Moudy and I are very happy to announce the launch of SpreadingStories.com. The past couple of weeks have been a little crazy, due to my new job, so it’s been a while since our last full length Starting Story; however, I couldn’t think of a better person to look to for inspiration getting back into our blogging groove, than my friend Jordan.
Jordan Watson is not only a dedicated blogger, youth minister and water polo coach, but he is also a dear friend. We met freshman year on the pool deck of our High School for the first day of Water Polo practice. Although we go way back, we’ve had our differences, namely Jordan is a devout Christian and I am an Atheist. In High School our friendship came close to ruin due to viscous, immature arguments over religion. Jordan adamantly believed that Christianity was a superior world-view and I adamantly tried prove he was wrong. The conflict was malicious and it led to an altercation between Jordan and I during a class that had to be broken up by a teacher. It has taken nearly five years for us to repair our relationship and find out we’re not so different after all. Jordan and I realized that we share an unwavering optimism for the future and an unequivocal love of people. I am very thankful that I get to work on a project with Jordan that embodies these shared values.
When we launched Starting Stories we had a supporter that stood far above the rest. We had one person that commented on every story we posted and provided the most encouraging feedback we could ever ask for. After putting a lot of work into starting a blog, the last thing you think about is whether other people are going to listen to you, but Jordan listened. Not only was Jordan engaging us in an incredibly meaningful way on our blog but was also consistently publishing amazing content on his personal blog. I approached Jordan about doing a version of Starting Stories for churches and was remarkably humbled that Jordan thought it was a good idea. Over the past few weeks, Jordan has taken the spark of this idea and turned it into a budding community devoted to the cause.
It has been an incredible joy to help Jordan get Spreading Stories off the ground. I am looking forward to watching Spreading Stories blow up and become the biggest Christian blog on the Internet, but I am more excited because I know that Jordan and I will work on more awesome projects in the future.
What is spreading stories?
It’s a blog site that showcases new, innovative churches in America. I really want to highlight church planters and their stories. How they build something from nothing. One of the coolest aspects of this project is that we’re showing how new churches are meeting the needs of their community in unique ways. I also want it to be a gathering place of resources for young church leaders of all backgrounds.
What is your day job?
I work at the Hilltop Community church, full-time, as a youth minister. I oversee the middle school and high school ministries. We run a program that has weekly events that try to partner with students, of all faith backgrounds, along their spiritual journey. My roles include mentor, counselor and teacher. I also coach Water Polo at El Segundo High School.
How do you balance blogging w/ you other responsibilities?
My job lends itself a little better to blogging than some. I don’t have to sit at a desk where I’m watched by a manager from 8-5. Having a schedule that’s flexible helps a lot but I still work 50-60 hours a week. So, what I do is, either wake up early or stay up late to work on it. I sacrifice the time to really be consistent with my blogging. I’ve found the more consistent you can be, the better your readership will be. For me, I balance it by dedicating the time and making it something that has to be done every single morning. This hones my craft. It becomes like exercise. Now, I can pump out a blog post in 20 minutes because I practice every day. It used to take me an hour and a half.
Why did you decide to go into ministry and what are your ministerial goals?
I think ministry is a calling. Being in ministry takes a unique gift set. Not every Christian is called to use those gifts. In my life, the skills that I’ve been given lend themselves well to helping people. I’ve always been a people person. I’ve always enjoyed being around people and engaging them. The reason I choose to go into youth ministry specifically is because of staggering statistics such as 75% of high school students that leave youth ministry will not stay in the church. I saw the church losing an entire generation of young people. When I was doing internships in college, I fell in love with youth ministry and loved working with kids. But, also, I really saw the church falling below the bar. More than anything, I have a passion for meeting people in their moments of need.
As far as future goals in ministry go, I would love to plant a church within the next 5-10 years. I feel like I have gifts that lend themselves well to church planting.
How does Spreading Stories align with your larger life goals?
Spreading Stories fits into my plan for a lot of reasons. One of my personal goals is to gain a lot of wisdom, tools, resources, and experiences that I don’t have now but can learn from other people who are church planting right now. It gives me a chance to enhance my writing style. One of my other goals is to write a book some day and I think working on this blog will both grow my readership and improve my writing skills. The biggest thing for me is being able to sit at the feet of people who are 5, 10, or 15 years into a church plant and learn from the best.
How is Spreading Stories different than other Christian blogs?
The big fad right now in Christianity is social justice. So, most blogs that you see out there are focused on bringing water to Africa, ending human trafficking in America and other social justice issues, which is great. There are church planting blogs out there but they are either personal blogs by people who are experts on church planting that provide resources or they’re organizations that put out content to help people. What makes Spreading Stories unique is that I want it to be very personal and show the faces and stories of these people. I want my readers to feel like they’ve experienced these stories first hand. At the same time, you’ll learn about tools and resources but in a more intimate way.
How does the Christian community view and deal with social media?
Like any other established institution, it takes them a while to keep up with culture. Unfortunately, the church lags behind most. I think church leaders don’t understand that this shift isn’t just a fad, but that it’s really a shift of culture, how people connect with each other, and what people value. A lot of people value the speed of information and being able to join causes that aren’t just across the street. I don’t think church leaders really understand this yet. Churches are afraid of social media because they don’t understand it and they see it as a problem to authentic community. A lot of church leaders use language that attributes huge problems like depression and suicide to people not having authentic relationships because they’re always online. They don’t see it as a tool to further causes or to gather people who want to live a certain way of life. But, there are some churches that understand it. Churches, like Mosaic, use Facebook and Twitter to get people across the country to participate in their Spark Initiative, which encourages people to do something good for another person and share it via social media. The churches that understand social media know that it extends their reach and can unite people from all over.
What needs to be done to bring the religious world up to speed with the Internet and social media?
I think the biggest thing is that churches need to see the value of how it can gather people in new ways. For example, on my personal blog, I try to do a lot of experiments whether it be “giving week” or “listening week”. I try to put a challenge out there through social media. It’s great to see different people across the country respond and see how it influences their community. If church leaders could see that it’s not changing the game, it’s just giving you new tools, I think people would begin to value it more and use it more for their ministries.
What has been the reaction to Spreading Stories?
My family, friends and mentors think it is unique within the Christian blog world. Most people have responded positively to it and have gotten on board with the vision of showcasing people who are doing the hard work of starting new churches. I’ve had a ton of help and people have given me a ton of awesome suggestions. It’s so great to have a community that doesn’t just cheer you on but actively gets involved. I’m thankful for my parents and friends for their support. I think some people freak out when I talk about crossing denominational lines. Some people are more comfortable in their communities and don’t really like to branch out. Building bridges and trying to connect with people who are different and worship God in different ways, sometimes scares people. I think it’s important to challenge people this way and get them to see that there is good being done in other denominations.
What is the value of collaborating with other people to enhance your blog?
I think people are kind of selfish when they want to tag their name alone on everything they do. For me, I love to partner with people that are more skilled than me in certain areas to make sure the project reaches its full potential. Working with you guys is a great example. I didn’t have the experience of writing in this way and didn’t know how to design the blog. If I had done it on my own, it wouldn’t have turned out as professional. It takes some humility to collaborate with other people and to recognize that other people are more gifted than yourself in some areas. The more people you have on your team, the more people you have willing to fight for you.
What advice would you give to other bloggers?
Hustle and publish. So many people I know have great ideas, awesome dreams for the world, and innovative solutions to tough problems, but they sit on it. Hustle is the difference between those people and people out there making a difference in the trenches. I see blogging as an opportunity to share rhetoric, and great rhetoric will always create new realities that call audiences to step into a different way of seeing or understanding the world. So be consistent in your determination and in your hustle as you blog about your ideas, dreams, and solutions and develop them into new realities. But you have to speak it. You have to share it. You have to publish. Refuse to settle for writing your ideas in a notebook. Click the publish button, and jump into the trenches.
What is the future of Spreading Stories?
I would love to have more than 10 denominations represented by the end of the year. I would love to eventually have events where we gather everyone that we’ve featured and ask church leaders to teach a class on a topic of expertise. I hope that churches will connect with each other through Spreading Stories and possibly partner. On a personal level, I hope it will propel me in the church planting world and also into the writing world. My vision is for Spreading Stories to become an organization that can help church planters and gather people together. I want it to be more than just a blog and offer something tangible in the physical world.
Links: facebook, twitter, personal blog
