Thanks to all of the faithful readers of this blog.  It has been a great venue to float out ideas in a format that is provisional in nature.  Great fun for me!

A blessed Christmas to all.  See you in 2016…if the Lord wills!

We have to include a blog on history.  My go to site is The Way of Improvement Leads Home.  Strong on history, especially American history.

http://www.philipvickersfithian.com/

One of my go to spots is Between Two Worlds.  Justin Taylor of the Gospel Coalition curates the site.  Reformed Christian convictions, but Justin does a good job with his eclectic mix of posts.

http://blogs.thegospelcoalition.org/justintaylor/

We continue with my favorite blog sites.  Today’s is Brain Pickings. 

Strong on literature and the arts.  Secular perspective.

https://www.brainpickings.org/

This week I am going to mention a few of my favorite blogs.  Today, we will start with Jesus Creed/Patheos.  Yes, I am regular contributor there, but I liked it far in advance of being asked to post things.

Strong on biblical studies and cultural engagement.  Check it out at http://www.patheos.com/blogs/jesuscreed/

Taking a short break from blogging (Dec. 10-28).  

During the hiatus browse through the over one hundred topics and hundreds of posts.  And tell your friends, tell your enemies, about what is going on here.

Now that I am a little over two months into blogging it is a good time to thank you for taking the time to stop by, look around, and for some of you, leaving your own imprint by way of a comment.

I am grateful to God, to you dear reader, and to the friends who lovingly hounded me to start a blog.  Chief among that group is Danny Smith. Thanks Danny!

Before I started blogging, I made up my mind about certain practices I would try to keep.   I was an avid reader of various blogs for several years, but noticed a few patterns of some writers.  One deals with valid criticisms readers raise.  It bothers me to see a thoughtful push back of an author’s post and no response.  The following is an actual exchange I had with a blogger over this very practice:

Me: I regularly read your blog and gain much from doing so.

One question and this seems to be pervasive in the blogosphere: When one writes or posts a criticism of someone (as in your case with X) it seems incumbent upon the poster to be ready to interact with readers.  I speak from some experience.  Scot McKnight posted some of my Patheos work [e.g. “An Open Letter to Karl Giberson”], so I made myself available to interact with folks.  There were 100+ comments so I interacted with any comments directed my way.  Even though you are directing folks to someone else’s critique, your post by the critic of X makes it evident you agree with his take.

All this leads to me wondering why you are not interacting with your own readers and their legitimate push backs?

Best, Dave

His Response: I don’t necessarily agree. There are some blogs that don’t allow comments at all, so it’s certainly not a necessity. I do try to be available to comment at times, but other times I just have too much going on to dedicate that kind of time.

At this point I’m glad to just point people to [the critic’s] writing as I think it nicely summarizes each of my concerns.

My Response to His Response: Please bear with me…

I will invoke the ghost of Schaeffer on this one: isness does not equal oughtness.  Yes, lots of blogs do all sorts of things, but that is not much of an argument, is it?

The time issue is certainly understandable, but it seems there is a Christian priority to make space when one invites comment which your blog does.  Rerouting folks to the [critic’s] is of course perfectly fine, but neither one of you has answered the important question of whether you are in disagreement with other important leaders.

Dave

No response

Hi Everyone,

Thanks for your patience, but we are live again after some important behind the scenes tech. stuff.

Dave