Archive for February, 2006
two worlds apart
I’ve got (at least) two worlds of audiences that come to djchuang.com — some here at the home page blog via bookmark or rss feed, and those who randomly surf in via search engines or deep linking. For the latter audience, I’ve started some AdSense ads to possibly cover web hosting cost for this deal, while my loyal blog audience shall remain ads-free.
So, to give visibility for a recent find with my blog audience, here it is: yesterday’s New York Times featured a piece on Redeemer’s Tim Keller, “Preaching the Word and Quoting the Voice” (ht: David Park).
Rather than quoting from the article, while it is still available, I particularly liked the disclaimer from kellered: “Redeemer does not aspire to fame. In fact, Redeemer did not want the article done but the journalist was going to do it whether or not Redeemer helped him to write it. … Redeemer is happy to fly under the radar of the majority.”
At the time of this writing, other bloggers have already picked up on this piece, 5 according to BlogPulse + 11 according to Google BlogSearch, with varying degrees of commentary. [update: GetReligion has a feisty reaction to the NYT article, and they even used my Keller photo instead of an NYT one!]
spontaneous trip to New York City?
Booked 2 seats on Vamoose Bus to make a last-minute weekend trip with my son to NYC (New York City), leaving 5:30pm today. If I make it, I make it. Cancelled the bus, cancelled the trip. Had a little snag with hotel arrangement, and Accuweather called for very windy, cold and wet weekend with RealFeel temperature of 6? F in the evenings. Let’s call it a postponed trip when the weather is warmer.
The kind of things I do with “disposable” income is not vacationing, it’s conference-hoping (and Starbucking). I’ll drop-in at the IAM “Artists as Reconcilers” conference and “Reconciliation” Juried Art Exhibition, where one of the pieces on display is by Rachelle Woo Chuang, who is already there having a good time.
[update: since I'm not gallivanting around for good eats, sights, and sounds in the frigid cold of the city, I've trimmed my bloglines subscriptions to 300, down from 1000, and identified some focused themes for my blogs: xanga and livejournal are mirrors of djchuang.com, voxtropolis will be for my commentary on my flickr photos, and my Yahoo 360 blog is DJ Chuang 360:: a more vulnerable, transparent, and personal voice; and, I've SuprGlu'd all of these together for 1-click viewing]
Leadership Network podcast
Leadership Network, described by NYT as a megachurch consulting firm, is now podcasting. There’s the official podcast feed posted on the FAQ page, and the podcast page is rolled up in an audio/video resources page. I love what they do, not so much in the size of churches, but in the innovative ideas they help to accelerate.
For your convenience, I’ve embedded Flash player objects so you can listen here & now.
Megachurch Myths: an interview with the researchers (16:53)
[mp3]http://media.leadnet.org/Megachurches/Megachurch_Myths_Jan06.mp3[/mp3]
Multi-Site Revolution Conference: Barry Brown on theater churches (10:12)
[mp3]http://media.leadnet.org/Multisite/Barry_Brown_Dec05.mp3[/mp3]
Multi-Site Revolution Conference: Jim Tomberlin (10:50)
[mp3]http://media.leadnet.org/Multisite/Jim_Tomberlin_Dec05.mp3[/mp3]
Ethics Conference in LA
For those who like (or need) clear answers to hard questions, this events for you [ht: D.J. Crawford]:
Compass at the Crossroads: Hard Moral Questions, Clear Christian Answers
This is an Ethics Conference happening on March 10-11 at the LA Convention Center. Scott Rae, professor of philosophy at Talbot School of Theology will be the keynote speaker. The event contact for this event is Pastor John Kwak at kdfkwak@juno.com
The host church is hoping for a great turnout from their church, but also praying that everyone will be excited to invite people from outside Living Way. It’s going to be a high-caliber learning time!
For those who are more comfortable with ambiguity and doubt, chew on this one: how come there are so many people who are sure about their answers, and also, at the same time, so many people sure about their doubts?
Growing Healthy Asian American Churches, together
To those of you tuned in here for my forthcoming stream-of-consciousness commentary about the new book Growing Healthy Asian American Churches, I’d like to expand it beyond my own voice–I’d like to invite you to a blog-based conversation about the book. 
Also, you can preview parts of the book, including the introduction and a special online-bonus supplementary chapter.
So get your copy in the next week or so, and I’ll start posting my comments here as the calendar turns to March. Please trackback or email me so we can all get linked up. I would try grid blogging, but my intuition tells me that most people don’t know what that is, so making hyperlinks will likely have a better net effect. In lieu of grid blogging, I suggest using the Technorati tag ghaac.
The book is edited by Peter Cha, Steve Kang and Helen Lee, and contains stories and insights from pioneering leaders like Ken Fong, David Gibbons, Grace May, Wayne Ogimachi, Steve Wong, Nancy Sugikawa and Soong-Chan Rah. I don’t think any of these leaders are on the blogosphere yet, except for David Gibbons. (also see the Leadership Blog interview with Dave Gibbons)
(cf. publisher’s description, my previous blog post about the book in December 2005, read the book discussion)