Category: Weblogs

The last few days have been pretty tense in some areas, even amid the celebration of the end of the year.

One of my favorite students of all time (Yes, I have favorites… I mean, that’s just the way life is, eh?) has been learning the hard way how powerful a blog can be. She broke a couple of my rules for blogging and some of her friends gave her the bad-girl slap for it. I think she was just blowing off steam and didn’t expect anyone to read it… or if they did I don’t think that they would care. Well, they cared… and shared… and what was one student’s steam turned into some hurt feelings. Whoops! Now we see why rule #1 is so important.

Rule #1 Don’t ever write something you wouldn’t want your mother to read.
Rule #2 Opinions are like…. bellybuttons… everyone has one.
Rule #3 Don’t throw gasoline on a fire.
Rule #4 Beware of Trolls, learn to love Lurkers.

If you’re noticing some things moving around here, it’s because I’ve started tinkering again. So readers feel free to give a little constructive criticism.

***Editorial note: This isn’t my thing, but I did get tagged which is like a dare and dares are hard to turn down on a Monday morning.***

I (A Meme)
By Adam McLane

I was tagged by Ryan – who was tagged by Len – who was tagged by Andy – who was tagged by mindi – who was tagged by renee – who was tagged by bobbie

I AM: A dad and youth dude

I WANT: to keep chasing my dreams

I WISH: i were braver and bolder and more willing to go with my gut

I HATE: bad habits, dogs who steal from the garbage can, being underestimated

I LOVE: what i do, my family, and creating things that people enjoy

I MISS: irresponsibility

I FEAR: being looked at as "cool" by 7th graders, people thinking i’m a fake

I HEAR: my kids talking to each other and watching cartoons

I WONDER: when life will slow down, when the whole world will be dominated by people buying Sirius Satelite Radio so I can retire, and when the president will call me for advice.

I REGRET: not following through better

I AM NOT: as organized as i’d like to be

I DANCE: as little as possible

I SING: during worship and in the car and that’s about it

I CRY: little, and never in front of others

I AM NOT ALWAYS: serious at the right times

I MAKE WITH MY HANDS: lots of things no one notices, a little site called Youth Ministry Exchange.

I WRITE: much more than i publish

I CONFUSE: about 40 students per week

I NEED: more time to reflect

I SHOULD: be doing yard work right now

I START: a lot of things but finish much less

I FINISH: about 1/3 of what i start

I’m tagging Todd and Kim.

A buddy of mine has chosen a small but cool mission. He’s decided that there are too many mySpace users with crap on their mySpace’s. You’ve seen it… revealing self-portraits… joining sexual oriented "groups," lots of cussing for no reason, on and on.

MySpace has become the proverbial locker room of the internet. People do and talk about things there that are degrading to themselves and well… just plain stupid.

Here’s how it works. Just add Mr. Clean to your "top 8" friends list and clean up your myspace. If we spread out and work together, we can clean it up a bit. Right now, I have to admit that some of my "friends" need some cleaning up.

Read this part too: By this time, I’ve likely been branded "one of those." Not so, I’m no prude. I’m not "the man" out their judging and patrolling myspace or anything like that, I just want to see something that is really, really cool get cleaned up so it can be really, really cooler.

I’m not ashamed to admit that there are some people in my life that I really admire. One of them is our former pastor, Ray Pritchard. He’s not a super fancy guy, and he’s no "church growth expert." But he is a person who simply lives a faithful life obedient to the Father as much as you can expect a man to. From my vantage point, he really lives out James 1:22-25 "Do not merely listen to the word, and
so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it
says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and
immediately forgets what he looks like. But the man who looks intently into the perfect law
that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard,
but doing it—he will be blessed in what he does."

As a member at Calvary, I always looked up to Ray. I don’t really know him personally and we’ve only talked a couple of times, but sitting in the pews week to week for a few years and you feel like you know a guy. What always struck me was that he was seemed confident in who he was… just a man.

Back in the Fall, Ray left Calvary. When I heard that news, as I wrote about back then, I was in a bit of shock… but I always had sensed that this wasn’t the last place for Ray. The shock continued for me when I learned that Ray just felt led to leave Calvary… not head on to greener pastures as so many successful people in ministry seem to do, but just to leave.

I am a lurker of Ray’s blog. Since I served in the youth group when a couple of his sons were growing up, I’ always happy to see news that the boys are doing fine… and better than fine is always a bonus.

But it especially warms my heart to read the joy between the lines as he filled a pulpit last Sunday in Tupelo, MS. You can just sense from his words that he feels at home in the pulpit and any church would be pleased to have him as pulpit supply.

I actually heard someone say "Amen!" when I finished telling the story.
Afterwards someone remarked that I was talking a mile a minute during
that part of the sermon. Someone else chimed in and said, "You had a
lot of ground to cover." When I said I would slow down a bit next
Sunday, a woman spoke up and said, "Just be yourself and bring the
message God lays on your heart." That put a smile on my face.

For me, I need to see this. That may sound so carnal and so selfish or whatever… but I long to see men following and chasing after God with their lives. Not a sprint, but a lifelong marathon.

So, this is a guy I admire.

I’ve been blogging almost 3 years now, and I know a lot of people are just now starting to maintain a personal blog. I also have seen how powerful (good and bad) blogging can be for those of us in "the public eye." So, I thought I would share some hard earned lessons with my reading public.

Blogging is a brand new mode of communication (compared to other forms of media) and it can either be really good for you, or it can be really damaging to you. These rules will help you keep your blogging life happy.

• Rule #1 Don’t ever write something you wouldn’t want your mother to read. Too many people have a false impression that their blog posts are private or that if they haven’t invited someone to read it, they won’t. Don’t make that mistake. If you journal on a blog it will eventually be found by people you know. Everything you publish online is public.

Rule #2 Opinions are like…. bellybuttons… everyone has one. The cool thing about blogs is that it gives you an inside look into what someone is perceiving from their point of view.  The bad thing about blogs is that you are only getting their perception, their raw and unedited thoughts at a specific time. The more you respect others blog opinions, the more happy you’ll be reading their blog. My rule of thumb is that for every opinion I read about something I know, I learn something. Even if I disagree with everything they wrote, I learned something.

Rule #3 Don’t throw gasoline on a fire. I would highly recommend that if you read something about you or your blog or your people that is negative… just do yourself a favor and don’t hit that "comment" button or send that person an e-mail, OK? Just leave it lie. I’ve made this mistake too many times… I’ll see something someone wrote about me or YMX and I’ll want to "vindicate" myself by commenting or dropping an e-mail to the author to address the "attack." The truth is that it is always better to let that sleeping dog lie. I can’t think of a single good thing that has come out of me doing that.

Rule #4 Beware of Trolls, learn to love Lurkers. A troll is someone who reads your blog to get information about you to use against you. A lurker is someone who just wants to read your blog to get to know you. Just know that both are out there.

Kristen has started a blog, appropriately called "Kristen McLane" and you can find it by clicking here. She’s also over on my blog list. I am looking forward to seeing it develop and overtaking me! She’s one of the smartest people I know… wohoo!

Tpyepad has some sort of major malfunction. So my blog is just now coming back online. It’s too bad because I had some great stuff to blog yesterday and I’ve forgotten all about it now.

You know… there comes a time when you sense that something you’ve created is starting to get bigger than you… bigger than you could have imagined because God has taken hold of it? Here’s an example of that.

Less than two weeks before Christmas, a good friend of mine posted a dire prayer request on a youth ministry forum we both visit. Money’s tight this year and their van broke down. It looked like her two young daughters wouldn’t be finding any presents under their tree this Christmas. Sure, Christmas isn’t all about the presents, but try explaining no toys in shiny wrapping paper to a three and four year-old. Read the rest at Amy’s blog, Atypical Musings.

When Derek and I swallowed hard and decided that in our "spare time" (whatever that means to full time ministry people!) we’d begin YMX just a few weeks ago… we had some idea what it could become. As I pray for this little fledgling thing… it’s stories like this that make this little hobby so cool. For a lot of hurting people out there, it’s my continued prayer that YMX will be an extension of Christ’s ministry to them.

I found this on a friends blog. I am loving the free pub for the new site.