Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Blogging....A New Habit Forming!

I want to begin by stating how excited I am to be the Pastor of Trinity Baptist Church in Southaven, MS. I have never had a desire to blog…I enjoy reading other people’s blogs, I enjoy reading our family blog (my wife does such a fantastic job at using it to keep friends and family updated), but with all I have to do as a pastor I really thought of it as a burden to my time. I recently came across an excellent article by John Piper on “Six Reasons Why Pastor’s Should Blog.” As I read that article it rang so true in my heart that I saw clearly the value of spending some time during the week blogging. I wanted to share a some of the reasons that resonated with me as I read Bro. Piper’s article. I will only share the top three but you can read about all six in their entirety at the link below. http://www.desiringgod.org/Blog/1156_6_reasons_pastors_should_blog/

• The first point that really got my attention was that as I pastor I should blog to teach. As I thought about how many hours of study goes into a sermon and all I can give our congregation is 40-45 minutes (okay that may be an understatement) on Sundays. I realized that this is an opportunity to flesh out some of the other things I really need to say from the Word to our people. My prayer is that at times this blog give our people at Trinity nutrients throughout the week, to bolster what they heard on Sunday. This will give me an opportunity to clarify something that I may not have made clear Sunday, or something that I was going so fast you missed. Either way, I want to encourage our members especially to keep an eye on this blog. You can leave me comments or ask questions through email or by responding on this blog…

• The second point that served as a major catalyst was the opportunity to use this as a place to give recommendations. In my life there have been some very dear friends to me that I have never even met. Some of these friends are with Jesus now and I will only meet them when I get to glory. But there are some men who have written books that God has used to encourage, convict and teach me some great spiritual truths. We as God’s people must be readers if we are going to grow, but we must not only be readers we must be thinking readers. There is a minister I know that reads often but he reads without filtering it through the Word of God and it breeds confusion in his life. We must remember that as we read books that they all must line up with THE BOOK. This blog will give me a chance to share with some of you some wonderful books that can enhance your walk with God. It will also be a chance for me to point you to some wonderful web-sites.

• Finally, I will blog to “be known”. I don’t me to be known in a famous way, after all everyone has a blog. I am blogging because it gives our congregation another way to know me. Our Church at Trinity is a pretty large church, it will be very difficult for some people to know me outside the pulpit. But between this blog and our family blog they will be able to know me at another level. I want you to see me, my heart and our family – to be able to know who we are – inside and outside of Church you will find us the same…like it or not!

In short, I can’t promise you incredible writing, I can’t promise you awe inspiring moments, but I can promise you that I will be honored for you to watch this blog and I pray it will accomplish it’s purpose. I look forward to seeing many of you Sunday!

Bro. Chad Everson
Pastor, Trinity Baptist Church

No comments: