If you know me, you know that I love to read. As a kid, it started with comic books (The Justice Society of America was my favorite), and The Chronicles of Narnia, and reached its height when I found a wife who reads even more than I do! (our kids had no chance…they all love books)
One of my favorite things to read now is blogs. The only problem was, I don’t really enjoy reading for extended periods of time on my laptop. And then this past winter I discovered something…I actually don’t mind reading on a smaller portable device. For Christmas, one of my daughters gave me the first book in the Game of Thrones series. I finished it in a couple of days and want to know what happened next, immediately downloaded book two to the Kindle app on my iPhone. Then, over the course of the next 5 weeks, book, 3, 4, and 5. So that is about 3700 pages read on something as small as an iPhone screen.
So realizing how much more reading I could do with something like this, I broke down and got an iPad. Well, there was a second much larger reason too…If you’ve ever been in my office and seen my library, think for a minute about how much it would cost to ship all of those books to Ireland. So I’m in the process of trying to digitize my life as much as possible right now…getting all my CDs into iTunes. turning all of my papers into pdf and storing them in Evernote or Kindle, and getting ready to replace my library (it makes me sad to write that).
Now, do the insanity of life over the past few months, (surgery, preparing to move to another country, wrapping up our time in Ithaca, little stuff like that) I actually haven’t read too many books. But I have been reading a number of blogs, much more frequently. Now that I’m not limited to reading on a laptop, that has been a lot easier.
[My two favorite resources for reading on iPhone & iPad are: Feeddler & Flipboard.]
Clearly, we all have different topics we enjoy learning about, that may hold zero interest for anyone else. The topics I tend to gravitate towards are Church Leadership, General Leadership, Behavioral Science, Productivity, and Mac/Tech stuff. (I’m wanting to start reading a bit more about photography, but only have one that I read regularly, and they don’t post all that often.)
So all that to ask you this…I’m looking for some blog suggestions. Who do you read regularly that you’d recommend to others? I’d love to hear your suggestions…please leave links in the comments below so that others can check them out too.
This is a new one I found that I never miss now: http://howtotalkevangelical.addiezierman.com
Why do you like it?
She’s a good writer. She uses words well and talks about church life with complexity and beauty. I think when I look at the blogs I like and read often, most are writers and could write many different things – they just happen to be writing a blog.
I don’t…I generally read, the Globe, the Herald and Gordon Edes at ESPN, and then follow a number of baseball people on Twitter. I have read that a couple times a while ago…I give it another look.
Sports blogs are nice because they’re from a fan perspective, which is usually much more relevant than some of the nonsense you see from newspapers. I’m sure SB Nation has something for the Bills too.
For your benefit, I will refrain from listings all 80+ blogs
that I follow and limited myself to my top favorites (minus the ones I noticed you
already follow). =D
Vineyard Related:
Jason Clark – Jason is a
Vineyard church planter in SW London, UK, as well as a teacher at George Fox
Seminary and a PhD student in theology at Kings College London. He has some great
thoughts and conversations on the church, culture, mission, and theology in
general. (http://jasonclark.ws/)
WordHavering – Writing by Mike Freeman, a Vineyard Boise (Idaho)
pastor, this blog full of amazing “musings/haverings on God, theology, the
Bible and the occasional movie.” While it may sound cliche, I would have to say
that Mike’s style of write is refreshing and warm to the eyes (http://wordhavering.wordpress.com/
)
As I See It… – Marty Boller is the pastor of the Cedar
Rapids, IA, Vineyard church and has been exploring ways to move from focusing
on size of a church building, money in the bank account and/or the number of folks
attending to really, truly following Jesus and being missional to our
communities (http://pastorboller.com/)
Peace Catalyst International – Peace Catalyst is an
organization seeking to “stimulate peacemaking between individuals and between
peoples.” Most of the articles are written by Rick Love, a truly peaceful and
loving man, who severs as a consultant for Christian-Muslim relations in the
Vineyard, USA. (http://www.peace-catalyst.net/blog)
Brambonius’ blog in English – Brambonius is a Belgium
Vineyard guy who writes some eye opening posts about Jesus, Christianity and
the Bible through a European worldview. (https://bramboniusinenglish.wordpress.com/)
Carl Medearis – Carl is an international expert in the field
of Arab-American and Muslim-Christian relations as well as the author of “Speaking
of Jesus” (one of the best books ever!). The thing I love about Carl is his passionate
love for Jesus and the ability to separate the culture of “Christianity” from following
the person of Jesus. Well worth the read! (http://www.carlmedearis.com/blog/)
Others:
Fors Clavigera – James K. A. Smith’s personal blog site with
tons a great articles and reflections on Christianity and the Bible. Note that
James is a Pentecostal Philosopher currently teaching at Calvin College (http://forsclavigera.blogspot.com/)
Jesus Creed – This is a fairly famous blog so you may know
about it…but it is a good one written by Scot McKnight, author, scholar and
professor (http://www.patheos.com/blogs/jesuscreed/)
Storied Theology – Written by Fuller New Testament professor
J.R. Daniel Kirk, this blog is great for learning how to read the Bible through
a narrative hermeneutics versus the typical systematic theological view. (http://www.jrdkirk.com/)
Tall Skinny Kiwi – This is a great resource for learning
about what Jesus is doing around the world, especially within areas/cultures
not normally reached by the traditional church. It is written by Andrew Jones,
a legend in emerging/missional church groups and a really nice gentlemen. (http://tallskinnykiwi.typepad.com/tallskinnykiwi/)
Red Letter Christians – Ran by Tony Campolo, this blog
includes multiple articles and posts by a wide variety of folks including, Jim
Walls, Joe McCough, Brian McLaren, Shane Claiborne, and Christian Piatt. While
I don’t always agree with everything written, it is help in understanding the
wider movement of Jesus in the USA (http://www.redletterchristians.org/)
Thanks for sending these Josh! Especially great to get some of the European Vineyard links…awesome
BTW – here’s another European Vineyard blog site you might enjoy:
“iGod” ran by Andrew Stewart-Darling, the pastor of the Stour Valley Vineyard Church in Sudbury, South Suffolk (UK) (http://igod.typepad.com/godcasts/)