Happy Blog Birthday

I've been at this for one year now. Time for a retrospective. What have I done?

In the past year I've posted a total of 389 posts, including 9 posts by my son, Jonathan. I've missed a few days ... but only a few -- and one of those was by design. My goal was one a day, and I've posted enough to fulfill that goal. I've posted on 15 different designated topics, but the truth is that most of my posts don't have topics attached. Of the posts with topics listed, I've done 33 on political issues, 26 on marriage issues, 23 on matters of Reformed Theology, and 18 on hymns, and 14 on worship. Odd that "birds" falls below those, isn't it?

The posts that have engendered the biggest response came from a variety of topics. The top ten are:

1 It's Taxing, Isn't It? (On the equalization of tax rates)
2 Peter's "Likewise" (On wives' submission to husbands)
3 Choice and Foreknowledge (On Election)
4 Safer Ground (On husbands' duties to wives)
5 Age of the Earth Controversy (On Creation)
6 Church Attire (On what to wear to church)
7 Apple for the Teacher (On homeschooling)
8 How Limited is Atonement? (On Limited Atonement)
9 Understanding Men (An insight into how men think)
10 A Question of Immigration (On, of all things, immigration)

Most of the comments have been kind. I can't remember any really mean remarks. (If you left one, forgive me for not remembering.) Not all have been in agreement, but it's always good when we can discuss our disagreements in a friendly way. I was interested, in this review, how scattered the topics were. The roles of men and women in marriage from a biblical perspective garnered some 53 comments, more than any other topic. There was some interesting dialog on the subject of the poor because I appeared to step on some toes. So there was a series of posts over a period of time starting with It's Taxing, Isn't It?, then moving on to The Poor You Always Have With You, and finally to Poor Communication, where I try to clear up some confusion due to my communication errors. I was quite surprised to have Brian McLaren take notice of my little blog corner on this topic and actually attempt some dialog on the topic.

There were some posts of mine that seemed to garner no response, and I was a little surprised. Sure, I understood why my readership dropped sharply when I blogged about hymns, but there were others that I thought would be more responsive. For instance, I took on Dan Barker's Easter Challenge and not a peep out of anyone. I would have thought that a subject like Partaking of the Divine Nature would have moved someone to say something. I thought there would have been some response, based on the current popular Christian perspective, about whether or not God is trying to reach as many people as possible and I said He wasn't. One of my personal favorites was Feathers of a Bird (a play on "birds of a feather", in case no one noticed), but that's probably because I just liked the last line: "You can almost knock Evolution over with a feather." And although I took a "far out" position on the subject of contraception, no one uttered a peep. (Get it? "Peep." Oh, never mind.)

That's okay. I've been pleasantly surprised at my readership. I'm a relative no one in a sea of more than 50 million blogs. I'm not a name that draws attention, and I doubt that a title like Birds of the Air makes people want to sit up and take notice. Still, I've had typically 200 to 300 readers a week. That's not a massive number compared to big blogs, but to me it's huge. I don't know that many people. And maybe, must maybe, some of those readers have been blessed once or twice or convicted once or twice ... or both. Maybe, just maybe some of them have even reconsidered something once or twice. Maybe I'll keep this up, at least for awhile longer.