liked about which I had planned on writing. A quick excerpt should suffice to infect you with equal enthusiasm:

Here’s a modest suggestion: If you really want to show the world what you believe in and stand for, how about telling us what you stand against?

Recently, my agency StrawberryFrog launched a new campaign for smart car that was rooted in this kind of oppositional thinking. We understood that the smart car brand stands for some pretty good things: efficiency, economy, reduced environmental footprint. But put way, it sounds rather dull and predictable.

By defining instead what smart is against — over-consumption, excess, thoughtless behavior — we began to craft a statement with more of an edge. As we boiled down the idea some more, what emerged was a simple yet powerful declaration of principle, stating that we are “against dumb.” It felt a little more gutsy and provocative than your typical ad line, which may be why the campaign immediately drew press attention. At the same time, by giving customers something to rail against (everything from gas-guzzlers to oversized Venti lattes), the campaign created a vocal community of smart car advocates. In a short period of time, the brand more than quadrupled its audience.

Of course the temptation of the nonprofit and church sector is to respond with predictable enemies, e.g., Our organization stands against hunger… Our church is steadfastly opposed to sin… We stand against illiteracy in all its forms.

True but hardly shocking stuff, that.

And it’s true that in many ways it comes so naturally to us nonprofit and church types to talk about what we’re against that we’re often faulted by the world for it. “”You Christians are so negative. You’re anti-everything. And you definitely hate gay people.” In fact, an ad campaign from the United Church of Christ played off this very tendency quite successfully (watch sample “banned” commercial here).

But isn’t this all the more reason to think carefully and creatively (and, I might add, with greater theological precision) about what we really are against?

“Love the sinner and hate the sin,” for example, is a fascinating quote from Mahatma Gandhi, not Jesus, and I’m not sure it’s ever caused anyone to respond by saying, “Ah–thanks! That really clears things up!” and nodding knowingly.

And by saying that we are “against hunger” (or illiteracy, or halitosis, or a whole host of other ills), have we really distinguished ourselves at all? Who, after all, is for hunger?

But if we were to say, for example, that we are against the defacement of the image of God in human beings, we’d perhaps enter into a far more interesting conversation about hunger.

So take a few minutes today to think about what your nonprofit–or you, or your church–is against. I found the exercise quite stimulating and clarifying, ultimately concluding that what this blog is against can be stated in one word:

Professionalization.

Or, to be a bit more long-winded, this blog–and the Whole Life Offering branch of the Transformational Giving family tree–is against the professionalization of ministry, which, among other things, has led a generation of nonprofits to conceive of fundraising as asking for money to support their professional ministers and ministrations.

In contrast, this blog proudly contends, with Ephesians 4:11-13 as its rallying cry, that all Christians are called to full maturity in Christ, with Christian leaders tasked by God to serve the Holy Spirit in that equipping. It contends still further that fundraising should be fundamentally rethought as a way of raising a pool of funds that individuals and groups draw on jointly to finance their shared endeavors to further the cause, with organizations (churches and nonprofits) serving as platforms for, not the doers of, those efforts.

Feel free to practice in the Comments section, below, about what your own organization is against. I’ll be happy to give you feedback on your effort.

And I promise not to “love the poster and hate the post.”