To Blog Or Not To Blog...

Lately, I have been searching for the reason to blog anymore. I summed up most of my hesitations in a previous post. Then tonight I decided to read a few of my posts from when we planted the church. It was great to have a running journal of what was going on and to see how far we've come. I think blogging is worth it, if just to have an online diary of our journey as a community. It may not mean anything to anyone else, but that's ok. It's much cheaper than therapy. Happy blogging and thanks for the fish!

Best Band Ever

I am sitting here listening to the 5.1 version of the new Beatles remastered cd/dvd "Love". These are still the best songs ever written, and they are the best band of all time. Consider that:

• They recorded everything live, mostly on one track.
• An "overdub" was cutting the tape and piecing it back in somewhere.
  
• There was no such thing as AutoTune.
• They were inventing everything they did.

Right now, I am thankful for John, Paul, George and Ringo. :)

Serinity Now!

My brother Geoff had a great post today that sums up why I am getting tired of reading blogs, and why I am hesitant to blog anymore. There seems to be a formula that has developed in the church blog world and here are some of the current phrases/hype that need to go away:

• Culturally relevant
• Engaging and authentic
• Missionally glocal
• "You will not hear this topic (sex, money, fly fishing, etc.) talked about in any other church."
• "Do NOT miss this Sunday, it will be the biggest, culturally relevant presentation you've ever seen!!!"
• The next week after said Sunday: "You will ABSOLUTELY not want to miss this Sunday, it will totally blow last week away!!!"
• "Don't EVEN think about going on vacation and missing this Sunday. You will not be able to live without it."
• "You will never hear that song done in any other church."
• Relevant environments
  
• Post-modern anything
• We have contemporary worship (what does that mean anymore?)
  
• "If you don't get everyone you have ever talked to to church this Sunday, they will die and go to hell on Monday!" (or something to that extent)

I am sure that I have been guilty of some of these in the past and that is why it has been hard for me to return to blogging. I just want to be real without having to sound like a John Maxwell book...not that there's anything wrong with his books. I just think church can be a place where people learn how to be missionaries in their own culture - without the hype and phrases. People's lives don't revolve around our church service at 11:00 on Sunday morning. The other 6 days are pretty important as well.

Who knows, maybe this rant is from all of the caffeine today and will disappear tomorrow...but I feel better and self-important now!