All I Really Needed to Know to be a Televangelist I Learned as a Used Car Salesman (humor)

The Door Magazine | September/October 2003 | Janet Snider

[AVNative]

All I really needed to know about being a televangelist I learned selling cars. This wisdom was not found in churches or classrooms, but in an oil-stained lot on East Street. These are the things I learned:

*Share only the good things.

*Play on emotions.

*People love gimmicks.

*Never tell the cost up front.

*Numbers DO matter.

*Offer a variety of payment plans.

*Be sure to push extended warranties.

*Remember, pulling out a few dents and slapping on a coat of paint can make anything look good.

*Think out of the box. Why sell standard cars and basic salvation? The money is in the extras. Everyone needs power windows and a prayer cloth.

*Be convincing of your connection with the Man Upstairs by talking to him on the customer's behalf.

*Create a profile of a "poor little old widow woman" and learn everthing you can about her. Note: she is the only previous owner of every used car and she can also be used in fund-raising endeavors. (People have a soft spot for widows.)

*Be aware that every person has potential. You can't always tell someone's income bracket by the way they dress.

*If all else fails, use scare tactics. Convince them if they don't close the deal immediately it may never be offered again.

*Don't fret. Once it's pulled off the lot, it's no longer your concern.

Everything you need to know is in there somewhere. Whether you decide to sell cars or save souls, if you master these basic skills you'll find taking someone for a ride and talking them out of their money will become second nature. And one of the extra perks - you won't even have to change your wardrobe or hairstyle.

[AVNative]

The Door Magazine, alas, though it has an internet site at www.thedoormagazine.com, does not load all its articles onto its site. Not to fear, though. . . I spotted this lil' jewel on page 39 and - voila! - you now get a small part of my snail mail subscription for essentially nada. (OK, so I plugged The Door - what else was I supposed to do?) (wry grin)

Hope this provides an appropriate humor break, and yet on deeper levels, offers more than mere humor. Political animals of all stripes practice many if not all of these things, I fear. Televangelists and used car salesmen, move over! Looks like you have company. . .

[ConservativeMan55]

Bump!

[AVNative]

ping

[bethelgrad]

The Door's pretty funny. Our seminary subscribes to it so I get to read a hard copy for free. Only problem is you can only take the parody so far before it all gets old hat.

[dix]

Sorry, but I am taking this with a huge grain of salt. Not because I am a televangelist, but I have been a salesman for thirty years, and those bullet points need a little work.

[AVNative]

Oh, please do. . . I think this piece is better as a spark for reflection, thought (and conversation) and has limits on being taken too literally. . . That's why I labeled it humor. The Door is, after all, The World's Pretty Much Only Religous Satire Magazine (so it says).

BTW, true fact: some of my best friends are salesmen, and even sell cars, and (gasp!) used cars! So this is not designed to be a slam on honest salesmen (and women), not at all.

One supersized grain of salt to dix's table, waiter!

[punster]

Here's another good one:

The Jewish man comes to see the rabbi. He is really frantic, he wails, "Rabbi! Rabbi! I don't know what my son is going to become. He doesn't seem to be interested in anything!"

The rabbi listens to the man's tale of woe. Finally, he says, "When you go home tonight, put a Torah, a hundred dollar bill, and a bottle of whiskey on the table. Observe what your son does. If your son picks up the Torah, he will become a noted rabbi. If your son picks up the hundred dollar bill, he will become a successful financier. If he picks up the bottle of whiskey, your son will become a drunken bum."

The Jewish man is very happy, because he now has a way to determine what his son will do with his life.

However, a week later, he returns to see the rabbi again. This time, he is even more frantic than before. He wails, "Rabbi! Rabbi! I don't know what I am going to do, I still don't know what my son will become. He came home. He picked up the Torah, he picked up the hundred dollar bill, and he picked up the bottle of whiskey. What does that mean?"

The rabbi gets a very sad look and his face, and sadly tells the Jewish man, "I am deeply sorry, but your son will become a television evangelist."

[AVNative]

ROTFL!

Tale of woe, indeed. . . ((<8

[BibChr]

My favorite Door article ever was titled (I've a terrible memory for numbers) "How to Spend Twenty Million Dollars."

On the left column, it had a bunch of things — start a missionary seminary, fund __ missionaries, build a hospital, and on and on and on. Each had an amount. Grand total: twenty million dollars.

The right column had only one entry: Build a big glass church. Grand total: twenty million dollars.

It was a very on-target sendup of Robert Schuller's Crystal Cathedral. (I call it, less charitably, "The Glass Abomination.")

Dan

[AVNative]

Dan, you probably are familiar with the saying "Those who live in glass houses. . ." (wry Scottish grin)

The Door, started over 30 years ago by Youth Specialties and now published by the Trinity Foundation (Ole Anthony's ragtag group of do-gooders and dumpster divers - said with all love and accuracy) has through the years skewered more Sacred Cows than perhaps anyone else in the country. Touche' on remembering that article!

To amplify a bit more on the "left column" of that Door article: the October 2003 print edition of Christianity Today has an article entitled "Influential Things Come In Small Packages" on pages 52 and 53 - speaking of the legacies of Campus Crusade's Bill Bright, who died recently. Rick Warren's mini-essay discusses the little tools Bright left behind that continue to do a big job for the Kingdom of God. I daresay that these were "left column" brainstorms of Bill Bright. . . Can you say The Four Spritual Laws booklet or the Jesus Film documentary? To quote that late Christ Follower Mr. Fred Rogers, "I knew you could!"