Come on Over to the New Fundamentally Reformed

I started in October of 2005 at fundyreformed.blogspot.com. I deleted that account this week. In July of 2006 I migrated over to wordpress.com (fundyreformed.wordpress.com).

Now we’re finally home at fundamentallyreformed.com!

The new design is pretty much set, but I have some minor tweaking and updating to do all over the place. But it looks good enough, and is complete enough, for me to lay the welcome mat out.

I’ll be having my old wordpress blog auto-redirect everyone over to my new site for a while. If you subscribe to my blog, please update your feed when you check out the new real estate. Oh and if you are one of the kind ones who links to my site, please update your link as well 🙂 !

The best feature of the new blog is the image in the header that randomly updates from 1 of 9 FR themed images. Let me know what you think (but leave your comments at the new blog). Regular posting to resume soon….

Bob’s Back, But Is He Blogging?

Small note here to say, I’m back from a trip. I’m busy too with reading the books on my review list, and I received a few more when I was gone. You’ll remember reviewing books on my blog is a way for me to ensure I’m investing time wisely. Lately I’ve also been posting regularly to my team KJV Only blog too.

I want to apologize for the lack of good posts around here. My reviews sometimes get in the way of consistent posting. Plus it’s summer, and life has its own obligations. We’re a part of a church plant launching this summer in St. Paul, and so that will take some time away from blogging too.

I realize that a few series around here are stalled, and I haven’t finished them. I have other plans for what I’d like to do, as well as migrate this whole blog to my newly owned url.

As a result of all of this, summer posting will be somewhat infrequent, I fear. Of course there’s no shortage of other good blogs to follow. Check out my Recommended blogs in the sidebar if you haven’t in a while.

With all this being said, I still plan on posting a couple times this week to my blog. So infrequent posting doesn’t mean I won’t post at all! Thanks again to all my readers, and those who continue to find my old posts worthy enough to post fresh comments on.

Oh and let me give a preview of some of the upcoming book reviews you can expect to see around here. I’ll just list off the titles of book’s I’ve read or just about finished off.

Mircroblogging: Twitter As the New Frontier of Blogging

Twitter is steadily becoming more and more popular, especially with bloggers. If you haven’t explored Twitter yet, you’re missing out on the microblogging revolution.

Blogging is great, but particularly with biblioblogging, posts can tend to be lengthy and updating one’s blog can be time-consuming. Microblogging, however, provides a much simpler alternative to blogging. Sites like Twitter, allow you to provide a link or a comment or both, in 140 characters or less. One click, and the update is published. You can follow lots of people’s updates more easily because they are at most 140 characters long (2 or 3 sentences). For commenting, you can reply (with an @ sign as in @johndoe how are you doing today?). You can also direct message your twitter friends. Â  Conversations are still possible, but everything is streamlined in the microblogging world.

Some blogging friends of mine enjoy Twitter more regularly than their blogging platform. It’s easy to discover new links and trends than using a standard blog reader (like Google Reader). When news is happening, it spreads fast on Twitter. And for those who use cell phones and hand held media devices, twitter is a perfect way to stay connected to your online social sites and friends, while on the go.

From time to time, I’m sure you’ve noticed that things slow down around here. My blog has always been somewhat inconsistent, with flashes of blog action followed by seasons of sporadic posting. If you’re hungry to know what I’m up to, and what I’m finding interesting on the web during these times, you can check my twitter feed (now in its own box in my sidebar). Sometimes I’ll share things on Twitter that I decide not to highlight on my blog. I was twittering about the Mark Driscoll – John MacArthur blog wars, and recently shared a link with John Piper’s thoughts on the topic in my twitter feed. Speaking of Piper, I also recently shared a link to his positive mention of Kevin Bauder’s call for fundamentalists to fight for a fundamentlism worth saving in light of recent anti-Calvinistic rhetoric from a FBBF speaker.

I also use my Twitter feed to update my Facebook account status. This lets me interact more on Facebook without having to log in over there. It makes me look like I use Facebook all the time, when in reality I only respond to people contacting me through Facebook from my Twitter updates.

Microblogging with Twitter makes sense, especially for bloggers, who can publicize important posts with Twitter, and reach a wider audience. It’s a whole new social media that’s really its own new world. Why not add some Christ-centered content into the mix?

One more application regarding microblogging. I have some friends who enjoy reading blogs, but don’t want to keep up with one of their own. For them, microblogging had given them an easy way to be a blogger of sorts, to share info and links and thoughts with others in an effort to influence them for Christ. I’d encourage any of my regular readers who don’t have their own blog, to sign up for a Twitter account, and add me as a friend. In time, bit by bit, you’ll see the benefits of Twitter and learn how it works. From there it’s fun to enter the world of microblogging.

Okay, one more tip. If you have Firefox as your browser, consider adding TwitterFox as an add-on. It is the easiest way to manage your twitter updates right from your browser. It makes Twittering even easier. You can retweet and shorten links automatically, and it sorts your replies and direct messages as well.

Announcing: Transformed by Grace

Some reforming fundamentalist friends of mine and I have got together and founded a new online social media site called Transformed by Grace. We are a community of former legalists and reforming fundamentalists, continually allowing God’s grace to bring us closer to Christ.

Using a free social media site provided by Ning.com, we have built a site that allows members, forums, groups, personal blog posts & pages, and lots of interaction. Think of it like a bigger Facebook group or a mini version of something like Sharper Iron. It actually has more capabilities than either Facebook or a typical forums site, and offers a lot of flexibility in how one can use it.

Our goal is to bring together other like minded reforming fundamentalists, particularly those who are familiar with the more conservative wing of Independent Baptist Fundamentalism. We hope to encourage one another, talk through remaining questions and problems, and forge relationships. And we hope to offer some help to those who are beginning their journey within fundamentalism. We want to help them learn and grow in a non-threatening environment. We don’t pressure anyone necessarily to follow a particular path out of fundamentalism, some of our founding members are happy within the IFB tent. We hope to challenge each other and grow in grace.

So, please go over and check out our site: http://reformedfundamentalism.ning.com.

Feel free to join the group or just lurk for a while. Bookmark us and come back in a few months, as I’m sure there will be more activity by then. If you have a blog that’s somewhat devoted to these issues, feel free to let us know and we’ll add it to the blogroll and possibly send some visitors your way. Above all, let us know if there’s something we can help you with. That’s what we are hoping to accomplish.