It was when I was staring at the lovely photograph of Stormie Omartian, pictured on the cover of her new Christian aerobics video, “First Step,” that I heard a discussion behind me regarding church-ware. Churchware? “Each of the pieces is protected by an exclusive baked-on enamel finish,” one man was saying. “Maybe so,” replied the other, “but I want that big glossy shine.”
Turning around, I saw the men with dueling Communion plates. One held his to the light. It had a glossy shine all right. But then the other held up his plate. And there, I could see, was that baked-on finish. It was going to be a long day. The men had to decide not only on Communion plates, but on a baptismal bowl as well.
I had come to the thirty-ninth annual International Christian Booksellers Association Convention at the Dallas Convention Center thinking I was going to see a lot of books. But here, to my surprise and delight, were not just books, but a cornucopia of all the Christian merchandise that we see at church. As a little boy I collected Sunday school attendance pins, portraits of Jesus, and those hard little Communion wafers that we were given on Sundays. I’d sneak them home from church and put them in my sock drawer to see how long they would last before crumbling.
And suddenly, here I was face-to-face with the world’s largest baker of Communion bread and the company that sells all the Sallman’s head of Christ paintings. Here was the Kingdom Shirt Ministries T-shirt company, famous for altering popular slogans to include a Christian message. One of their new T-shirts read: “For all you do, His blood’s for you.” Here was the company that made Jesus coin holders, and here was the company that made “Bible Story Balloons.” There were Christian nail clippers, Christian combs, the Jesus Saves bumper stickers, and Praise the Lord overnight bags.
Obviously, the little religious bookstore in your neighborhood shopping center does a lot more now than sell books. It makes money off of Christian videos, gifts, cards, toys, and paintings. There are now more than 6,000 religious bookstores in the U.S., doing nearly $2 billion worth of business a year.
Of course, their dominant business will always be books-especially Bibles. The Holman Bible Publishers were there in full force, touting their nearly 500 kinds of Bibles, from the “dusty rose” bonded hand-sized giant-print King James version to the new International Version Read-to-Me Bible, “the little Bible for little hands.” One salesman showed me a copy of “The 10 Commandments of Bible Selling.” Commandment Six is a good one: “Start with a Bible price just above what the customer indicated he is willing to spend and then work down if necessary. . .A Bible is special and customers are often willing to pay a little more than they expected to get better quality.
” But I was more surprised, wandering among the 1,265 exhibits, by the variety of Christian titles. What subject will a Christian book not address? Everything was there-books on sex, nuclear war, knitting, Democrats. One new title read: “Bulimia! Help me, Lord!”
Reassurance came quickly, however, As I moved on, an exhibit in the very next booth caught my eye. There, for sale, was a series of videotapes called “Gospel Bill & Friends,” short, inspirational films about a group of Gospel-loving cowboys who tackle the challenges of the West and hardly need their guns to survive. Now that’s what I call living right.
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