Coffee shop uses redemptive ideas without being outwardly “Christian”…
While thinking of a redemptive business, the first thing that comes to my mind is that comes to mind is the idea that the business outwardly uses the name of Christ and scripture in the advertising. While researching more local coffee shops in my home area, I was shocked to see that one of the coffee shops that explains all these ideas of “bringing people together” and “aiding the community with any need” failed to have a trace of anything biblical on their website.
R+R Coffee Bar is located in Massillon, Ohio. Like most coffee shops, (redemptive and nonredemptive), they have a standard lineup of caffeinated and uncaffeinated drinks available to their general consumers. However, when entering their about section of the website, I was greeted with a unique instance. R+R Coffee Bar’s website lists out all the common redemptive and biblical ideas, such as an emphasis on relationship building. The biggest redemptive idea that stood out to me was “to be a place where Love is restored”. The idea of restoring Love is usually associated with restoring a personal relationship with Christ and His children. It was interesting to see that among this idea especially, there was no mention of scripture or Christ.
It was interesting to find that there are businesses and non-profits operating under the same ideas as redemptive businesses without being directly redemptive. It is also cool to see that even businesses that are not tied to a church or trying to have a biblical impact are doing good among the community and do the good things that Jesus commands us to do. It shows that any business have the opportunity to do good in the community and the world.
I think that’s great that R+R Coffee Bar is being redemptive without even trying to be. It’s definitely easy to be outwardly Christian or relating Christ to everything we do, but I also liked how this coffee shop still wanted to follow the idea of restoring love. I also agree that any business can make a difference and be the change in the world to make it a better place.
I love how you brought up the point that even though they didn’t explicitly mention Christ or the Bible, that it was possible for them to exhibit redemptive values. This is a point that most people don’t think about. You can have a redemptive effect on a community, even if your mission within your business is not focused on that.