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iParent.tv Giveaway offer for Fellowship of Christian Bloggers members! iparent.tv would like to give bloggers a one year subscription ($49) to iparent.tv and a one year subscription to giveaway to your readers. The subscription includes a password and login to the site and access to articles, news, information on what’s new in the world of tech and how it affects your family. There will be ratings, rankings on which platforms are safe for kids and age ranges so you know if a site is safe for very young children. This is a great way to stay ahead of the curve and be informed just like your kids are! Important Details Partners Hub is very selective of what blogs can post their giveaway offers. They have generously offered to automatically include all members of The Fellowship of Christian Bloggers in this Giveaway offer so that you can host this giveaway on your blog! And you will of course get your own free one year subscription to iparent.tv too! If you choose to take part in this promotion, you MUST email Mike at mike@partnershub.com and include a link to the post on your blog! What is iParent.TV? If your kids are awake, they’re probably on a smartphone, in front of a smart tv, downloading apps, or posting to social networks. And most likely you have no idea what they’re doing. iParent.TV will be a yearly, subscription-based website for teaching and informing parents on all things tech, mobile, devices, websites, and apps for kids so that you WILL know. The Problem. Most parents don't have an inside track to tech or social media dangers, let alone how to safeguard their kids against them. 58% of 10-12 year old kids believe they know how to hide their online activities from their parents. 46% of them said they would change their online behavior if they knew their parents were paying attention. Introducing iParent.TV - keeping parents ahead of the tech curve. We believe we have the opportunity to help parents understand, get involved and safeguard their children in the ever-evolving tech World. iParent.TV educates parents with all the latest trends via Websites - Social Media - Apps - Devices The idea. It started with a group of dads who felt like their 9-year-olds knew more about tech than they did. They were right. But their idea will help change that forever for all parents. Once launched, iParent.TV will have 100s of videos and product reviews that are very current, cutting edge and trending, keeping parents who subscribe ahead of the tech curve. How it will work? The iParent.TV website will be a subscription-based site costing $49 per year for parents to access all the videos, reviews, how-tos, and live chat support. It will be the largest site on the net helping parents understand what's safe and what’s not in the world of tech. - And we are offering it for only $29 on Indiegogo. What you get? Articles, videos, reviews, tips, tools and expert advice on EVERYTHING like… - Popular Apps - Social Network Sites - Major Websites - Top Devices Blog App Email preview iparent tv app Learn About iparent.tv! - Learn about out the idea and the awesome people behind iparent.tv and be sure to check out their Indiegogo page for awesome backing deals. Copy and paste the code below to post the app Helpful Tips Great Contest Ideas! • Have your readers check out the indiegogo page and post their favorite part about theiparent.tv platform in your comments section. • Check out the awesome interactive app and watch the iparent.tv video to learn more! Get Social With It! • Tweet using the #iparenttv hashtag to let your audience know about this awesome giveaway! • Share on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter or Tumblr to drive traffic to your site! Recommended Giveaway Guidelines To make sure everyone has an equal chance of winning we recommend including the following into your giveaway post: Each household is only eligible to win One (1) Subscription to iparent.tv via blog reviews and giveaways. Only one entrant per mailing address per giveaway. If you have won the same prize on another blog, you will not be eligible to win it again. Winner is subject to eligibility verification. Additional Assets Standard image hightechtipspdfv2 preview Downloadable Infographic Copy and paste the code below The prize will be sent via FedEx or USPS. No P.O. Boxes please. Please note that the assets included within this message were delivered to you to promote iparent.tv. Any actions (including contest and competitions) that you complete with the provided assets are your liability, and should comply with both local and international laws. Also, please remember to disclose that you are working with iparent.tv, or that iparent.tv supplied these materials to you if required by local law. Currently rated 5.0 by 1 people Currently 5.0/5 Stars.12345 Categories : blog promotion . members . traffic Tags : Should I (market/rank/optimize/advertise/make money with) my Christian Blog? 30. January 2014 13:37 / David Brown I have talked to bloggers on both sides of this question. Some think very strongly one way or the other whereas other bloggers seem to be indifferent. How you feel and what you feel lead to do is up to you. I’m simply going to voice my opinion and give you some things to think about. Accepting Awards Blog Awards When I first got into Christian blogging, this is one of the first things that I noticed; Blogs that do not accept awards. I was a bit surprised by this. If you have a good thing going and someone feel compelled to nominate you for an award, why not accept it? After pondering this one a bit, I can see why you would choose to do this. As Christian bloggers, our goal should be to lead others to Christ and help fellow Christians strengthen their walk with Christ. Everything we do should be for HIS glory, not ours. If you choose to accept awards on your blog, I think this is fine. If you choose not to, I think that is fine to. Mainly because the award reflects your blog site and the difference your writing is making. Well, as long as you’re not going around flaunting your awards and telling everyone that you are be best blogger in the world. Marketing, optimizing, & ranking Blog Marketing Ranking A couple months ago, when I added the FOCB Top 50, I was shocked by some feedback I received. Long story short, we lost one member because they did not want to be associated with anything that had ranking or paid attention to ‘the numbers’. I think a lot of this goes back to the previous point about awards. Some bloggers feel that nothing should matter other then the writing itself. Yes, your blog posts and writing to glorify God is of utmost importance. But there are other factors involved. Most website ranking systems (ours included) focus on the popularity of a site. If a site is popular, has a lot of people coming to it, and is easy to find online then it will have a high rank. If a site has very few readers and is hard to find in the blogosphere then it will have a low rank. Let me put it another way. Let’s assume that you are a wonderful Christian blogger and you write wonderful content that anyone would enjoy to read and it helps them grow closer to Christ. Now if you have a high ranking site, then people will find and read your posts and in turn, grow in their faith. If you have a low ranking site, very few people will ever find and benefit from your posts. Make sense? No, Christian blogging is not all about the numbers. Yes, paying some attention to the numbers does make a difference. Should a Christian Blogger make money on their blog? Now for the big question, is it acceptable for a Christian Blogger to make money on their Christian blog? I have heard a lot of debate on this issue. Are you blogging for the LORD, are you blogging to make money, or can you do both? Blogging for the LORD Blogging for the LORD Without a doubt, this should be our primary goal! Everything we do, in every aspect of our life, should be done to glorify God! I recently asked the question on our forum; where do you find inspiration for your posts? Several of our members weight in with basically the same answer. God inspires their posts (by various means) and gives them the message to write about. Writing what God inspires us to write and knowing that He is glorified by our writing should be all the reward we need. We don’t need to make any money, were doing it for God! Blogging for money Make Money Blogging If you spend some time looking around online, you will find some VERY profitable blogs. Granted, most of the big ones aren’t Christian blogs, but the point remains. There is even one site that provides training for bloggers that advertises being able to earn a six figure income, from blogging! Sounds a bit farfetched, but I believe it could be possible, in the right niche, with the right resources and hard work. Even if you’re not looking for a six figure income, it is possible to earn some money blogging. Offering advertising spots on your site can bring in a little money each month. Offering eBooks or other resources for sale can make you even more. Blogging for money AND for Christ How do you accomplish both? Is it ok to do both? Should you? Wither or not you should on your blog, is a personal question you will have to ask yourself. Is it ok to, I think so, as long as money is not your primary goal. Some think it is wrong for a Christian blogger to accept any money from their blogging efforts. I think this is equivalent to saying your Pastor is working for God’s glory so he should expect a pay check from the Church. It is ok to pay your Pastor, as long as he is doing the Lords work, and putting God’s kingdom first. Motive can be everything here. Keep your focus on Him and blogging to glorify God and grow His kingdom. If you are able to make some money to help pay for your hosting, design work, etc, etc, I say go for it. What do you think? Do you make any money on your blog? Do you think it is ok to do so? Let me know in the comments below. Currently rated 4.3 by 4 people Currently 4.3/5 Stars.12345 Categories : blog promotion . blog stats . blogging without obligation . criticism . marketing . SEO Tags : ThunderClap & let the world know that God's Not Dead! 26. January 2014 16:23 / David Brown I'm sure (or at least I hope) that you have heard about the move "God's Not Dead". The Robertson Family, the Duck people behind the Duck Dynasty, have been working hard to bring this movie to theaters across the country. GOD’S NOT DEAD features a talented cast of actors including Kevin Sorbo (SOUL SURFER, HERCULES, ANDROMEDA), Shane Harper (GOOD LUCK CHARLIE, HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL 2), David A.R. White (BROTHER WHITE, REVELATION ROAD and JERUSALEM COUNTDOWN), and Dean Cain (LOIS & CLARK: THE NEW ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN), with special appearances by Christian super-band Newsboys and “Duck Dynasty’s” Willie and Korie Robertson. The movie opens on March 21st 2014. They want EVERYONE to join them in making a statement that can't be ignored! It’s time to declare to the world that God’s Not Dead! He is ALIVE in us and we want to change the culture through HIM and HIS LOVE! For the world to take notice, we need to shout it out loud, all at once. That’s what this Thunderclap campaign is all about. Coming together as ONE voice! Join with the God’s Not Dead Movie Team to help us reach Millions of people, on 1 day, with 1 message. Sign up for this Thunderclap now and on March 21st we will flood the world as we digitally celebrate the #GodsNotDeadMovie release and prayerfully ask God to use us to show His LOVE and CHANGE the culture for Christ! I signed up, will you? Will you post this on your blog and encourage your readers to join in the ThunderClap also? Let's flood social media with the message, the message that God's Not Dead! If you posted this to your blog, put a link to it in the comments below. They have a goal of 500 supporters. Let's blow that out of the water! Add this this Thunderclap to your own blog using the following code! Be the first to rate this post 12345 Categories : Tags : How our Writing can Bring Glory to God 25. January 2014 06:16 / Anne.Peterson I couldn’t believe it. I held a human brain in my hands. And only a few of us volunteered to do this. “Run your fingers through the grooves,” Our professor said. This most certainly became my favorite day as a returning student. One fact I learned in that class was this, “If you want people to remember what you write/say, you need to touch their emotions.” One of the best ways to do that is to be vulnerable. Write about the hard things in life. In Tribe Writers, an online course I’ve taken by Jeff Goins, one assignment brought this home to me. Write something scary I sat there staring at the submit button. Something scary? Coming from an abusive home, I had spent most of my life avoiding scary things. Discovering the importance of writing what’s scary helped me. We’re writing what matters when we write the scary things. It became easier the more I did it. In addition, I discovered readers related to things I shared. And the shame I previously felt about my weaknesses started diminishing. Dr. Brené Brown, Psychologist explained we experience shame because we keep secrets. We feel like we’re the only ones going through experiences such as ours. Sharing those experiences alleviates the shame. You’re not alone I quickly found I was anything but alone. People used words like, “courageous,” “brave.” I almost looked behind me to see who they were talking about. I felt anything but brave. I was scared. But I wrote anyway. Writers can sometimes hook their readers with opening sentences, but to ensure they stay, we need to engage them. So I open up—share my weaknesses. Recently I shared how God helped me let go of my motherly guilt. Will this make me famous? I doubt it, but I can tell you something. It will touch people. I take writing seriously. It’s a calling to me, not a hobby. I’m a poet, blessed to have my poetry in stores. You can read about that here. I started putting my poetry on my webpage, my blog, my Facebook page. Pieces like these: God uses our weaknesses In 2 Corinthians 12:9-11, Paul tells us God’s power is seen through our weaknesses. We want to Give glory to God. Let others see how His power is perfected in you. Paul opened up, thorns and all. By being vulnerable, people will see God working through my broken places. The same places I used to hide. Tweet this How can you glorify God through your weaknesses? What is He asking you to share? Anne Peterson Anne Peterson is a poet, speaker and freelance author of 42 published Bible Studies as well as 25 articles with christianbiblestudies.com, and Today’s Christian Woman. Anne’s poetry is sold in gift stores throughout the US and in several countries. Her first book, Real Love: Guaranteed to Last, is available HERE. You can find out more about Anne by visiting her website or her Facebook page. Presently Anne is working on her second book, Broken, Yet; Growing Through the Pain of Abuse. Currently rated 5.0 by 3 people Currently 5.0/5 Stars.12345 Categories : Authenticity . blog images . blogging . inspiration . transparency Tags : Is Guest Blogging over? See what Google has to say 23. January 2014 07:30 / David Brown Guest blogging has long been considered the #1 way of driving traffic back to your own blog. Not only is it one of the best ways, also one of the easiest! There are even several very large website that focus on connecting bloggers with guest bloggers. The reasons behind guest blogging are simple. You write an original blog post to be posted on another blog. That site publishes your article, which includes a short bio about yourself and a link or two back to your own site. Your blog automatically receives ‘Page Rank Juice’ from the blog your article is posted on. Meaning Google ranks your site a little bit higher now that you have a link coming from another popular blog When that blogs readers, read your post, (if it is well written) many of them will click on the link back to your blog to read more of your posts. Depending upon the popularity of the blog you posted on, this could drive a HUGE amount of traffic back to your site! The hope is that they will then Like & Share your page and Subscribe to your feed or newsletter What a great deal. Spend a little time writing a post for another blog and get a ton of traffic and higher search engine ranking! But wait, Google says No More!! Matt Cutts, a Google engineer and the head of Google’s WebSpam team recently posted on his personal blog that in 2014, Google is putting a end to Guest Blogging for Search Engine Optimization reasons. The problem is that it really has gotten to be too spammy. There are a lot of people and companies that will offer to guest post on your blog, or even pay you to publish their post. The problem is that a lot of them are poorly written spammy articles that include links to spammy website. Not what you want your blog linking to! So what does this mean? Should I stop guest posting and not allow anymore guest posting on my blog? Not necessarily. Matt says that Google is changing the rules and will no longer be giving you the higher ranking just because you guest posted on a more popular site. As long as you’re not posting on spammy site, or allowing guest posts from spammy site, I don’t think you have to worry about your ranking being penalized. Even if you ignore the ranking factor, there is still the potential for your article to bring in a lot of clicks from the readers of the other blog. After all, it’s not just about what Google thinks is good. Google ranking is important, but it is not more important that human readers finding your wonderful writing! I will continue to guest post on other blogs. I will still allow respected bloggers post on my sites. We just need to keep these things in mind and be a little bit more careful from here on out. What do you think? Do you find guest blogging to be useful? Will you continue to do it? Have you noticed an increase in traffic after making a guest post? Let us know in the comments Currently rated 5.0 by 3 people Currently 5.0/5 Stars.12345 Categories : blog promotion . guest blogging . guest post . SEO Tags : Are you there for your readers, or just preaching to them? 19. January 2014 14:15 / David Brown Do not disturb Recently, I have spent a lot of time looking over Christian Blogs. Our member’s blogs and other blogs I have found online. I love looking around and reading different blogs. To see what others are writing about, to get ideas for the Fellowship of Christian Bloggers or my own blog, etc. There is one thing I have noticed on a lot of blogs. There is no way to contact the author….. Ok, so most of them have a comment system on their posts, but it surprised me to see so many sites that did not have a email link or ‘Contact Us’ page. I can see how you may think this isn’t necessary. Sure, if someone wants to make a comment, they can just comment on the post itself. But what if that’s not enough? On my blog, I have received messaged from my readers that they most likely would not have left in a post comment; Specific details of how the post spoke to them or related to their situation, prayer requests, requests for help, etc. Now this can be hard to handle sometimes. You may not feel comfortable with a stranger pouring their heart out to you; I know I wasn’t at first. Maybe you don’t think you have time to deal with a bunch of emails from your readers. (Unless you have a VERY popular and active blog, you probably won’t get emails very often) Whatever the reason, ask yourself. Would you keep going to a Church where the Pastor came out of his office long enough to preach to you, then went back into hiding and was not available to you for questions, comments, or help? I wouldn’t. In John 21:17, when Jesus instructed Simon (and all of us) to "Feed my sheep", He didn't mean for us to throw some food in front of them and leave, we should be ready to serve each other. I’m sure of you would ever have such cold hearted motives, but sometime we need to consider how these things may appear to our readers. Just a thought… Currently rated 5.0 by 4 people Currently 5.0/5 Stars.12345 Categories : blog . Learning to Serve Tags : How to pick a blogging platform 15. December 2013 08:00 / David Brown These days, starting a blog online is incredibly easy. There are all kinds of options, most of which are free, but they not all created equal. How do you go about picking which blogging platform to use? What options are there? Well, here is just a little info on some of the major platforms. Wordpress Wordpress is without a doubt, the most widely know blogging platform. You can either download and install it on your own server space via Wordpress.org or you can use the ready-to-go and freely hosted Wordpress.com Pros Very widely used and supported Free hosting available Tons of free and premium widgets Cons Free hosted Wordpress.com has lots of limitation as to what you can add/install to your own site Requires knowledge of php to make advanced changes Security issues can leave your site vulnerable to spam/hacking Popular Wordpress Widgets Google XML Sitemaps - Creates a Google friendly XML sitemap of your blog and automatically updates it when you post new content on your blog Thank Me Later - Anytime someone leaves a comment on your blog, this plugin sends them a follow-up email to thank them for taking the time to comment on your post. Follow me - Adds a persistent box on your side bar. Add in your Social Media widgets to make it easier for your readers to Like/Follow/+1 you TinyMCE Advanced - Although I don't use Wordpress, this is my prefered text editor that I use here on the FOCB. TinyMCE is a enhanced WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) text editor that will give you many more features to insure your post come out looking the way you want them. Smush.it -Image optimizer that reduces the file size of your images, without any lss in quality. Keep your site looking great, without the slow load times. Pros Free Very Easy to use Obviously Google loves it and can index it quickly Cons Limited widgets Very limited ability to customise and extend it further Fewer 'bells & whistles' compared to other blogging platforms. Blogger is a bit different in the way it handles widgets. When you go into your layout settings, it gives you the ability to add different widgets provided by Google. You can also add or make your own widgets. Blogger does not have nearly the following that Wordpress has so there are a lot less ready-made widgets outside of what Google provides. I have decided not to link to any 3rd party widgets since most of them are from random developers with no guarantee of stability or security. BlogEngine.net (BE) is my personal favorite blog platform and it is what The Fellowship of Christian Bloggers website is built on. I enjoy the built in features, available widgets, and ability to custom code anything I need into it. Pros Comes packages with several HTML5/CSS3 themes, useful widgets, and SEO/compress features Fully open source and customizable (requires knowledge of ASP.net framework) Typically faster then other platforms Cons No free hosting available (but it can run on cheap shared hosting accounts) Not as many widgets available as Wordpress Popular BlogEngine.Net Widgets Live View Count - Show the number of live users that are reading your posts. T-ny.co URL shortener - If you want to share a blog post, but don’t want to send a long link (or can’t in twitter) this makes is simple to generate a shorter URL Quotations - Display a daily quotation or Bible verse that will change each day. SOIC (Semantically-Interconnected Online Communities) - SOIC is an extension of RDF which goes beyond RSS in that it describes not only the content of a website, but the connections between site content, authors on the site, and other websites. StopForumSpam (now integrated in the BlogEngine.Net 2.8) - Automatically blog comments against a database of common comment spam. If a match is found, it flags the post as Spam rather than displaying it on your site. TypePad and MovableType are two other blogging platforms that I have starting to hear more about. I have not used either of them and while doing a little searching, found they are a bit pricy for what they offer. What do you think? What platform do you use and why? Be the first to rate this post 12345 Categories : blog . blogging Tags : Are you truly spreading Gods love? 14. December 2013 10:01 / David Brown "Dispensing good, helpful advice gets the benevolent juices flowing. As easy as it is to give advice, though, it often hits me with the irony of a cartoon anvil when I end up tripping over my own counsel. When this happens, I’m convicted to examine my motives for advice-giving. In his letter to the Romans, Paul challenges the superior mindset that was common among some Jewish people at the time: “But if you call yourself a Jew and rely on the law and boast in God and know his will and approve the things that are superior, because you are instructed by the law, and are confident that you yourself are a guide of the blind, a light to those in darkness, and instructor of the foolish, a teacher of the immature, having the embodiment of knowledge and of the truth in the law. Therefore, the one who teaches someone else, do you not teach yourself?” (Rom 2:17–21). Paul is explaining why looking to the OT law for righteousness is futile. No person could perfectly keep the law. By holding to it, they were in fact condemning themselves. Paul even points out that some Jews thought they had attained a higher moral standing because of their knowledge of the law—and believed they were in a position to teach others. Yet they were still breaking the law. It’s easy for us to discard this as an early church issue. Yet we still sometimes take comfort in “keeping the law” today. If we cling to our own good behavior rather than the righteousness we have in Christ, we commit the same sin. We can attempt to live like a saint—we can cultivate a reputation for goodness and dishing out wisdom—but we’ll set ourselves up for imminent failure because we can never keep up the pretense of godly behavior on our own. However, if our “circumcision is of the heart”—if we trust in Christ’s sacrifice for our righteousness and the Spirit is working in us—then our hearts will be in the right place. That place is where we know we are great sinners, and where we are receptive to His transforming work to bring us into complete loyalty to Him. Then we will seek God’s favor, not the favor and superiority we crave from others. If our lives are truly changed, we will be motivated to love others out of the love God shows us. That will give us the right perspective for seeing the transformation that God is working in their hearts. And it will free us to give the best advice of all: Seek God in everything. What are your motives for giving advice?"1 Reading this devotional this morning sure got me thinking. I think this is something we all need to be careful of. No matter what your background is, how long you have been saved, or your role in the Church, we all need to humbly seek God in everything. Even the most knowledgeable among us, is still a fellow sinner, saved by His grace. Do not get stuck in the law like the Pharisees did. Do not use your blog to "Preach (down) to" people. Instead, use it as a way to spread the Gospel to the ends of the earth. Does your blog lecture people on what is wrong or right? Do you use it as your personal soap box to voice your opinions, or are you truly spreading Gods love? What are your motives for giving advice? 1Excerpt from Connect the Testaments: A Daily Devotional. Barry, J. D., & Kruyswijk, R. (2012). Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press. Currently rated 5.0 by 2 people Currently 5.0/5 Stars.12345 Categories : criticism . encouragement . Learning to Serve . pleasing people Tags : New Look, New Features, Growing Community! 4. December 2013 12:01 / David Brown I hope everyone is enjoying the new Fellowship of Christian Bloggers website! We are working hard to build this into the best online community for Christian Bloggers! Since we moved to the new website and reopened member applications just a few weeks ago, we already have 19 new blogs! Praise God, he is working to grow this ministry! What do you think of the new look? Please help me give a HUGE thanks to one of our newest members and designer extraordinaire Leslie Jenkins for all of the work she has done! Leslie is a fellow Christian blogger and owner of From a Daughter Designs. She has done some design work for me in the past and she always delivers impressive work! Have you looked at the member directory in the past couple days? It now shows your blogs Google Page Rank, Global Alexa Rank, and the number of pages indexed by Google! (I’m hoping to add some other metrics soon!) Yes I know, blogging to encourage others and glorify God is way more important than just the numbers, but these do help us understand how well were doing to get our posts out there so others can see and read them. Numbers aren’t the most important thing, but they do matter. All of these numbers for your blog are updated daily then each site is ranked and the top 50 blogs on the FOCB are awarded a special ‘Top 50 Blog’ Badge! Speaking of badges, have you seen then new Member Badge? Thanks again Leslie! I know that everyone just had to update their FOCB badge recently when we moved to the new site and I do hate to ask you all to do it again. If you have your badge linked to us, it will have changed automatically. If you would rather keep the old image, that’s fine with me too. If it’s not too much to ask, I would like for everyone to update their code just one more time. When you login to focbonline.com and go to your profile, you will see a specific code that includes an image link for your blog. This is a special code that will display the Member badge on your site, but if you reach the Top 50, it will automatically change your member badge to a special Top 50 badge! Do you accept Guest Bloggers on your blog? If so, be sure to check the box on your profile. This will add a "Guest Bloggers Welcome" button to your listing in the member directory! What would you like to see added to the FOCB? What features, resources, posts, etc would help you in your efforts to spread the Gospel online? Let us know and we will add it to the to-do list for FOCB! Notice I keep saying ‘we’. I may have taken over the FOCB, but there is no way I can do this alone. First and foremost, I am nothing without the knowledge and talents God has given me. He deserves all of the praise and glory! God has also blessed us with a wonderful team that is working hard behind the scenes to make this community a success. Big thanks to our admins; Jan Christiansen, Carolyn Roth, Valarie Wyatt, Mark Luker, Idella Luster, Lori Ettel, Joe Siccardi, & Rachel Stephenson! Make sure you stay connected with us. If you haven’t already please be sure to ‘Like’ us on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/focbonline Also be sure to subscribe to the Newsletter on focbonline.com. (widget in the right sidebar) Thank you all and God Bless! Currently rated 5.0 by 3 people Currently 5.0/5 Stars.12345 Categories : blog stats . fellowship of christian bloggers . guest blogging . members Tags : A Lesson from the Humble Dandelion 3. December 2013 14:06 / Jan.Christiansen Don't ask my why, but today dandelions have been on my mind. I know that many people consider them weeds, but when I was a kid, I loved to look out over our front lawn and see the buttery colored blossoms looking all sun-shiny and bright. They cheered me up. I also loved their puffy white heads at the end of summer and yes, I was one of those kids who blew on them, scattering seeds all over the neighborhood. Much to the chagrin of the man across the street, who kept a perfectly manicured lawn...or tried to. Today, I've been thinking about how our Christian blogs are like those dandelions...bright and cheery, bringing joy to others and then how God takes each post (sometimes months after they've been written) and carries them on the "wind" of the internet (work with me here, people) to others scattered around the nations. He knows where to carry each tiny seed we've planted. He knows where there is fertile soil and He will water the seed and nourish it until faith springs up in the heart of the receiver. So, keep writing, my friends - we're planting seeds for the Master Gardener! Smile Happy Blogging! Jan ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Photo courtesy LifeSupercharger (License) Original photo altered Currently rated 5.0 by 2 people Currently 5.0/5 Stars.12345 Categories : Tags : Dandelions . evangelism - See more at: http://www.focbonline.com/focb/#sthash.voq1Kq5I.dpuf