One In Jesus

Well, it’s been nearly 11 months now since the blog started. I was barely aware of what a blog is (still not quite sure), but friends kept pestering me to put my writings on the internet. I figured I’d post the stuff I’d already written and maybe post something new every quarter or so.

I was hoping to get a hit a day. It’s now consistently over 250 a day, often topping 300, which is very gratifying. I mean, I just wanted an easy place for people to find the books, and blogging software seemed an easy to way to post them, as I didn’t (and don’t) know anything about HTML coding.

But numbers were never really the goal. Rather, the foremost goal was to help people being made miserable by legalism in the Churches of Christ. Ever since I wrote The Holy Spirit and Revolutionary Grace (still in print!), I’ve gotten letters, emails, and phone calls from people who felt trapped in their home churches, unable to experience the freedom and joy which Jesus died to give us. Continue reading →

Enjoy this.

We’ll consider the theological implications after the 25th!

Well, the pagan New Year’s Day is approaching, and so it’s time for year-end kind of stuff, like this preview.

I’ll be working on the Church Growth series based on Beyond Megachurch Myths for the next several posts.

After that, I’ll be taking on the newly published book Richland Hills and Instrumental Music: A Plea to Reconsider. Some 20,000  copies of this delightful little tome are being sent (free of charge!) to every Church of Christ in the US to help us see how Richland Hills is damned for having an instrumental worship — even those members who continue to sing a cappella.

After that, we’ll reflect on Stanley Hauerwas and William H. Willimon’s classic Resident Aliens and the newly released sequel, Where Resident Aliens Live. This is really good stuff, and I’m looking forward to digging deeply into the scriptures with these guys.

I’m also working up some thoughts on hermeneutics I call the “Third Way,” but I’m not sure how long it’ll take to think through it. And I keep meaning to get to predestination.

Hopefully, without being too rigid, that’s kind of the mix I’ll be presenting — practical thoughts on church leadership, challenges to Pharisaism in the Churches of Christ, and some good theology outside the Church of Christ box.

A few days ago, I asked the readers how often they’d like to see new posts. Some said daily (more more). Sorry, but I do have a church, family, and job. I can’t keep up that pace!

Others like a weekly pace, like Al Maxey’s. But most are happy with the every-third-day pace.

I’m going to keep posting every third day, but will occasionally insert a post on one thing or another, like this question, announcements, and catty comments about New Year’s Day and paganism. Sometimes, I just can’t resist.

I just discovered that my software can give me a list of the posts that received the most hits in the last 30 days. The “Top Posts” window in the right-hand column lists the most popular posts for the last 2 days only, which is hardly representative.

I was really surprised at the results, as (not counting the Index) my books were five of the top seven — and all the experts say people like shorts posts, not 100+ page posts!

But I was even more surprised that my notes on Luke were on the top. I had no idea! And I didn’t even get finished working through Luke (but there’s enough material there for 6 months of lessons — easy). That just might motivate me to finish.

Anyway, here they are —

Index	274
The Gospel According to Luke, Chapter by	184
Do We Teach Another Gospel?	112
Buried Talents	101
The Holy Spirit and Revolutionary Grace	80
Church Growth: Hiring the Right Preacher	75
A Communion Meditation Reflecting on the	72
Is it okay to celebrate New Year’s Eve?	68
Church Growth: Getting the Elders Out of	65
Lessons on Grace: Conclusions, Part 3	62
The Birth of Jesus on Christmas Day	58
Amazing Grace: The Spirit Who Lives In U	55
Amazing Grace: The Spirit Who Lives In U	54
Church Growth: Getting the Elders Out of	47
What’s Wrong With How We Do Church?: Wil	44
Amazing Grace: Conclusions, Part 2	43
Amazing Grace: Introduction	37
The New Perspective: The Theology of Com	32

I’ve set the blog software to publish a new post every third day. I had been posting whenever I wrote something, but I think that sometimes I was posting faster than many people care to read. And so I’ve been trying this every-third-day thing.

Al Maxey posts weekly. Ed Fudge posts about twice a week. RollBamaRoll (my favorite football blog) posts daily or more often.

What pace works best for you? Please comment below or email me. I can go faster or slower. In fact, I’m WAY ahead of pace thanks to time off for Thanksgiving and my surgery.