Friday Blogtalk

Man, I just love the Christian blogosphere. It has really become a significant part of my life, and I'm not sorry for it either. I love all my regular visitors and commenters, for one. They really bless me. The funny thing is, I began Mr. Standfast on a whim, not realizing how richly I would be blessed by the discipline of blogging. Yes, I do think of it as, at its best, a spiritual discipline. Although of course blogging can be and often is an indulgence of the flesh, it can also be a means by which we offer ourselves as servants to our Master, saying, in essence, "Use me, Lord, and use this weblog, to your praise and honor." It is a place to stand in the flow of God's wonderful grace, pouring out what we have received. Another place, you might say, for grace to abound.

I also love the Christian blogging community. I am amazed by the richness, by the abundance, of this electronic garden. And that's why I want to be true to my purpose of setting aside the Friday post as a time to applaud some of these blogging saints. In that spirit, I want to point you to some new residents of my ever-changing blogroll.

Stones Cry Out. I don't know why it took me so long to discover this group blog. I really enjoy the diversity that becomes possible in group-blogging, and Stones Cry Out is really a demonstration of that. Very well done.

BeliverBlog. This is the weblog of Rusty Peterman, another fine Texas blogger. Read How Not to Use the Old Testament, for starters. Rusty speaks wisdom here, which should be important to any believer.

Scotwise. Scot is devoted to exercising the gift of encouragement in the blogosphere. I'm with you there, Scot. Read his The Need for Encouragement for an example of one who is pouring out what he has received via blogging. Awesome!

And now it's time for Mr. Standfast's 3rd ever Gospel-blogger Award. This is my completely subjective award to the blogpost which seems to me to best represent the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I guess what I'm getting at here is a way to honor those posts which really keep Christ most plainly at the center of things.

The first winner was Jollyblogger. The second, The Irvins. Joining them in the winner's circle this week is the aforementioned BelieverBlog, for his wonderful post, When Christ Really Gets Ahold of You. Check it out. Money quote:

Our lives will never be dull. Our worship will never seem merely a predictable set of motions we go through. We'll never again see our interaction with other lives as somewhat routine or accidental. We'll never think of a single day as uneventful.

Instead, when Christ really gets a hold on our lives, they will be RADICALLY TRANSFORMED.

The way we think about Jesus. The way we read our Bibles. How we worship and serve and obey will be charged with energy and power and meaning and purpose and direction that comes straight from our very radical Lord Jesus Christ.