I toyed with the idea of turning off the comments on this blog a few weeks ago. Not because of anything negative that had happened, and honestly not because of anything overwhelmingly viral either. Blogging is changing, and comments aren’t as frequent as they used to be and so I simply wondered if it would matter. So many well known bloggers have comments turned off, maybe it’s just the thing to do.
If no one is taking time to leave comments, would it matter if they no longer could?
I find myself doing what everyone else is doing, especially now that I spend the majority of my hours immersed in social media and blogging. I read fewer blogs that mean more to me – the ones written by friends, the ones that speak truth and integrity and challenge. I no longer have a huge list of “must read because they’re well-known and it’s the thing to do” blogs.
But I read them on my phone. You’re maybe reading this in your email. And I click over to the post from an engaging Tweet or inspiring Instagram and I take, but I don’t respond. Or I’ll contact a friend privately and let her know how much her words meant to me through Voxer or email. I invest in my current community, but I haven’t made much of an effort to engage in any new conversations.
Community can’t happen without conversations.
I need the dialogue, the chatter back and forth about a shared dream or encouragement to keep going. I love giving women the opportunity to connect beyond state lines and time zones and connect as new friends simply because we’re all living our everyday, ordinary lives together.
So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you.
Maybe blog comments and link-ups are changing. Maybe what we’re sharing online is changing, and our lives and the way we engage with one another is changing. Maybe you’re looking around at what she’s doing, or how they’re blogging, or what they’re writing about, or the project she’s leading and you’re wondering if you should try it, too.
Whatever it is, let’s first fix our attention on God. The same way I felt in my heart that the opportunity to cultivate conversation was more important that making the popular blogging decision, you’ll know your answer, too. Pause, wait quietly for God to lead, and then take action.
Let’s live and write and work from a place of God-centered planning.
Amen Crystal! It is so all about Jesus. It is so all about his glory. I don’t want to be so caught up in getting affirmed that I miss his heart. I don’t want to be pulled into the way of writing requirements that I lose track of the one who fulfilled all requirements. It’s all about Jesus – even if nothing is ever about me. Great post and I commend you for leaving comments on.
I get your blog posts delivered to my email and I almost always read them there. Thanks for the reminder about the importance of community and of checking in with others here in the comments too! It’s comments on my own blog that keep me motivated to continue and that have been the beginnings of in-person friendships…both so important!
This is such a great reminder for those who have communities a;ready built and an excellent building block for those of us who are in the beginning stages of creating a community on their blog. I can attest to how easy it is to get tangled in the comparison. I had to step back recently, and ask myself whether I was visiting some blogs because I loved what they had to say and wanted to support their journeys or because I wanted to see what was being done to go back and implement on my blog. I am so thankful that the Lord would always remind me that a voice “isn’t mine” whenever I think of duplicating what I see elsewhere :).
Love this!! I started reading blogs in hopes of connecting and being a part of community, but I’ll be the first to admit I’m not the best at commenting. I need to work on that. I love the blog world and all the friendships that come from it. Thanks for sharing this!!
Well, then I consider it quite the honor that you chose to comment today! Can I share a secret? I’m kind of awful at replying to comments, so that’s on my “cultivating quality community” list this year!
Yes!! Thank you for this, Crystal. And thank you for doing YOUR thing and freeing us up to do OUR thing that God has for each and everyone one of us as individuals. Though times are a changin’ I totally love that you are sticking to what matters most!
If I didn’t already have “savor” as my word for this year, I think “freedom” would be my next choice – love what you just said! Our blogs aren’t the boss of us – they’re a gift to be used to do work for the glory of God, not ourselves. There should be freedom and joy in that – not comparison and dread!
Yes, this is what we all need to hear. We could expend crazy amounts of energy trying to figure out if comments are best or not, or what post will get the most traffic. But at the end of the day, really all that matters is how God is leading each of us. More often than not, His plan may not even make sense to our human understanding, but it’s always the best plan!
That’ll preach! It’s funny to me that I considered turning off comments and then wrote this post, and it took this post for me to realize my blog has stopped notifying me when people comment 😉
Crystal! I find myself so often battling the comparison trap. Sometimes it starts so subtly and then before I know it I’m lost in a sea of “not good enoughs”. Thank you for this pointer back to Him and in that view I find encouragement to keep pursuing the call He’s placed before me.
Thank you!!
P.S. I love comment boxes! 🙂
Those “not good enoughs” are sneaky little buggers, aren’t they? They get me, every time!
Ha! As I read your post I thought to myself, “I really like how she put scripture in a handwriting font. Maybe I should try that.” Then I finished reading your post. Ha ha ha. I am trying to write more of what God is telling me to write. I wrote one hard post and one easy post this week. On the second easier post I felt I heard the Lord speak to my fear and say, “See, Amanda, not all writing assignments from me are going to be difficult. They can be fun too.”
Oh Amanda, I love that! We’ll definitely have fun this year – if God promises us JOY and new mercies each morning, I feel confident we can apply it to the words we write, too 🙂 And if you’re on WP, add the Google Fonts plugin to your page, then head to https://www.google.com/fonts to play around to find one you like. Once you’ve found it, go into Settings > Google Fonts, find it in the dropdown list & set it as your block quote font 🙂
Thank you, Crystal. I’ve been focused on Psalm 127:1 as the prayer for whatever is built in my online space– I want it to be built by God’s hands and not by my own. Sometimes that looks like quiet and other times it looks like doing something differently than nearly everyone I respect in the writing world. Your words solidified that for me again this morning. Thanks for being used. 🙂
“Unless the Lord build the house, those who build it labor in vain. Unless the Lord watches over the city, the watchman stays awake in vain.” Psalm 127:1
And I, personally LOVE the comments. Love the conversations that can happen there.
I love that verse! And I’m so grateful to be writing among women who appreciate a “best practice” but will always choose a “soul best” first 🙂