On General Research

I read an article in Popular Science today about how IBM has built a supercomputer that they are going to pit against contestants on Jeopardy. It's going to participate just like a human, with a buzzer and everything, and offer spoken answers. The showcase here is the programming that has to be able to read Alex Trebek's voice and interpret it's meaning, not only literally but also through tone of voice and inflection.

I told my brother, "Why is IBM doing this? They've been losing money for 20 years, it seems like a waste."
He replied cooly: "General research. Companies make money by doing research."

And he's completely right.
Example: NASA spends billions of dollars each year in weird little projects that don't seem directly related to space exploration. Yet NASA projects have given us things like memory foam mattresses and the protective coating on the outside of the statue of liberty.
Bell Telephone in the 40s through the 70s had one of the most successful think tanks in the world- Bell Labs, which created UNIX (aka every modern computer operating system), thousands of advances in electronics, MOSFET amps, C, and all sorts of things that have shaped our very world. None of which, of course, seem to have anything to do with telephone. 6 Bell Labs researchers received Nobel Peace Prizes.
And you know what?
Bell Telephone was one of the most successful companies of all time before it was split up by the government.
Companies get successful by putting money into research.

And you know, it got me thinking.
Think about how much more successful church ministry would be if we invested more into general research?

I've sat through innumerable "salvation sermons". Some have been better than others. But the problem with every salvation sermon is that at the end of 40 minutes or so, they challenge a listener to make a radical, life-changing decision.
That's not something that i think I, personally, would do after a 40-minute sermon, at least not without help from the holy spirit.

Recently in our area i've noticed an increase in general church ministry- there's more outreach going on, which is a good thing. But i still think the church is lacking in the area of community "research": Spending time and money getting our foot in the door by creating community building projects and being generally charitable. Things that have no apparent use for getting people to church. Because when you make something obviously about getting people to church, they won't want to go. Because there's valuable experience and reputation that can be built by "just being there" in the community at every available time.

I want to be part of a church that puts emphasis on that: "just being there", even and especially when it doesn't make sense to "church people". Because just like Bell Labs, you never know when you'll stumble on something that changes the world.