Revival Blog

on May 15, 2008

. 1 Comment

As you may have noticed, I have begun running Google Ads on The Revival Blog.Â This is not a plea for you to click them.Â The ads make almost nothing for me and I am not trying to generate an income from this blog.Â Websites that have religious content are very low earners.Â People are not spending a fortune to get you to visit their sites.Â The real money makers are anything that deals with the 7 deadly sins (specifically the trifecta lust, greed, and pride).Â But that is another post alltogether.

Instead, I now run the ads because Google has said that it will index all pages that have their ads on them.Â I notice that not all of my content is indexed and therefore cannot be seen by the search engine results when people are searching.Â So now the pages have Adsense ads.Â Feel free to ignore them.

Popularity: 30% [?]

Improving Communication

Published

on August 17, 2007

in Carl's Writings, Websites and Wordpress

Nothing spiritual here. Just some advise from a tech guy.

Can your readers contact you? You would not believe the people you will come into contact with through your blog. If there is no way to contact you, you can’t believe it because you won’t come into contact with them. Get a contact form. Here is the one I use. I am simply amazed at the number of blogs that give you no way to contact the author. It is a sure fire way to tell the readers that you are here to talk and they are there to listen. No conversation desired.

If you are new to blogging and wonder why nobody ever comments on your blog make sure they are able to. Do you require people to register to leave a comment? Unless you are running the New York Times (who by the way does not require registration to comment) this is not going to happen. If you had a contact form I would have sent you a note telling you to turn off the “require commentors to register” feature, but you didn’t have one.

And for those of you that maintain a church website: Is the location of your church clearly spelled out on an easy to find page? Nothing demonstrates small vision like having a map of your church that says “we are on the corner of Johnson and Peach.” What you are telling the world is, “If you don’t know this intersection, you would not be interested in our church.” There have been church sites that I went to that I could not even determine what country they are in. At the very least your church contact page (please tell me you at least have that) should have the address of the church, a phone number, and a contact email address.

—————-
Now playing: Lecrae - After The Music Stops

Popularity: 33% [?]

Off to the Uttermost Parts of the Earth

Published

on July 2, 2007

. 3 Comments

Pray for me! I have cried out for Africa. I have been to Central America. I have labored in the inner city. I have fantasies of preaching in the middle east. But God has chosen to send me to the very edge of darkness…high school camp.

This week I will be escorting 75 young people to youth camp. Thanks to modern technology, while you are reading this post I am probably casting the devil out of someone’s precious son or daughter.

I thought this would be a great time to ask some of my internet friends to fill the void for me on this blog.

I will not have internet access so I will not be able to approve comments for this week. If you don’t see any comments, don’t be afraid to let these guys know what you think.

If you read this blog and would like to be a guest poster in the future drop me a line, or better yet a post, using the contact tab above or send it to revivalblog@gmail.com.

Don’t forget to pray for me and these youth. I want every youth in that camp to come home baptized in fire!

Popularity: 24% [?]

Tips for My Blogging Brothers

Published

on June 15, 2007

in Carl's Writings, Websites and Wordpress

I have been blogging for a couple of years now and have been reading other blogs for about the same amount of time. I have just shy of 20 web sites including a few blogs. In this time I have learned a few things that I would like to share to my fellow blogging faithful. If are about to start blogging, this list will be invaluable to you.

I will start with a few things to remember:

Free is not always the best - Now you already know this to be true but so many bloggers start out cheap and never move on to better blogging platforms because they think they are stuck with what they have. How many of you never switched versions of the Bible because you already have so much KJV memorized? This is no different.

One caveat to this is WordPress. I believe this is the best blogging platform and it is free.

Cheap may indeed be the best - There are web hosting packages out there that are close to nothing. They will give you great service for next to nothing.

Expensive is a rip off - Small companies cannot compete with the super hosts. They are great for design and control of a web site but this is unnecessary with a blog.

Step by step guide to starting your blog and becoming famous for your writing.

Get a domain name - Sure, you can do a blog without one but for less than $10 why would you do that?

Even if you use Blogger’s free service, one day you are going to grow out of that and your readers will not have to learn a new address if they always went to Your ReallyDeepThinkingBlog.com instead of thinkingblog.blogspot.com with a note to go to the new address. Most people use Godaddy.com but they have pretty racy commercials. Netfirms.com has a special where you can get a domain for $4.95 for the first year and privacy protection is free. I have a dozen domains registered there.

Get hosting - Websites are kept on computers called hosting servers. When you get a website, you rent space on these servers. The great thing about this is that you can host as many domains as you want. Dreamhost.com will give you an unbelievable amount of space and bandwidth for less than $10 a month. They will even pay for you domain registration. On top of that, if you decide to have more websites, one for your kids soccer team, one for your work, one for your ministry, you can add them on your account for free!

Tips for the Blogger faithful - If you still want to go free try wordpress.com. You can get used to wordpress while still having free blogging. If you are determined to use blogger, please observe these bits of advise:

Turn off pop-up comments. Yeah, I know it seems cool. But you can’t track comments with co.comments and often, the window is so small that you can’t use it in Firefox. These are two really annoying features. Get a domain name. If you are even mildly serious about blogging, spend the $10 and get a domain name. Get a custom layout. With this, you can drop the blogger bar at the top of the page. This is vital.

Now, if you have followed this advise, write some good stuff and watch the world take notice!

Popularity: 34% [?]

More Changes . . . And an Explanation

Published

on February 21, 2007

in Carl's Writings, Christianity and Wordpress

. 4 Comments

Ok, so here is the deal. A couple months ago I was preparing to move into full time ministry. My job ended, we put our house on the market and told the youth we were leaving. Around the same time God gave me an idea for a web business.

That was almost four months ago.

Since that time I have preached my “last message” a half dozen times. The house is no closer to being sold. My ministry has flourished like never before and my web business exploded. Here is an example:

These are the webstats of one site I build in the last six months (click for larger view). I have seen a small discipleship group that I started for a few teen boys grow into a Friday night revival service attended by 20 or so, and I have seen the youth that I disciple begin to really be used by God to win their friends to Christ, minister under the power of the Holy Ghost, choose righteousness and be a light to their circle of influence. I have had no less than three of them ask me what to do when their job is threatened because of their winning coworkers to Christ.

This is all great. I find it extremely fulfilling but my mortgage company does not. Same is true of the electric company, the homeowners association, Chrysler financial, student loans, well, you get the point.

So I have been lax in posting here because I have been consumed with my online business and ministry.

There is lots going on and much to report. I try to skim all of your blogs and even rarely post a comment.

Please continue to pray that something will happen soon to bring some sense of stability.

Popularity: 20% [?]

WP 2.1

Published

on February 16, 2007

Anyone updated their blog to 2.1?

Did your plugins work? I just built a new site based on it and I really like the look.

You can see it here http://praiseclip.com

I really like the changes but am a little scared.

Popularity: 15% [?]

Tweaking the Site - Bear With Me

Published

on January 26, 2007

. 1 Comment

I got a new host. I went with SLhost.com and their level II VPS. I can’t say enough how happy I have been with them so far. I am shocked at how little you can get a virtual private server for these days. I looked at other options but I have a pretty massive site (obviously not this one) and no one could tell me that I would not have problems.

I pay bi-anually and get something like 40G of space and 300G of bw 358MB of guaranteed RAM burstable to 1.5G. In addition I have CPanel/WHM and Fantastico, fully managed, full root access (not just shell - that’s the cool thing about VPS) and daily full root backups for less than $400 a year!

I am also doing some template testing so forgive me if it looks funky for a little bit.

Random bolding in honor of Mark Batterson.

Popularity: 14% [?]

Links, Blog, Tech Stuff and More!

Published

on September 12, 2006

in Christianity, Holy Spirit, Revival and Wordpress

. 2 Comments

1. I have been on a blogging frenzy latley but wanted to post a few things of varrying importance.I have a soft spot for missionaries but I have a special affinity for Holy Ghost missionaries. I discovered a missionary drunk on the new wine a while ago while he was waiting to go to Brazil. If I had any money I would sponsor him but you all know how broke I am so he will have to settle for this plug and my prayers. Carl (great name by the way) keeps a great blog about his adventures adapting to a new country.

Brazilian medical system works differently that anything I am accustomed to. Iâ€™m not exactly sure yet how it works, but I am most definitely sure that Iâ€™m not accustomed to it.

and

Chatting with the guard, asking about his family, inviting him to dinner sometime, and wishing him a good day is also some insurance against getting shot should you inadvertently drift into the wrong line and have to be escorted away. It is, after all, considered poor manners to shoot someone who has invited you to dinner.

Just a few of the informative quips. Check it out and follow the adventure of hislegs and see if they, “first explode or burst suddenly into flames.”

2. If you don’t have Cocomment, get it. If you have a blog, get the plugin.

3. I am looking for a new webhost. Mine is not very good. I need xNix, CPanel, Fantastico, shell access as well as the ability to host multiple domains. I don’t need phone support. If you have a lead, let me know.

4. If you don’t use firefox stop reading. Get the TrashMail plugin. Once installed, you right-click in a mail for box and post a disposable email address. I keep it set at 2. So once someone has sent you 2 emails, the address gets deleted. My wife completed a form online last week and gave her real email address. She has gotten close to 1,000 junk emails since. With trashmail that would have been 2.

5. If you are still reading this far get a life.

Popularity: 15% [?]

The Google Effect

Published

on August 7, 2006

I have several sites. None of them make me any money. I thought I had an idea for one the other day while in prayer. I tinkered around a little and put it up then linked to it from a couple other sites I have.

Can you tell when Google and Yahoo found the site?

Â update:Â I put up that graphic prematurely.Â That turns out to only be half of the visits I got yesterday.

Popularity: 10% [?]

What I Learned in My Year of Blogging.

Published

on June 8, 2006

Continue reading ‘What I Learned in My Year of Blogging.’

. 4 Comments

When I started this blog I just wanted to be able to post some essays on my family website. My family had just left an incredibly dysfunctional church and I wanted to post an essay or two on some things that were wrong specifically with that congregation and more generally with the movement they were claiming to be a part of. I desperately wanted to get the word out to the church that there was a true Gospel and it was worth proclaiming.

As time went on, I soon realized that the Church was just fine. The problem was the congregation that I left. Since the group I left shunned me like Jehavahâ€™s Witness clones, there was no chance for them to even read my blog. In the end, I wrote this post and went on with my life. I was part of that church plant. I was a leader in it. I watched it grow. I watched it wither to a shell of what it once was and a mockery of what it could have been. I dusted off my boots and went on with my life.

While the original purpose of my blog was no more, I enjoyed it and continued to post articles. Like all the big guys I posted lengthy articles about theological issues. The only problem was that nobody cared about my views. I would enter debates on other blogs with links back to mine but nobody followed. I even tried to antagonize some people in the hopes of some blog action but all I got was convicted by the Holy Ghost for being mean spirited and had to delete them. So instead I started to comb the web for neat testimonies and when I found them I would reprint them with a link. I like testimonies. I figured since I am paying for the hosting I might as well post something I want to read.

Popularity: 27% [?]

Blog Tech Stuff

Published

on May 24, 2006

I used the CoComment Enhancer plugin and now I think that Cocomment is finnaly working correctly on my site.

The comments themseves are not showing up correctly. For some reason all formatting for them is removed when they are viewed. the formatting is still there. I can see it when I try to edit them but it does not show up. does anyone know why this is?

UPDATE: The propblem was caused by the ESV plugin. I will let you know if I get a work around

UPDATE2:Â I got the workaround thanks to the folks at WrodPress. I think the author is going to update the code.

Here is what I did:

Change this line at the end of the plugin script:

add_filter(’comment_text’, ‘esv_display’, 20);

to this:

add_filter(’comment_text’, ‘esv_display’, 40);

All better!

Popularity: 13% [?]

JaguarPC Server Fail - Update 2

Published

on April 30, 2006