Blogging legend Tim Challies has just announced he is writing his second book. It will be published by Zondervan in 2011:

The book’s working title is The Next Story. I’m really pleased with the title, but it does have a downside in that it is remarkably difficult to pronounce (try saying it out loud). It is a book about technology in general and digital technology in particular. Even the least technical among us are being pressed from all sides by technology. Like it or not, we rely upon it in unprecedented ways. Many people feel that they are analog creatures in a digital world. Christians are beginning to awaken to this reality and are trying to think critically and biblically about many new realities brought about by technological developments.

via The Next Story (The Next Book) .

Tim Challies has started a new blog over at the Gospel Coalition. He calls it 10 Million Words. His goal? To review from a Christian perspective every book that appears on the New York Times bestselling non-fiction books list in 2010. To warm up, he has started doing some already. The guy is a phenomena. Here is how he introduces it:

My wife thinks I’m a little bit crazy, I’m sure of it. During eleven years of marriage I’ve done a lot of things that have led her to roll her eyes and sigh. I guess she is getting used to it, though, because even she is interested in what I am planning to do in 2010. I plan to read all of the New York Times bestselling books over the course of the whole year. Do the math and you’ll see that this will come in at somewhere around 10 million words . . .

America’s bestselling books tell us, I’m sure, who America is, who her people are, at this time and place. Surely they will give me a glimpse into the world’s most powerful, the world’s most fascinating nation . . . They will provide, I’m sure, a snapshot of where America is at as she enters a new decade.

If my series on the gifts of the Holy Spirit, which is now finished, has left you wanting to know more, then I encourage you to listen to three talks from my friend, Joel Virgo. Joel leads the Brighton Newfrontiers church, CCK. His first talk speaks about something I have blogged about previously, apostles today. The second goes through some of the gifts, and in the third he speaks about how the gifts can operate in meetings.

Joel argues for a different approach, depending on the size of the congregation, saying “the bigger the number of people in the room, the more important the leadership gift becomes in that meeting.” He believes that the ideal size of meeting for the gifts to freely operate is around 100, although that does not mean they can’t be used at all in larger or smaller meetings.

Also, there is one talk that I recommend more than any other if you are now eager to receive more of the Holy Spirit. Terry Virgo spoke at a Newfrontiers USA event on “How to Receive the Holy Spirit.” You can download the audio, or read a testimony of how that talk led to a breakthrough for a man who had been seeking the Spirit for many years. Terry also has many other useful talks online

John Piper has a number of talks on the Holy Spirit available over at Desiring God. For example, The Gift of Prophecy in the New Testament and Today. Grudem edited a four views book to which Sam Storms contributed called Who’s Afraid of the Holy Spirit. Read how two professors’ theological training had left them ill-prepared to deal with traumatic events, and their resulting journey away from what they called a spiritually sterile tradition to an experience of God’s Holy Spirit. Can cessationists experience the Holy Spirit without becoming out and out charismatics?

Don Carson’s book, He Who Gives Life is a very helpful and comprehensive theology of the Holy Spirit.

Gordon Fee’s God’s Empowering Presence examines every mention in Paul’s letters of the role of the Holy Spirit.

Last, but by no means least, my friend Greg Haslam has recently written a fantastic book on the practicalities of pursuing the gift of prophecy today, called Moving in the Prophetic.

And there, for now, I will leave this subject of the gifts and this blog will move on to other things.

Although I am on a blog holiday at the moment, it gives me great pleasure to welcome my friend and newly published author, Tim Challies, to the blog for the next portion of his blog tour. Today he will answer a question submitted by another blogger.

As I discuss spiritual discernment with other people, one of the questions that always seems to arise is this one:

“Isn’t spiritual discernment a gift of the Holy Spirit?”
The answer to this one is, “Yes, but . . .” Let me explain.

“In 1 Corinthians 12:10 Paul writes about the gifts of the Holy Spirit, and in that list is “the ability to distinguish between spirits.” The Bible provides no further elaboration on this gift and does not tell us all that it entails. Whether this gift is the gift of discernment as we understand it today or whether it is a little bit different we can’t know. What we can know with some certainty is that there is a spiritual gift of discernment in operation today. There is a wide variety of gifts (certainly far more than the Bible lists) and discernment must be one of them. This gift will allow those who have it to identify and expose the spirit of Satan. While all believers are exhorted that they must “not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God” (1 John 4:1), those with the gift of discernment have been given special ability and responsibility. They are equipped by the Spirit to expose the lies of Satan in the teaching of men. They are able to see to the heart of the issues and to see Satan’s shadow behind what does not accord with the Word of God. These people are given special skill and special responsibility in doing the work of discernment. These people are to be a blessing to the Church.

So while this gift does exist, it is important to realize that this does not let everyone else off the hook. I like to draw a comparison to the gift of evangelism. There are some people for whom evangelism comes so naturally. Where some of us are terrified at the thought of sharing the gospel with a stranger, there are some for whom this is completely natural and they like nothing better than meeting strangers for this very purpose. I knew a man who, several days a week, would head to the local train station and stand on the platform for hours, sharing the gospel for five or ten minutes at a time. It was his passion and he woke up in the mornings excited to do this. I can scarcely imagine such a thing! But even though there are some who have been blessed with this gift, it does not mean that the rest of us have no responsibility for the spread of the gospel. All of us are called to take the gospel to the lost. And discernment is similar in that, though there are some who are specially gifted, we are all to practice it and are all to understand its importance to our faith.

So is there a gift of discernment? Yes, there is. But do not allow this to preclude you from understanding discernment and putting it into practice in your life. For most of us, discernment is a discipline, a way of thinking about life and a skill that we must sharpen with constant practice.

I just received the following announcement in my e-mail about a blogging tour that Tim Challies will be taking next week. I have previously highlighted Tim’s book here on my sidebar, and in my review of it, in which I said:

“Tim Challies takes us from the turbulent marketplace of ideas that is the modern western church back into the world of the Scriptures. Sadly, today many people fall into the trap of being naively blown from one wind of teaching to another. Others become so expert at straining out the gnats of what they believe to be error that they are unable to learn from anybody. Instead they believe themselves to be the guardians of “true” doctrine. Tim shows us from the Bible itself how to avoid both errors. Tim’s reliance on the Bible is refreshing in an age when doctrinal pillars of our faith are being challenged by prominent preachers, and there is a constant search for novelty in parts of the Church. This book, like no other I have seen, aims to give ordinary Christians like you and me the tools we need to learn how to discern truth from error. I wholeheartedly urge you to get yourself a copy and read it, and then buy one for a friend.”

RELEASE FROM CROSSWAY

Most Christians are a little fuzzy on the topic of discernment. We know that someone should apply discernment to the media, to teachings, and to important decisions. We’ve heard of discernment ministries, and we may have even used the phrase “the gift of discernment.” The general tenor of our conversations could lead us to conclude that discernment is best left to the professionals.

Perhaps this conversation needs to be re-opened. Leading evangelical blogger Tim Challies initiates the dialogue with his new book, The Discipline of Spiritual Discernment, which contends that discernment is the call of every believer. In conjunction with the book’s release, Challies is taking his message to the blogosphere. His two-week blog tour will start on Monday, January 7th and will run until Friday, January 18th. Watch for Challies on the following sites, and submit your comments to participate:

Jan 7: Evangelical Outpost

Jan 8: Tall Skinny Kiwi

Jan 9: A-Team

Jan 10: Adrian Warnock

Jan 11: Gender Blog

Jan 14: Jollyblogger

Jan 15: Between Two Worlds

Jan 16: Team Pyro

Jan 17: Internet Monk

Jan 18: Church Matters

Tim has written more about his tour and some foolish comment controversy some have been stirring up about his book. All I want to say for now is that a team of professionals built the Titanic. A single amatuer built the ark.

In my interview with Wayne Grudem he said something pertinent to this latest controversy over “professionalism” in the church:

“. . . it is always wise to have a governing structure where the highest governing offices in the church and the highest positions of influence are open to lay people as well as ordained people. The denominations where only clergy have the highest of authority seem to be the ones that are never able to be brought back once they drift into liberalism because the ordinary lay people who have common sense and are reading their Bibles every day don’t have any way to regain control of a denomination that has gone astray if it has that kind of structure.”

—Wayne Grudem

If there is one thing that the discernment debate between the Pyromaniacs and myself has confirmed these past few days, it is surely that discernment is far from easy!! It’s a good thing Tim Challies has written a book on it. I really like the following extract from his book, which I think totally sums up what I think has been happening over at the fire-lovers’ place. Of course, the whole point about wisdom and discernment is that it is very situational, so I am quite sure that some others see things very differently from me on that matter! Please note that I am not trying to claim that Tim would or should side with me in this debate; rather I am choosing to apply these words to the situation at hand as they seem relevant to me.

“It is easy, when attempting to be discerning, to neatly categorize people into two camps: safe and unsafe or good and bad. We then implicitly trust the people in the good camp and entirely reject anything said by those in the bad camp. To do so, though, is to ignore the common grace God gives whereby even those whose views are far different from our own can still be wise and can still speak the truth. While we need to read their words with care and discernment, we can and often should still read their words. We need to rest in the security of the Spirit’s guiding and protecting ministry in our hearts rather than in sheltering ourselves from views that do not always accord with our own.” (Tim Challies in The Discipline of Spiritual Discernment)

Tim then goes on to quote Dennis E. Johnson, Professor of Practical Theology and Academic Dean at Westminster Seminary California, in an article on Common Grace and Theological Scholarship as follows:

We cannot simply compile a list of “safe” authors, stamp them with the Reformed equivalent of imprimatur or nihil obstat, and then confine our reading to them. We must do the hard work of exercising discernment—sentence by sentence, paragraph by paragraph, argument by argument. Facts, insights, perspectives, and methods must all be tested in the light of the principles of Scripture. And we must keep alive our consciousness of dependence on Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. Our safety is not in avoiding the ideas of the unbelieving world; our safety is in union with Christ, who transforms the mind of those who trust in him.

There is hard work to be done in sorting and sifting the teachings of other humans, especially when we realize that we cannot simply cubbyhole the unpleasant or challenging ideas away and ignore them. But this hard work, like other exercise, gives us the necessary muscle tone to serve and lead God’s people. “Solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil (Hebrews 5:14).

UPDATE—February 19, 2008
In January 2008, the following post was identified as the 2nd all-time most popular post with readers of this blog. The 3rd most-read post was “The ESV: A Bible Translation for Everyone?“

This post was an expression of some of my own concerns and frustrations about the blogging world I have come to love so much. I said some things I had been wanting to say for a long time, and it was not a great surprise that the aftermath of this post would lead me to disable comments on my blog a month later. Tim’s book addresses discernment, which lies at the root of many of my issues with the Christian blogosphere and its direction.

***************

UPDATE—November 3, 2007
Phil has now written part two of his reply, and I have responded with a post entitled, “Of Tone, Discernment, and the Charismatic Question.”

UPDATE—October 29, 2007
Phil Johnson over at Pyromaniacs and I have been debating the issues raised by my criticism of him in the comments section of his original post. Just search for “Adrian” using the “find in page” function if you want to follow our specific debate. Phil has also written a new post, “If you can’t say something nice,” and we are debating in the comments on that post.

I will leave this post at the top of my blog for a couple more days as I want to give you all a chance to read it. If you are interested in some of my related thoughts on this subject, you could read the following posts:

• My Visit to the Billy Graham Center
• I Don’t Want Balance, I Want It All!
• My Comments Policy
• Blogging Principles for Christians

Those of you with an eagle-eye will have already noticed that I am publicizing Tim Challies’ forthcoming book, The Discipline of Spiritual Discernment. I doubt that many are surprised that I should want to encourage you to read his book, and I will show in this post why that is the case.

To begin with, however, I want to be very open and honest with you. When I first heard that Tim was writing a book I was actually a little concerned. This may surprise those regular readers who know how much I respect Tim and enjoy his blog. But I still had in my mind an old paradigm where those who are in some way “approved” as trained experts are the ones who should write books. Tim, like me, has no theological degrees. I also know that, just like me concerning this blog, he has been rather surprised by the way in which his readership has grown to an extent he never predicted (and, I should say, to a substantially larger figure than my own). So I was surprised that Tim put his neck on the line still further by taking on the challenge of writing a book.

Tim and I have both been riding a wave—the wave of blogging. In both the secular field and the Christian field, it seems that the most successful bloggers almost all seem to have something in common; they are not “officially trained” recognized global experts in their chosen fields. Perhaps this is because the real experts are too busy to write on a daily basis, or perhaps this is because of a new phenomena in our culture—one with which I’m not particularly thrilled, to be honest. In our 21st century culture there is a growing mistrust of any form of authority and of academics. It is actually rather sad to me that this now seems to be spilling over into the Church, and that it might seem, at first glance, to also include the Christian blogosphere.

One of the most influential early articles discussing the Christian blogging phenomenon was titled, “We Know More Than Our Pastors,” and it embodied this trend. It concerned me immensely. David Wayne summarized this piece and sounded some very valid concerns about it. For me, I wanted almost nothing to do with the concepts outlined therein.

Even as I have enjoyed the way that I have been able to be buffeted in this hurricane called blogging, I have also been somewhat concerned about some of the implications of this new marketplace of ideas. I suppose that, despite these reservations, I remain in the blogosphere because I am drawn to it as surely as a bee is to a flower in bloom, and as the Apostle Paul was to the debating spots of ancient Athens.

I am also here because somebody has to be. I am certainly not here because I imagine myself to be at the vanguard of some modern reformation that will sweep away the “old guard” in the way some bloggers (usually not Christian ones) speak about. I am here because, ironically enough, I see this new media as a way that we can proclaim the old, old message. I am here because, in some small way, I can act as a signpost to direct passing traffic to wiser heads than mine. The more readers I find visiting here, the more I feel the need to both quote and link to others. Whatever the size of your blog readership, that filtering process is the single best gift you can give both to your readers and to the writers of even the biggest blogs. I am pleased that the headlines from several bloggers who deserve to be read more than I do appear in the “Warnie Winners” box in my sidebar.

The blogging community can be thought of as a road system, a library, an ecosystem, or perhaps most aptly of all, a jungle. With no single classification system or map, what is needed are good wise guides. There are precious few of them online.

One such wise guide is surely Tim Challies. I know that he shares many of my concerns about the world of blogs, and has a similar attitude in wanting to support those in positions of authority in the Church rather than tearing them down. I know that he is submissive to others. I like that he respects those, like me, who might differ with him on secondary issues, but firmly join hands on the Gospel. I have also met a godly man called Paul Martin who pastors him wisely. The more I came to know Tim, the more my concerns about the concept of a non-expert writing a book began to evaporate. If the modern world needs non-experts to grapple with the words of the experts and make them more accessible to the rest of us, then those who have been given that gift should be encouraged to find an appropriate outlet, even if that looks a bit different from previous models.

Writing a book is very different from writing a blog, even though the number of words involved in a blog over the years may be just as numerous. With a blog, there is instant feedback, and a chance to easily go back and reword or retract an argument. With a book, not only is it more permanent, it is somehow expected to be more accurate, so the responsibility feels greater. James 3 is ever present in the mind of a preacher, and should be in the mind of a blogger as well. Speaking personally, I have applied it even more strongly to the concept of writing a book, which quite frankly has always terrified me rather than attracted me.

But for some people there comes a time when a book finds them and demands to be written. That is what has happened to the man I am glad to call my friend, Tim Challies. He is painfully aware of the cacophony of voices available online, and the need to discriminate between them. The average member of your congregation might well be either theologically illiterate or have imbibed a watered-down, overly simplistic doctrinal system which he has heard away from your church pulpit. Blogs, mp3s, books, magazines, TV programs, conferences, and radio all compete for the minds of modern Christians. The battle has never been stronger. How should we respond to this?

There are a number of different approaches that could be taken. We could just ignore what is going on around us, which would not be wise. We could, instead, become great experts in the different types of false teaching that are being purveyed. There are some bloggers who seem to have the goal of ferreting out everything that is less than perfect. These are often termed “watch blogs.” The temptation is to take some kind of perverse gratification out of proving others wrong. As the years have gone on, by God’s grace, that temptation has increasingly looked less appealing to me, although there was a time when I frequently delighted in giving in to it.

Sometimes even bloggers with good intentions can fall into the trap of being over zealous in their discernment. I am sure I have fallen into that trap myself at times. But this past week, in reading a post by Phil Johnson, I thought I saw a classic example of someone who had over-reached himself in reacting to some things he had discerned. Now, don’t get me wrong. I share many of Phil’s concerns. I am indeed concerned about some aspects of Willow Creek’s ministry philosophy. Personally, I am not sure how to interpret their recent “repentance,” and certainly was VERY worried to see that they have invited Brian McLaren to speak at one of their conferences. BUT it bothers me that Phil seemed (at least to me) to be implying that Willow Creek has absolutely nothing to teach us. I am sure that if we fail to recognize something as being good and helpful and true, we fail in our discernment as much as if we blindly accepted everything in a naive way. I know it sounds cliched, but we really must be looking for the good in people, especially in those who have not denied important aspects of the Gospel. It is quite correct to say, “I like what this person says about the following subject, and have learned from them, although I disagree strongly with them on another subject.” If, instead, we lump people and whole movements together into an amorphous lump of theological rejects, surely we risk alienating them and, ironically, driving some further away from the truth of the Gospel that I know Phil and I both love.

But if Phil was harsh on Willow Creek, he went on in the same post to be even harder on the charismatics. I mention this because this kind of over-zealous discernment is sadly quite common. Again, quite rightly, he was pointing out the sin in a specific charismatic minister. Also, quite rightly, he was pointing out that due to an absence of discernment this kind of error is all too common in the charismatic movement, and sadly is often covered up. So far so good. And, despite his claim that his charismatic friends would be angry at these comments, I agree! What I struggle with, however, is that he then makes plain that he believes that charismatic doctrine itself is to blame for these sins and the lack of discernment that allows them to continue unchallenged. Phil applies the red card of his disapproval to the entire movement that, despite all its acknowledged weaknesses, I am thrilled to have been part of for decades. Should we use discernment with such a broad brush stroke?

My dear friend, Jesse Phillips, took Phil to task admirably in the comments section and repeated this on his own blog. No one seemed able to answer his arguments that while it is true that some second-order implications which people draw from core charismatic doctrine do encourage gullibility and an absence of discernment, the core doctrines themselves do not need to do so. Phil, in reply, claimed that reformed charismatics were a new breed, and only caused by alien influences on the movement. This is not true. Men like Terry Virgo and C. J. Mahaney and the groups of churches they lead have been around for many decades now. Perhaps these groups are not as visible as they could be, but I know they are also not alone in being committed to a firm grasp on reality and the wisdom of the Bible.

To simply dismiss the entire charismatic movement in just one sentence does not seem a wise response to the fastest growing segment of Christianity. It is not, of course, wrong to disagree with charismatic theology (some of my best friends online are cessationists, like Tim himself, of course), but Phil does not seem to recognize any good that has come out of the movement. It would be like me refusing to acknowledge the fantastic work being produced by cessationists. Much as I disagree with some of the positions cessationists take, I am willing to go so far as to state I learn as much and perhaps even more helpful theology from their teachers as I do from fellow charismatic teachers. Doesn’t discernment require that we identify helpful material even when it comes from those we disagree with on relatively minor points?

There is surely another way to respond to the marketplace of ideas to which we are exposed in today’s church. The single best approach to discerning truth from error is to focus on understanding and proclaiming the truth more (while remaining aware of what is being taught around us). We need to learn to recognize the truth for ourselves by studying the Bible. But we must recognize that we ourselves are not immune to error. We need to ask God for humility wherein we submit ourselves to the views of others and are willing to be taught by them. Indeed, we should be willing to use our discernment as a sieve to strain out the good bits from a mixture of error in order to do so. None of us has a monopoly on truth, or for that matter, error. Some may grasp certain aspects of the truth with remarkable ease, while others of us may struggle to understand it for years. There is, in my view, often much truth in the very ministries of those who we eagerly criticize. We can learn from more people than we like to think we can—provided we have discernment. I am frequently provoked when I read the writings or listen to the teachings of others who come from different parts of the Church than I. This must be done with caution, of course, and requires that I have studied the Bible for myself first. The more we understand the biblical truth for ourselves the better skilled we will become at testing everything and holding onto the good. I love the way Tim says it in his book:

“We can best know what is wrong by first knowing what is right. Experts on counterfeit currency know this as well. They train others first to know the traits of genuine currency because such knowledge will make apparent what is fraudulent. Christians need to dedicate themselves to learning and knowing truth so that what is evil and abnormal will appear obvious. For this reason the Apostle writes, “Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things” (Philippians 4:8). He encourages us to think first and foremost about what is right and true and pure and lovely. In Romans 16:19b he says this as well, exhorting the Roman church “to be wise as to what is good and innocent as to what is evil.” Never does the Bible tell us to dwell primarily or repeatedly upon what is false.

The relationship of truth to error is such that we can best know error by knowing truth. The opposite is not true. People who invest undue effort in concentrating upon what is false will not necessarily be able to identify what is true. By dwelling upon the beautiful truths of Scripture we will subsequently learn discernment. A discerning person will know that he must focus his heart upon what is true and pure and lovely, having confidence that in doing this God will bless Him with the ability to expose darkness.”

Tim Challies takes us from the turbulent marketplace of ideas that is the modern western church back into the world of the Scriptures. Sadly, today many people fall into the trap of being naively blown from one wind of teaching to another. Others become so expert at straining out the gnats of what they believe to be error that they are unable to learn from anybody. Instead they believe themselves to be the guardians of “true” doctrine. Tim shows us from the Bible itself how to avoid both errors. Tim’s reliance on the Bible is refreshing in an age when doctrinal pillars of our faith are being challenged by prominent preachers, and there is a constant search for novelty in parts of the Church. This book, like no other I have seen, aims to give ordinary Christians like you and me the tools we need to learn how to discern truth from error. I wholeheartedly urge you to get yourself a copy and read it, and then buy one for a friend.

I will close by quoting another passage from Tim’s book that expresses well his aim in writing the book:

This book is written for the general reader who wishes to understand discernment, to understand what the Bible teaches us about discernment, and who wishes to equip himself in this discipline. It is not written primarily for people with theological training, though I trust they, too, can benefit from it. Rather, it is written for you and for me—average Christians living in a culture and in a church where it so often seems that anything goes. It is written for those who look at much of what is said and done in the name of Jesus and ask themselves, “How can this be right?” It is written for all those who believe that it is the duty of every Christian to think biblically about all areas of life so that they might act biblically in all areas of life . . .

I do not intend to do the work of discernment for you. There are many books, web sites, and ministries that claim to teach discernment but do so by simply listing all the things you must do and the things you must not do. This book approaches the subject differently and is the result of my studies in Scripture to find the tools of discernment that God provides to us in his Word. And so I will not present a list of ministries you should avoid or endorse, authors whose books you should burn or buy, and music you should not listen to or that you should immediately download to your MP3 player. Rather, I hope to teach biblical wisdom on how you and I can become more discerning. I will present to you the wisdom of the Bible as it teaches us how we can become men and women of discernment. I will present principles you can use as you walk this life distinguishing between what is truth and what is error, what is right and what is wrong.

Few readers of Christian blogs will have failed to come across Tim Challies, the uberblogger who will shortly become a Crossway-published book author. In fact, I’m almost willing to bet that no one will first hear of Tim’s blog through this post. If I’m wrong, do leave a comment to that effect and/or drop me an email! Anyway, Tim has a bit of a tradition over at his place. Unlike lesser mortals such as yours truly, Tim blogs EVERY day. I really do mean EVERY day. Christmas, Easter, summer holidays—in fact, Tim has now blogged for 1396 days without a single day off!

So, like around twenty others, when I saw a group on Facebook dedicated to a campaign to give Tim a short rest, I simply had to join. Then I saw that Tim’s pastor and wife had joined, and for a while, to be honest, I was getting a bit concerned. If one’s pastor and wife are telling you it’s time for a rest, you ought to listen. So, I even offered to send Andrew Fountain round to steal Tim’s PC for a day or two! I know from personal experience how addictive the Internet can be, even when we are doing good things.

Anyway, Aileen Challies, wife of Tim, is also a Facebook friend of mine, and I was therefore really pleased to be able to discover that she had joined the group out of a sense of fun, rather than any real concern about her husband’s addiction to blogging. This is what she said (she’s given me permission to share it):

“You need to understand Tim’s personality. For a long time he was not a disciplined person . . . and his attention span has always been well, flighty? That is one reason blogging has been so good for him. It allows him to stay in web design because blogging, and everything else associated with it, gives him a variety of things happening, which stops him from being bored. It has also been a vital part of his spiritual growth over the last four years. Blogging truly has turned my husband into a much stronger man and husband. He thirsts now after God’s will and Word in a way that he never has in the twelve years I have known him. I’m not sure most people could carry what Tim does with the reading, writing and research, and work, and, of course, family, but it is necessary with his personality! He does read fast, writes in the mornings, from about 8:30 to 10:00 (one benefit of being self-employed) and still has plenty of family time. While I can understand where the concern is coming from (outside looking in) you all really need to spend a day in the life of our family to see that it is not anywhere near what you are imagining!”

UPDATE
My blog editor has started another group on Facebook to campaign for Tim to keep going and not miss a single day! It’s called “I need my daily dose of Challies!” How could she????

Tim Challies has started a series stemming from the seminar he lead at the Basics Conference last week in Cleveland. He has some interesting facts and insights into the medium of blogging and the world we know as the blogosphere. He starts off with these comments:

“I . . .found that there was a lot that was worth saying when I looked deeper than the simple nuts and bolts of blogging. When I dug a little bit deeper and looked at the history, value and impact of blogging, I found all sorts of interesting issues that the church would do well to think about . . . There should be something of interest in this series for all Christians.”

Do pop over to Tim’s site to read the complete series, which includes the following posts:

• Blogging — My Story
• History and Societal Trends
• State of the Blogosphere
• Blogging — Wrapping It Up

Here are some key thoughts from the seminar Tim is giving at the Basics Conference, currently ongoing at Alistair Begg’s church in Cleveland, Ohio. (HT Russell Smith)

Tim begins his seminar by describing the way blogs communicate:

• Blogs are a more PERSONAL means of communication. The tone is informal and conversational, as opposed to books and magazines, which are more formal.

• Blogs are an INSTANT form of communication.
• Blogs are a TIME-STAMPED form of communication. They are organized by dates.
• Blogs are a PUBLIC INTERACTIVE form of communication.

He then goes on to list five things that Christians are doing right on their blogs and five areas were they could improve.

AN OVERVIEW OF THINGS CHRISTIANS ARE DOING WELL IN THE BLOGOSPHERE

1. Community — the blogosphere has helped to promote the resurgence of the Reformed movement.

2. Sanctification — Approach journaling as a spiritual discipline — and as an ongoing discipline. Blogging is more public and less deeply personal, but one gains the ability to challenge others with ideas and have them weigh in on those ideas.
3. Teaching — blogging does provide an opportunity to teach good doctrine, although this is limited by the fact that readers tune out after about 1000 words, or possibly 2000. This leaves bloggers to have to limit the amount of teaching they can bring, so it’s not a great medium for presenting serious ideas, at least not in it’s current form.
4. Information — the blogosphere is nearly unparalleled in its ability to convey information quickly because it’s a network where one affects the other — conferences all over the country are seeing a surge in attendance this year. Blogs are stirring excitement about past conferences and generating interest in upcoming ones.
5. Unity — blogging is a great platform to learn about each other – what makes us different and what unites us. Blogs have been instrumental in bringing together those who are united by the Gospel, but who differ on the finer points, such as reformed cessationists and reformed charismatics who, in the last several years, have made great gains in understanding each other.

AREAS WHERE CHRISTIAN BLOGGERS NEED TO IMPROVE

1. Evangelism — the nature of blogs results in people gravitating to like interests — Christians tend to read Christian blogs, etc. If we are to make a mark on evangelism in this medium, we need to do what has always been done in society in general – filter outward; shine a light there. Christian bloggers may need to write about other things that interest them, while still maintaining their identity.

2. Filtering — there’s been a dramatic rise in the amount of information available to us — too much of it can be a liability. We need to use discernment to filter out the garbage from what is valuable, and also not to give undue time to blogs at the expense of other things, like reading Scripture, praying, reading good books, and other things. Don’t become too narrow.
3. Control — just because you CAN say it doesn’t mean that you SHOULD. What you write may be available on the Internet for a VERY long time!
4. Replacement — don’t find your sense of community online rather than in a local setting — don’t neglect the church and family.
5. Controversy — Nothing generates traffic like controversy, but it isn’t helpful — it’s only malicious. Avoid becoming specialists in discouragement and gossip.

For further information on what’s happening at the Basics Conference follow these links:

• Audios of the general sessions and breakout sessions, including Tim Challies’ complete seminar on “Blogging Your Ministry”

• Videos of all general sessions
• Live-blogging by Tim Challies

This is a short excerpt from a quote on Challies Dot Com which Tim says is entirely consistent with a cessationist perspective. It sure doesn’t sound like the cessationism I love to caricaturise!

“. . . My friend knelt down in the middle of a circle of elders. We anointed him with oil, laid lands on him, and began to pray. Since I had started the process, I was appointed to offer the closing prayer.

As soon as we began to pray, I had an overwhelming sense that God was, at the moment, healing my friend. My arms felt what I can only describe as bolts of fire pushing through them. As I grasped my friend’s shoulder, heat and energy burned my hand. I felt that my one hand could lift all of his 230 pounds to the ceiling or push him through the floor if I wished.

I knew God was healing him. I wanted to shout, ‘We must stop praying that God will heal John and start praising God that He has healed him.’ But I was too astonished, too ensure of my sensations, to say a word to anyone that night. For four days, I kept my experience to myself.

Four days later, after church, my friend beckoned me with a wild grin, ‘Dan, watch this.’ At once, he dashed up a flight of steps. I dashed after him and met him at the top. He smiled, ‘And I’m not even breathing hard.’

‘I knew it,’ I exclaimed, and told him what I had felt a few nights earlier. And he told me, ‘I knew it too . . . .”

Challies had better watch it – he is almost sounding like a charismatic!

“True worship relies on both feeling and understanding, or as Jesus said, on spirit and truth. Worship that is devoid of feeling and emotion will be dead worship, for the God we serve is worthy of feelings that express His worth. It is the very height of hypocrisy to pay lip-service to God when we do not truly feel affection for Him. At the same time worship needs to be thoughtful. While it engages our feelings it must also engage our minds. Our feelings must have their basis in what we know about God so that the more we know about Him the greater will be our feelings of affection for Him.”

Adrian
It is my great privilege and delight to welcome to the blog today Tim Challies. Tim is one of the most prominent of all God bloggers and though he wont tell you his traffic, I can tell you he gets more readers than I do just from looking at his comment section! Or perhaps his readers just like commenting more than mine. Welcome, Tim. As we start can you just tell us a bit about yourself?

Tim
Sure. In fifty words or less? I live in the Toronto area, just far enough outside the city to avoid the pollution. I was born and raised in this area and have lived here for my whole life other than a year I spent in Edinburgh, Scotland. I have post-secondary training in two fields- history and network administration. Despite that, I currently work from my home as a web designer – a job that requires none of the training I received in school.

Adrian
Why do you blog?

Tim
I blog as part of my spiritual disciplines. If I stop walking closely with God I very quickly run out of things to say. And so I blog to ensure that I continue to read the Bible, I continue to seek after God and continue to read good books. If I become lax in these activities my blog suffers. It really is a thermometer that measures my spiritual temperature. If that sounds selfish, so be it!
Of course I also blog because I love to challenge other people and to interact with them. I love people and love to spend time with them, even if only in an non personal setting like the Internet.
Adrian
You are dead right. You know why I started blogging? I figured it would be a good place for me to store clippings of stories and quotes and ideas that might find there way into one of my sermons!

Adrian
How did you get into this blogging thing? And how did your blog come to be so popular? Did you have any particular strategy that you were following in the early days?

Tim
I really just fell into this blogging thing. I began challies.com as a web site to provide family updates for my parents who had moved to Atlanta, Georgia. Every now and then I would put a little article on the site just to share it with them. At some point Google picked up these pages and people began to read them. A few years ago I decided to make the site into more of a blog, even though I hadn’t ever heard the word “blog.”

So to be honest I had no strategy. I don’t know that I’ve ever really done much to publicize the site. At the beginning I suppose I would try to find well-trafficked sites and post comments, but that didn’t seem to work. So I just dedicated myself to writing what I felt was quality content.
There were a couple of topics that I feel drove quite a few people to the site. I wrote an in-depth study of “The Purpose Driven Life” and several articles about “The Passion of the Christ.” These seemed to resonate with conservative Christians. So I suppose these were topics that helped make the site popular

Adrian
So just for the record, do you think that Warnie I gave you helped any? What about being on aggregators or being linked to by any other prominent bloggers? Or were you just in the right place at the right time?

Tim
I certainly appreciated the Warnie award. If you want my honest opinion about whether it helped any, I’d have to answer “not that I know of.” But I also don’t know how people discover my site, so perhaps it did. Regardless, I was honored to receive it and consider it an honor.

Adrian
You mentioned quality content earlier. I couldnt agree more about your content being great, but what do you think makes good content? How can we recognise it? To me it feels like some blogs become popular without much great content – perhaps mine is a case in point(!) A lot of bloggers like you and I dont have any real qualifications, or right to be listened to more than anyone else- no theological degrees or anything – we are just pyjama theologians you and I arent we. Why on earth does anyone listen to us?

Tim
Those are good questions. I sometimes ask the same questions about authors of books. How is it that one author, who really has little to say, gets book deals while another person does not? It does not seem to make much sense, yet that is the way it works at times. Again, I feel the author himself (or herself) is an important factor. I think Amy of Amy’s Humble Musings is an excellent example of a writer whose audience identifies with her (and no, I am not passing judgment on her content!).

As for what makes blogs popular, I suppose there has to be a combination of a topic that is of interest to people and a writer with whom people can feel some type of affinity. In my experience I know that I feel more comfortable reading blogs where I can identify with the author. Obviously the most popular topics among blog readers are politics and gadgets. Almost all of the most popular blogs are dedicated to these topics.

Adrian
Having some affinity with the author, now theres a point. I know for me that there are some blogs I love because I can see traits in the author that I share- sometimes to a lesser degree- but I share them nonetheless. I do love your passion for books for example. When I was young I know I read a lot more books than now but your obsession with reading in the real world definitely helps me want to listen to what you have to say…and there are all kinds of other ways why I have felt that I have some kind of connection to you.

Adrian
Blogging seems to do that to you. People often feel strangely connected to other bloggers they discover, and can begin to think that they agree with them on everything, and almost see them as somehow an extension of themselves. That kind of relationship can look weird to those watching

Tim
Exactly. Blogging is a form of communication that is very personal in nature. It is far more so than books, for example. A person can interact with the blogger and his audience through the comments section. He can almost always email the blogger to communicate his appreciation or criticism.

Adrian
That sense of identification can really take a hold cant it? I remember a time when a number of people actually thought jollyblogger and I were the same person! Did you ever see that?

Tim
I believe I may have been partly responsible for spreading that rumor, even though I knew you were actually two people!

Adrian
You rascal! What was it about us that made people feel that way?

Tim
I think it was based on the “in partnership” messages on your respective sites. I’m not sure that anyone really believed it. Your styles and subject matter are sufficiently different that it would be difficult to believe you were one and the same.

Adrian
I guess the really interesting thing is what happens when people who have made that connection suddenly discover that they DONT agree on everything. Like the day that I dropped a bombshell (for some people!) that I was a charismatic despite being known up to that point as a reforemd bloggger.

Tim
…or the day I admitted to being a closet Catholic! (Just kidding, of course).

Adrian
When it came to jollyblogger and I, we seemed to find it hard to really disagree on things. Our first crack at the so-called charismatic-cessationist debate makes hilarious reading in some ways. We both bent over backwards to try and understand each other, and seemed reluctant to say “I think you are wrong”

Tim
And yet one of you must be.

Adrian
I felt like I begun to understand the moderate cessationist viewpoint so much better that I actually wondered if we DID agree, but simply used different words to describe the same experience. I guess, that kind of convergance (HT Sam Storms!) is definitely one possible outcome of blogging for people. Do you agree?

Tim
I do agree. I think blogging gives us all opportunities to meet people who are like us in many ways, but also to meet people who are unlike us in other ways. It helps us all appreciate the diversity within the body of Christ.

Adrian
I mean, realizing that David was basically a cessationist was shocking, but not as shocking as when I realised after months that as he was a presbyterian he must be a paedobaptist! I mean a charismatic talking to a paedobaptist!

Tim
Presbyterians tend to be that way, don’t they?

Adrian
I know, I know, but I never made the connection!

Adrian
I guess we were agreeing so much on other matters that I could hardly bear to think of myself disagreeing with him.

Tim
Fair enough. As long as the disagreement is handled in agreement with Scripture’s exhortations to kindness and understanding, I don’t know that disagreements are a bad thing.

Adrian
No I think you are right (joke!)

Seriously though, I guess its fine to disagree, but great to do so from a point of being reluctant to get into a big argument, and fearful that you might be understood. I suppose valuing the relationship and what we agree on more than being right and the things we differ over. So I suppose what I am saying is, its fine to disagree, but do it remembering we are brothers and that brothers shouldn’t fight!

Tim
Absolutely. We need to separate the primary from secondary issues. When we agree on the major doctrines we can respectfully discuss the secondary doctrines, even if we do so more from a desire to understand and appreciate than from a desire for conviction.

Adrian
And, disagree with people like we respect them and love them! I know for me, its always easy to imagine my “opponent” in a theological debate obviously hates God and the church and is clearly inspired by the devil or else he wouldn’t be thinking what he thinks

Tim
It is easier that way, isn’t it?

Adrian
Blogging has been good for me because I have been exposed to godly men like you and David and others who disagree with me but are NOT actually my enemies!

Tim
That is what I find so difficult in discussing issues with others. I have come to see not only the value of not only loving the same thing, but also hating the same thing. Yes, we both love Jesus, but do we both hate it when people formulate doctrines that reject His free gift? I find it particularly difficult to disagree with those I admire. The more I admire a person, the more difficult it is to disagree.

Adrian
I cant help but wonder whether that was part of the reason for Pyromaniacs reluctance to really interact over the cessationist issue. Maybe I am being overly analytical but it seemed to me that he had got to know a few charismatics well over the blogosphere, and I guess also he must have heard CJ when he came to preach. Could it be that even the pyromaniac who definitely has “bulldog” tendencies at times felt he couldn’t really bring himself to dispute with reformed charismatics the way he would say with the emergent crowd….

Tim
That is possible. There are certain bloggers who have more to lose than others. A guy like Phil Johnson, as the elder of a prominent church, as the right-hand man to John MacArthur, has to exercise great caution and discernment in what he says and does. His reputation, his church’s reputation, and his pastor’s reputation could all be adversely affected by what he says.

Adrian
Yeh, you and I didnt have a reputation to loose before we started all this did we!

Adrian
I was surprised by his sudden change to a group blog though

I got the feeling reading his reasons that being “out there” and exposed to the hoardes of comments (and he used to get more than you or I) became a bit much due to all his other work.

Or maybe he was just busy over Christmas

Tim
I was saddened to see Phil move to a group blog format, and I say that with all due respect to the people he invited to participate in it with him. I would have preferred to see him go to a once-per week format or similar.

Adrian
Yeah, what is it with some people that they seem to think a blog HAS to be every day for it to be any use?

Tim
I can’t imagine feeling that way!

Adrian
O yeah? I seem to remember a comment about me and David Wayne being delinquent bloggers because we are how shall we say not as regular as you are? Sorry, that makes it sound like we are constipated! Bloggers block perhaps?

Tim
That I have committed to blogging every day has raised a few eyebrows and brought some gentle chastisement. But I feel my motives are pure. I know my personality and know that once I allow myself to become lax in an area, I tend to become very lax. And so I try to blog every day. Blogging is so closely connected to my personal spiritual disciplines that I fear I have a lot to lose if I stop blogging!

Adrian
Just so long as you dont expect all of us to be quite so disciplined! Going back to group blogs, some people think that they are the future of the blogosphere- I guess by the fact that neither you nor I have thrown in the towel we might have different views, right? I think that actually, a group blog can often loose that very intensity of personal reaction that I love about a blog like yours. I come to your blog to read YOUR views, not those of somebody else

Tim
I have also heard that group blogs are the future of blogging. I would tend to disagree. I do think there are some group blogs that are successful, but these seem to be among the minority of blogs. Again we return to the personal connection between the reader and writer. That is easier to form and maintain when there is only one author. Blogging is a perfect postmodern activity. It is a subjective pursuit. A person can blog as he sees fit and still be considered a blogger.

Adrian
What are good conservatives like us doing using such a postmodern activity? I can think of some exceptionally good group blogs though, and the ones I like are ones where the writers have a genuine connection between themselves.

Tim
Precisely. The Together for the Gospel blog is a great example. Anyone who cares to can eavesdrop on the relationship of four men many of us much admire. They have a strong bond already and have chosen to take that relationship to a blogging setting. I think they will do well.

Adrian
Yeah, I couldn’t agree more. That blog DESERVES to do well. I am already in awe of the guys, and then to hear of their reading habits, well it makes your book obsession seem lightweight!

Tim
I’m not a big fan of the word “deserves” and I suspect C.J. would agree with me!

Adrian
Very good! OK. let me rephrase that, I think people will benefit more from reading that blog than many others, my own included and yes yours too!

Tim
Fair enough!

Adrian
Do you think that blogging is a good medium to get the message out?

Tim
I’d say that depends on the message. I do think blogging is a good medium for many messages. The difficulty may be that people do not take blogging as seriously as other forms of communication. A book still trumps a blog when it comes to communicating something serious. Of course with the ability of people to self-publish books this may soon change! But generally I think that people do not take messages communicated by blogs as seriously as they might.

Adrian
Why do you think that is?

Tim
I suppose because in many applications it just isn’t that serious of a medium.

Adrian
I actually think that blogging is better than books for putting across the general cut and thrust of a series of arguments for and against a position. Books can be so one sided

Tim
They can be. And yet they’ve done well for us for the past several thousand years!

Adrian
I think blogging is a good forum for generating a kind of community theology for example or at least for superficially understanding differing positions. I guess what blogging does is reinvent the “pamphlet”

I think that Wesley and Whitefield for example would have had their arguments over calvinism on blogs if they were alive today. And it is possible that they may have gone down the reflective, lets try and understand and interact with each other honestly rather than the polemic “this is what I think so there!”

Tim
Community theology can be both good and bad. Blogs make experts of people who have no right to be understood as experts.

Adrian
Too right people like you and me for example!

Tim
But I understand that a polemic “this is what I think so there” position in a book shows that a person has thoroughly researched and reflected upon a topic.

Adrian
Well it can do, but it doesnt always…..

Tim
When it comes to theology I find that blogging is a good medium to begin discussions that will lead back to Scripture and more thorough study in books.

Adrian
Of course, I do agree with what you said earlier, a blog is a very bad medium for developing an argument more thoroughly. But a book can often get away with portraying people who think differently in a very unfair light. In contrast, I can come onto say a cessationist blog and say something like “but charismatics DONT think that prophecy is on an equal with scripture and authoritative”. I cant do that with a book!

Tim
I would suggest that is more the function of a writer than a medium.

Adrian
Thats true to an extent, but there is nothing inherently interactive in a book format, indeed any kind of interaction has to be imported into it

Tim
I guess what I’m saying is that interactivity may not be what people are looking for. I would rather read a thorough explanation of a particular viewpoint and then read an opposing viewpoint rather than read both in a blog format.

Adrian
I guess, what I mean is that people are forced to interact with what other people are REALLY saying rather than the straw men we all are so guilty of erecting. To be quite honest, before I discovered otherwise through blogging I honestly thought that most if not all cessationists didn’t really believe in any sense of an experiential relationship with God for example. Bloggers from “the other side” have put me straight on that and many other points! Gosh. I am sounding like a blog evangelist arent I
Tim
You are! And I don’t think that is necessarily a bad thing.
Adrian
I am interested in the conversation aspect of blogging, but also the fact that its not entirely a free-for-all conversation
Adrian
For me it is somewhere between the spoken word and the written word, would you agree?
Tim
It combines aspects of both of those, yes. It has the interactivity of spoken conversation but is premised on arguments that are, hopefully, well-formulated and well-written.
Adrian
Weirdly, I often think of my blog posts as mini sermons, where I am declaring a point, but unlike sermons there is the opportunity for almost instant feedback. I think that there is something powerful in proclaiming, followed by an opportunity for discussion.
Tim
Feedback is not only an opportunity but an expectation with blogging.
Adrian
There is something very biblical about that
Tim
And yes, it can certainly be powerful.
Adrian
I think that we are in real danger in the modern church if we conclude that discussion between equals is the best and only way for truth to be explored, however
Tim
I think that you’ve touched on the greatest appeal of blogs. The beauty of blogs, and also the curse, is that any person can have a voice. That means that the reader must exercise great discernment, but it also means that the average person in the average congregation can have a voice within the church. I think it is a beautiful thing. But I also think there are issues that we must wrestle with, particularly in regards to teaching, the biblical qualifications of teachers, and so on.
Adrian
I certainly dont think blogging will ever replace preaching. I believe the task of the preacher is to declare the truth with great conviction (obviously moderating that conviction depending on the subject under discussion). The “thus says the Lord” aspect is crucial to preaching, it can never resound with quite the same strength on a blog. Preaching should only be done by those with a recognised call
Tim
Absolutely. I think there needs to be some discussion about the place of blogging along those lines. Some people have, for example, raised questions about the propriety of men reading theological blogs written by women.
Adrian
There is definitely a kind of blogging that is quite dangerous for just “anyone” to do. I think that the main issue surrounds the declaration of something as “Gods truth” If a blog is raising something as a discussion point that is one thing, but I for one am careful not to get my preaching form a blog! But I do like reading blogs written by preachers
Tim
Absolutely, and I assume most people would agree. As Mark Dever warned a week or so ago, blogging (writing to some extent and reading to a greater extent) needs to be supplementary to reading good books, studying Scripture, spending time in fellowship and so on.
Adrian
What do you feel are the other dangers of blogging?
Tim
As with any pursuit there is the danger of pride. Joe Carter wrote an article several months ago about being controlled by statistics and desiring influence and I think that resonated with many people. It is easy to become prideful. And of course there is the danger of teaching what is false. Anyone who blogs is, to some extent, a teacher and ought to read through the Scripture’s warnings to those who teach!
Adrian
Yeh, I know I have been there at points in the past when numbers got the better of me! These days weirdly the stats when I look at them have the opposite effect on me. I worry instead that I might be leading so many people astray……I think “Who am I that people read this drivell?” Do you ever feel like that?
Tim
I have never publicized my statistics. I do that primarily so people will not judge my site based on the traffic, whether they feel the actual number is a lot or a little.
Adrian
But I am sure you have looked at the numbers…..do you ever feel “O boy, what have I got myself into?”
Tim
When I stop to ponder the numbers I feel nothing. But when I understand that each number is a person, made in God’s image who is reading words I have written, I am humbled and sometimes terrified. Less so, of course, when I have written about social conventions regarding inviting oneself to another person’s house, but more so when I have written about matters of theology.
I often marvel that people read my site, but I suspect that is true of most bloggers and true even of many authors. It is very humbling to me that anyone would choose to take time from his busy life to share in my life through my site. But that is part of the attraction to a blog, isn’t it? It is a glimpse into another person’s life. It is much like peering through the window of a person’s house.
Adrian
Yeh, and I guess we are back to where we were before. I know I sure love looking though your window Tim as do many! What do you think about the future of God blogs?
Tim
I don’t think we’ll see the number of God blogs fall off anytime soon. Blogging continues to increase dramatically and, almost by definition, Christians have a lot to say. So I would expect to see more and more Christians begin blogging. I also expect to see many higher profile Christians begin blogging. Just in the past few weeks we’ve seen Tim Keller, Mark Driscoll, C.J. Mahaney, and Mark Dever join the blogosphere. And I know that some people are pushing John MacArthur to begin a blog, though apparently he has enough trouble with email that he is unlikely to start blogging!
Adrian
I wonder if there will still be room for “nobodies” like you and me, or if we will retreat into the relative obscurity which we probably rightfully deserve?
Tim
Sure, I think there will be room for nobodies. The trouble with being a “somebody” is that the blog either tends to devolve into a circus of comments (imagine if Driscoll allowed comments) or the blog will not allow comments at all. There will always be an attraction to the “true” blogs that allow the interactivity that helps make blogging what it is.
I suppose the real question is what influence blogging will have on the church in the years to come. And I am not entirely sure of that. I suspect we will see Christian leaders arise from the ranks of the bloggers – people who had a blog before they pastored a large church or wrote their first book.
Adrian
Thats an interesting thought I guess. I wonder if we already know any of them? Theres a meme “God blogger most likely to “make it” in the real world?” Should I ask you for predictions? Perhaps not….
Tim
I don’t do memes! But I do think you will see people get their start in blogging. I would imagine they will have to turn to books and conferences and pulpits to really gain credibility. A question I have is whether or not these people will soon outrun their qualifications in terms of education and preparation. At this time I have no predictions, no.
Adrian
One of the things I have thought a lot about is the way that blogging tends to be a good way of sorting thousands of blogs into some kind of order
Adrian
The ranking system of the Blogdom of God is one example
Adrian
The blogs that tend to rise to the top (present company excepted) do seem by enlarge to have some degree of merit. But I also know that there are loads of great blogs that never seem to rise through the ranks. Do you believe in the notion of “the wisdom of crowds” some bloggers speak about?
Tim
I agree. There are some wonderful blogs that seem to “languish.” But we could as easily say the same of various Christians and their finances. If we understand that God is the true force behind the blogosphere we realize that there will not be and should not be parity. The responsibility of bloggers is to be faithful stewards of what God gives them, which in this case is people!
Adrian
yeah, that’s where it really gets scary for the blogs near the top of the pile. We are hear because God has put us here, and therefore will hold us accountable for what we do with our popularity. This is why I tend to want to use whatever popularity I have to give prominence to OTHER blogs or writers- eg in interviewing them.
Tim But, going back to what you just said, I am not sure what you mean by “the wisdom of crowds”?
Adrian
The wisdom of crowds is the notion that the decisions of a great number of people aggregated, especially if those decisions are in part determined by the decisions already made by others will often cause good decisions to be made. According to this model, instapundit is king because it is only right that he should be so
Tim
Then no, I would not believe in the wisdom of the crowds. I don’t know that the majority vote necessarily has a lot of relevance to the Christian life! Humans are far too predictable and fickle!
Adrian
I think that you are right there. Crowds can get it very right sometimes, but they can also get it very wrong!
Tim
I seem to recall what crowds did to Jesus!
Adrian
Yes, and perhaps we would be well to remember that the crowds that currently shower their links and visits on our blogs could quickly turn and crucify us!
Tim
I suppose they could. But I can honestly say that, as long as I was convicted by Scripture (and perhaps a few trusted friends) that I was correct, I would be fine with that. I have prayed that if I am ever in a position where I cannot give God all of the glory for anything that happens to or through my site, that either He take it from me or that I have the strength and wisdom to let it go.
Adrian
You are wise to pray like that. Actually the way that the god blogosphere can sometimes go in for almost public crucifixion of certain bloggers bothers me a great deal does it you?
Tim
The blogosphere is really just a group of sinful people, so sure, they can do great harm in singling out and smiting particular people or blogs. I would hope that people act on the basis of conviction and not just to follow a crowd.
Adrian
I think we must learn to follow both our conviction AND a heart of love that seeks to be winsome, would you agree? What we really need to do is learn to blog the truth in love!
Tim
I can’t disagree with that statement!
Adrian
Thats probably a good place to end. I really enjoyed this chat, lets do it again sometime!
Tim
Sounds good to me. It has been fun!

Josh Harris has a list of links to blogs on his main website. I was greatly honoured to find myself included in such a list and loved the comment about Tim Challies, which I suspect is a reference to Tim’s post on being jealous of Josh for being discipled by CJ. Anyway Josh has chosen some great blogs- anyone want to nominate any of these for the last warnie of the year?

• Between Two Worlds: a blog by Justin Taylor that I find consistently useful, provoking and informative.
• Rebelution: my 16-year-old brothers, Alex & Brett Harris, are out to change the world. I have no doubt they will.
• Girl Talk: a great blog by Carolyn Mahaney and her daughters on biblical womanhood
• Challies.com: this insightful writer and web designer has a killer blog. I’m jealous of Tim Challies.
• Adrian Warnock: a reformed-charismatic brother from the otha side of the pond.
• Al Mohler: a devoted Christian, brilliant man and biblical thinker comments on current events.
• Solo Femininity: a blog by Carolyn McCulley the author of “Did I Kiss Marriage Goodbye?”
• Diet of Book Worms: blogger reviews of various books. A great resource.

Tim has a great post where he is being the Tim we all love. He shares his thoughts from his reading of the ESV Old Testament, and shows in detail the weakness of some of the other translations. He concludes:

“As I indicated earlier, I was grateful this morning that I have access to such a solid translation of Scripture. While I do not know Hebrew, I still have access to an accurate translation of the author’s original words, complete with the phrases, words and metaphors that set one author apart from another. I have access to the full meaning, or as close as I can come without access to the original language, of what was written so long ago. I simply can’t understand how anyone would be satisfied with anything less.”

The comments box includes a question about what readers of the Hebrew would really have understood by the idiom which the ESV includes. The fact that we can even have that conversation and discussion based on an English Bible makes Tim’s point forcefully for him. The beauty of the ESV is it leaves certain points slightly ambiguous. Did the Hebrew readers take the words “rested with his fathers” as meaning a literal rest or simply as death? We can ask the question, we can explore how the rest of the scriptures interpret it, and most of all we can know that the actual words have been as accurately as possible included in this english translation.

Making us do a bit of work and ask a few questions is no bad thing in a bible in my humble opinion. Great post Tim!