Blogging Is Cool

I came across this very interesting piece on the practice of Christian blogging by blogging veteran Challies.Com, who in turn, was responding to an article with this great title: "Lessons of a Recovering Statistics-Addicted Influence Seeker", posted by Joe over at Evangelical Outpost (another venerable blog). And I didn't realize it at first, but Joe's post was also referring to another blogger, David Bayly, whose post Numbers and Blogging... was the one that started the conversation in the first place (well, that's how these blog conversations tend to go, isn't it?)

Not too long ago, I wrote Why Blog/The Faithful Blogger as a personal exploration of my motives/vision for blogging. Since then blogging has been increasingly taking up my time. And as I have spent more time blogging, I've been mulling over the possibilities of blogging, not only as ministry, but also perhaps, as a means towards starting a new writing career. Blogging on a regular basis has allowed me to hone my writing skills as I have taken on the challenge of writing on some heavy topics: spiritual warfare, the search for truth, what kind of legacy we may leave behind, and becoming a moral being, among others. I've even tried my hand at a little humor (Homeless Riff, Blogger Blues, Getting To Know the Real You). If I decide to maintain blogging as a not-for-profit pursuit, I nevertheless will have improved my writing skills, explored many issues more deeply (and in the process have gained some insight into them), maybe caused a few people too laugh (or yelp), and made a few new friends (enemies?) along the way. A worthwhile endeavor, if you ask me.

It's a challenge to work on blogging, though, and at the same time, keep up with my dedication to my other passion, songwriting. Still, it seems that the more busy people become (at least when their productivity is driven by the Spirit and by their passion), the more efficient and prolific they seem to get. I mean, the other day, I came across a blogging pastor who is also a tri-athlete (My word!). And when I click on many blogger's profiles, I find quite often that they are lawyers or professors! So it seems to me you can be quite the busy person and yet manage to make time to blog (and blog well, I might add).

As I mentioned, another great benefit of blogging is making new friends; finding like-minded people (and perhaps also making friends with those outside my particular "circle"). Well, at least there is the potential for making friends! I have been encountering some cool people lately whom it would be great to get to know better. That's one reason I'm excited about the God Blog Con '05, if Lord-willing, I get a chance to go. I look forward to meeting personally some of the terrific bloggers I've been reading, and coming back with new ideas and inspiration for blogging!

P.S. I came across yet another excellent take on blogging called Blogging About Blogging: Why I Blog on The Dawn Treader's site.