Blog "Look Back," part 2

Continued from part 1.

Here are some blog highlights from April through June, 2008.

April

• Our research about church architecture was reported in a dozen different places. We first released it here.
• Made a trip to rural Missouri, ate frog legs (pics included), and talked about the history of the Second Great Awakening. It bought out a few folks concerned about heresy in the movements.
• My most recent book (with Philip Nation), Compelled by Love, was released.
• Tim Keller and I discussed research and his new book in a podcast here.
• My most commented upon post was this one explaining and opining upon the decline in the SBC. It brought Danny Akin out of blog-comment exile and prompted many other responses. The strangest thing-- the Associated Press and other media outlets quoted the blog and I decided I needed to be careful.
• A follow up to the SBC decline post explained why this decline will probably continue in the future.
• The month ended as I spoke at the Dwell Conference in NYC and "slow blogged" the experience.

May

• Shared some rules I follow about interaction between married men and women and I was surprised that some people found them controversial.
• Listed some historic and current accountability questions that some have used to keep themselves in accountable relationships.
• Listed the candidates for SBC president and Johnny Hunt allowed me to list him as a candidate here, making it public on the blog that night.
• Mixed it up with Neil Cole and Alan Hirsch about the challenges caused by the professionization of the clergy.
• USAToday reported on our politics research and it ended up getting involved in the conversation about the Evangelical Manifesto. It led to several other posts involving the Evangelical Manifesto.
• Joined the faculty at Southeastern Seminary.
• Was glad to see 11 Innovations in the Local Church (my book with Elmer Towns and Warren Bird) be a finalist for Outreach book of the year.
• Opined on what plagarism in preaching really is.

June

• Mixed it up on multi-site churches with Geoff Surratt. First, my article, "Questions for McChurch" from my monthly Outreach Magazine column. Then, Geoff's response. World Magazine picked up on the debate and Geoff and I were interviewed in the story-- with Geoff on the cover. (He says he is going to buy me dinner.)
• Updates from the SBC annual meeting on Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday. I then penned my analysis and hope for the SBC.
• Kristen and I went on her 10th birthday trip to Yosemite.
• The Pew Forum released some research and we shared some additional research which asked a similar quesiton but with different wording. The comparison of the data became a national story. (I actually will post again about this next week-- Pew has updated the data.)

And I forgot this from February:

• Tim Keller clarifies some issues from a Newsweek story.

Part 3 coming tomorrow...