Feb 9, 2009
Consistently creating content: A suggested requirement for seminary students.
If I ran a seminary, I’d make blogging a requirement.
What better way to practice finding something worthwhile to say every day?
* * * * *
© 2012 Abuyo. All rights reserved.
of course, this presumes there’s something worthwhile to say every day by every person. i often wonder if the new media environment with its “get something fresh up now!” and “make sure you post lest you become irrelevant,” is actually all that helpful. in other words, perhaps some of us shouldn’t blog every day because every day we really don’t have something worthwhile to say.
Good call. Albert Mohler does it. Why shouldn’t we?
lol not all bloggers find something important to say when they blog… :P
That’s a great idea. I sense resistance from academia regarding blogging and bloggers, however. Seems that it would be a good exercise for seminary students though.
So can I get Seminary credit for my blogging if I blog about the Bible?
But it was your phrase “finding something worthwhile to say every day” that really hit home.
I struggle daily to make the Bible fresh and new and winsome.
I am working on a way to do that with our students this year. My problem is how to evaluate.
I’m sending this to Dr. Derouchie.
http://bethlehemcollegeandseminary.org/news/jason_derouchie.html
The value of blogging isn’t limited to seminary students. It’d be good for most any graduate student working with concepts and ideas.
interesting… i agree–evaluation of worthwhileness would be an issue. there’s a lot out there in the blogosphere. i’m sure much of what I deem not worthwhile is seen by others as fascinating.
maybe it could be topical–the professor could assign a new topic each day or each week. if you somehow address the topic in a thoughtful way, you get credit.
There is value in writing things instead of just talking.
Mike, you wrote
this presumes there’s something worthwhile to say every day by every person
Actually, it presumes the opposite. The fact is not everybody can come up with worthwhile content consistently.
Being required to blog would help students discover whether or not they can be fresh and interesting before they’re in the pastorate where it is expected of them.
Is there not the same value in finding something worthwhile to (think and) say every day to friends and family?
If we are thinking well (which was a goal on the part of many before the internet was active), “finding something worthwhile to say” does not have to be a distinctive project.
There can be a presumptiousness about blogging just as there can be about publishing a book or reading the Bible through every year.
Your thinking convinced me and so far it’s been beneficial. It helps to deepen your well. I don’t want to walk and speak on top of a puddle. And that is my inclination. I want an ocean. Therefore, I must look outside of myself. That is where the worthwhile is.
Yeah, but only 22 words? It sounds like something which would cause sermons to become sermonettes.
You’re right, Frank.
Though I don’t think most blog posts should be sermon-length, I also wouldn’t recommend my genre for the “requirement” I’m posting about here.
Fortunately for me and my brevity, I have no aspirations whatsoever to be a pastor.
Frank Turk…
And the problem with that is?
I’m in seminary, and:
I think it is a good idea, because it forces you to process information at a higher level, and not just be a recepticle for knowledge.
I think it is a bad idea, because I need another “requirement” like I need another hole in the head…
Another thought:
It’s a bad idea. So much of my own seminary experience has been rethinking and re-understanding those things I formerly held to dogmatically. I think if required to blog regularly, I would be short-circuiting the reflection and re-thinking portion of seminary that has become a very critical part of the growth process.
Can’t explain it to you, Chamblee. The point of reference is something you reject as useful, let alone authoritative.
I sometimes wish blog posts had a 22-word cap. It’d make the www a better place.
I did make a commentary on this post at my blog. Visitors are welcome, commenters are loved.
I don’t know. The Bible has a lot to say about the benefits of silence, the need to consider carefully what one says and the value of a word spoken ‘in season’ as opposed to ‘much speaking’.
I think that pushing for creativity is a good thing; I’m not sure that a blog is necessarily the best vehicle for that. Even so, it wouldn’t be a bad idea as long as your hypothetical seminary also mandated regular periods of silence and solitude, which these days could be summarized, ‘Unplug!’
Of course, this begs the question of whether one (especially a seminar student) should have something to say every day.
i’m with myrddin. plus, i don’t see how you could “enforce” whether what was posted was worthwhile and meaningful to the poster or just churchy drivel. i think that pastors ought to have their audience in mind, but not ONLY that – they need to have their own soul in view, and nothing seems to kill soul-growing reflection like making it a requirement.
i still like parts of the idea. maybe once a week.
I think blogging helps to make one think of the subject, the manner communicated, and the reader’s eye…a potentially beneficial exercise.
Yeah I bet this’d help seminarians (and all us who are preachers) get over their academia.
If you want readers on your blog, posts titled “Variegated Nominisim: My Perspective” or “101 Reasons Why I’m Not Supralapsarian” will never suceed.
Hopefully this will drill into us that this stuff will fail in the pulpit too.
I’d also add this post must be addressed to non-Christians. Doing post for unvelievers is really stretching me at the mo.
I would suggest “Creed Bratton” style blogging.
Get the tech guy to set up a “blog” at http://www.seminaryblogs.org/(your)blog.com/notreal.net/text.doc on the seminary server and keep it far, far away from the general public until the seminary student has proven themselves not to be dangerous.
I say this tongue in cheek, as a seminary student myself – a student who did not need to be blogging for my first two years of seminary.
It should be required that you are not allowed to write about the church or the world until you love it for the sake of the gospel.
I love this idea and do agree with you about having seminary students to do this. It doesn’t have to be only those who is planning to be a pastor. It can be for those who want to be journalism / English major in Biblical Studies / Christian writing and other fields of Biblical studies.
My pastor, Justin Childers does blog online too. I love to read his blog and learn a lot from him. I would encourage other pastors to do the same thing and also encourage his sheep to read his blog too.
I do blog because I do want to share my faith in Christ with other, and it does help me a lot too. I do want to major in Journalism/English major in Biblical Studies. I love to write. Right now, I can’t afford to go to school to SECWF or to Moody Bible Institute.
Hungry to eat His Word,
‘Guerite ~ BoldLion
Then again there is always the option of blogging about going to seminary
Always have something worthwhile to say: Pray about and share the gospel with at least one person other than yourself every day.
diary, maybe. blog, no. sometimes what you need to say most are for God’s consumption, not for the world at large, and sometimes the day should be spent listening, not talking.
I’m with ya. Blogging helped me stay sane during seminary.
I think I spotted you at the DG conference, kept meaning to walk over and give you some 22words props!
[...] Source: 22 Words [...]
This post is going to get me in deep trouble with my favorite seminary students and even my pastor. Both who have blogs.