Over the last month, my primary activity in life has changed. Instead of being a full time seminary student, holding multiple jobs, volunteering at church and blogging as a student, I now serve as the Associate Pastor of Contemporary Worship and Student Ministries at St. Paul's United Methodist Church. This change means many things. One of them was thinking how my blogging will transition. I spent most of a 12 hr drive thinking about this a few weeks ago and I have some thoughts.
I have always said that blogging should be an intentional activity. Just jumping into it without a plan really just lets your blog be a personal dump yard for random thoughts. If folks in ministry are writing online, they need to have a plan. The internet is part of their ministry. Here are the three areas I identified:
1. The Blog as an Experimental Playground:
Many pastors, especially those fresh out of school, really like to use their blog to flex intellectual muscles. They might be in a doctoral program or part of an existing online community and they want to have a place to show personal study and deep thought.
I know some great examples of this type of blog. These are the guys I count on to point me towards resources I might never have found. Blogging keeps them connected to the academy and allows a continued voice in certain circles.
The Con of these blogs are they really don't allow the pastor to connect online to the folks they minister with. The occasional post might inform of a controversial theological or denominational idea, but generally isn't intended to be directed at those in the pew.
2. The Blog as a Personal Platform:
These pastors are looking for a place to brand their ministry or find income in non-traditional ministry venues. They might travel often, or use the blog for connecting to a wider community than available in their immediate local. They could run a para-church ministry or serve in denominational leadership and the blog helps them communicate the wider sense of their ministry to those they might minister alongside for short periods of time.
The Con to this blog is for those who don't vocationally fall into this category. If you are serving a church and pimping your blog to get a book deal........you need to rethink your strategy. There are multiple reasons this can be unhealthy for your day to day ministry. If what you have to say is good enough to publish, the right folks will find you down the road.
3. The Blog as a Formational Pulpit:
In current social media use, a pastors blog can serve as a relational platform for spiritual leadership. With Facebook "liking" and Twitter retweeting, congregants who encounter worthwhile blog posts can share them with those in their own network.
The means the minister needs to write in mind for sharing. They need to stay on top of culture. These are pastors that curate spiritual content for others. They understand the blog can be a great place of interaction, with those who want to go deeper engaging in these discussions. They tweet like Kim Kardashian. They can use the blog to talk about things that just didn't make the final sermon edit. They understand the fine line between challenging and confusing. In short; they see their blog as an extension of their ministry in the local congregation.
I think every blog will look different, regardless of the topic. Those in ministry will probably have a mixture of all three. I tend to think the weight should exist on the 3rd, but every situation is different.
What do you think? Do you have another way?
