I thought I would...
12 July 2008 Jeff Gill
…try a little post from my iPhone 3G.
That’s all.
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tags: blogging
Rearranging the deck chairs
15 May 2008 Jeff Gill
I moved things around on the edges of the ol’ blog today. The only real change of note is the feed of stuff I think is worth sharing (top right, just under Christine’s latest photo).
There are many people who write more important, more interesting things than I do. Thanks to Google I can share the best of it with you. It tends to be stuff focussed on children’s and youth ministry, some interesting theology, and mind expanding insights from the Archdruid and the Martial Artist. Feel free to subscribe or visit my ninja-themed* shared items page.
*Choice was limited; ‘ice cream’ and ‘sea’ didn’t appeal to me.
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Blogging will turn you into a self-righteous [insert naughty noun of your choice here]
2 May 2008 Jeff Gill
It’s easy. Just make sure your feed reader is stocked with a steady supply of bloggers you agree with. Make sure you cut out most of the non-Jesus blogs so that all your culture comes filtered and packaged like a carton of Tesco Value apple juice. When you are not online, try to be in your church office. It’s comfortable there. Read enough rants conversations about Mark Driscoll/John Piper/Bill Gothard/Some Other Reformed and/or Fundamentalist White Male to be at least strongly tempted to write something about him yourself – nevermind that he’s on a different continent and spends a big chunk of his life trying to connect people with Jesus. Once you’ve got all that in place, sit back and enjoy the slide into becoming exactly the same kind of [naughty noun] that only a few years ago made you think seriously about whether or not you actually could carry on being a Christian for much longer. Don’t think twice about any of this until your 15 year-old throws out a statement like, ‘You don’t like anything that’s different.’ Immediately deny it and try to ignore its truth by reminding yourself that you aren’t narrow like all those other people. You’re just right. You’re a pastor at the hottest church in [your region], for crying out loud. Carry on with some success until you start to prepare to talk to your teenagers about an area or two where they aren’t acting like Jesus. After you have been crushed by the weight of your hypocrisy, you might find repentance is the best tool for re-inflating your lungs.
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tags: blogging,
church,
humans
In case you were wondering
9 April 2008 Jeff Gill
Here are all the sites whose feeds are piped into my Google Reader.
Except that I’m taking a break from a bunch of blogs for a while so I can work more on learning how to write and spend more time reading really well-written words on paper in books. Blogs titles in italics, although I think they are very good, are not being read by me right now.
Friends & Family
i61 – our church
Steve & Gill Houghton – our pastors
To be known is to be loved – our oldest daughter
Youth & Chidren’s Ministry
Children’s Ministry and Culture
Once a Youth Pastor – sharp insights and hard questions about the effectiveness of youth ministry as practiced today
ysmarko – one of my favourite blogs
Other Ministry & Church Stuff
Abandon Image – great ideas, sharp commentary
Access Elevation Blog – behind the scenes of a young, fast-growing multi-site church.
Floyd & Sally McClung – pioneers of missional ministry, pioneering again in South Africa
Jason Clark – pastor of an emerging / deep church in London
One for the road… – groovy guy from Jason Clark’s church
Out of Ur – Christianity Today’s leadership blog
Random Reflections – Greg Boyd – my very favourite blog
Environment, Sustainability & Peak Oil
The Archdruid Report – my second favourite blog – the insights into human beings and civilisations are superb
Design, Illustration & Type
Brand New – the latest rebrandings
Design Observer – if you only read on design blog, read this one
The Dieline – packaging design
Illustration Art – beautiful pictures, sharp commentary
The Johnson Banks Thought for the Week
Marian Bantjes – my favourite illustrative designer
Noisy Decent Graphics – if you only read two design blogs read this one
Martial Arts
Karate Thoughts Blog – karate + human insights
Everything Else
Blue Sky Living – positive (but not cheesy) living
Dark Roasted Blend – daily interestingness
Indexed – life, very cleverly diagrammed on index cards
Seth Godin’s Blog – marketing in the age of t’internet
Museum of Kitschy Stitches – that’s what it is
The Ongoing Adventures of ASBO Jesus – daily comics, not suitable for oversensitive fundamentalists
Strange Maps – that’s what they are
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Essential reading for youth ministers
17 March 2008 Jeff Gill
Design project deadlines and Easter deadlines are keeping me from writing the ten blog posts in my head and adding a new section to the site. Nevermind. In the meantime, all people who are involved with church and teenagers must read this blog: Once a Youth Pastor
Personal experience in youth ministry shows me that the #1 indicator of a teen’s spiritual longevity and commitment is the degree to which parents are involved in their kid’s spiritual development. The #2 indicator is the degree in which a teen connects with an older spiritual mentor outside the youth group.
Got it? #1 is parents. #2 is mentors. That’s the starting point for the reasoning that follows.
Now, what do most churches with “effective” youth ministries do? They hire a youth pastor.
I’ve come to believe that this is one of the biggest barriers to #1 and #2 happening! That’s right. In most places, the presence of a youth pastor is the biggest barrier to overcome.
Also related are these two articles that Christine and I wrote about a year ago: Community and Youth ministry is broken, but should we fix it?
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church,
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Sunday evening reading
9 March 2008 Jeff Gill
Tia Lynn has started a very promising series on God’s design for women at Abandon Image. She starts here with good definitions of egalitarianism and complementarianism. Her second post speaks brilliantly about NOT glorifying the consequences of the curse of Genesis 3. And I love the fourth post about Deborah. It shows the things you can find in the bible when you are willing to put aside your grid and read what the text actually says.
Greg Boyd has written a very good (and long) review of Chuck Colson’s latest book God and Government: An Insider’s View on the Boundaries Between Faith and Politics.
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tags: blogging,
books,
greg boyd,
kingdom of god,
women
Her humps
28 January 2008 Jeff Gill
While we are all waiting around for me to have time to write the next installment in our money story, let’s watch Alanis Morrisette’s rather brilliant satirical cover of the Black Eyed Peas song My Humps.
In that same vein, have a read of Tia Lynn’s article on the book Ten Lies the Church Tells Women and my Seven Cheers for St Paul.
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tags: blogging,
leadership,
music,
silly,
video,
women
Jeff said I have to write again
11 January 2008 Christine Gill
Jeff said that this blog was nothing without me. Jeff said that if I wrote something here our popularity would go through the roof and people would be clambouring, begging, offering large amounts of money etc, for D-Train T-shirts, D-Train coasters, D-Train hoodies and mouse mats…
We’ll See. Maybe I’ll start writing stuff. For now, I’ll inform you all that… I Turned 30 Yesterday.
30!
Shock, Shock, Horror.
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I, Jeffrey Gill, do solemnly resolve...
30 December 2007 Jeff Gill
… to be a better blogger in 2008.
Earlier I blamed Christmas busy-ness for my recent lack of substantive posts. But I must also accept some of the blame because of the amount of time I spend with my 58 blog subscriptions on Google Reader.
So here is my rule for 2008: Write first. I will write something for this here blog every day (pretty much) before I go read what other people are writing. I won’t post an article every day, but I will aim to at least one and preferably two substantive posts a week here.
Happy new year.
Amen.
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