Christmas Eve 2011 Week In Review…
What a great week here at the Stretched Blog. The blog traffic is up for the week, and we’re already running a higher page view total than last month. If we can keep it up this week (which could be tough over the holidays), the Stretched Blog may see its highest page views per month total ever!
Monday’s post was titled My Treasure & My Heart was an opportunity to share some of my wrestling over time and priorities. I really appreciate the empathy and encouragement expressed in the comments for this post. Tuesday brought a visit from Jonathan Pearson. Jonathan did an excellent job sharing the stretching of a young leader. Wednesday, I started to share the top 5 posts for the year. The number 5 post for the year was a great guest post by my wonderful wife. She shared about Detours that she has experienced over the past year or two. On Thursday, I shared the 4th most popular Stretched post of 2011 – Locks of Love – about my daughter’s generous donation. And finally and Friday, I shared another fun Ice Breaker about our favorite toys.
I am so thankful for your continued contribution to the blog through comments. Your comments are what makes this Stretched Community! Please remember to take the time to Subscribe to the blog, so you can have Stretched delivered daily to your e-mail inbox. Also, don’t forget to stop by the Jon Stolpe Stretched Facebook fan page. Become a fan to keep up with some additional Stretched stuff. I have started to share more blog highlights from other blogs that I read regularly. I think you’ll find some great stuff here. Thanks!
A few of my favorite posts from the rest of the blogging community this week:
- Questions To Ask For Reviewing 2011 by Brad Lomenick on BradLomenick.com
- I Dare You To Do This With Me by Jon Acuff on JonAcuff.com
- The Only Way To Become A Real Writer by Jeff Goins on GoinsWriter.com
How about you? How was your week? If you’re a blogger what happened over your way this week? Did you read any great blog posts this week? Share with the rest of us!
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About
You might be wondering where the “Stretched” thing comes from. For starters, when I was in high school at Rancocas Valley Regional High School, I was short – 5’6″ to start my junior year. Since then, I’ve grown to almost 6’6″. Many of my friends started calling me Stretch.
On a more recent basis, I often feel “stretched” by all the things going on around me – career, marriage, parenting, church, running, reading, friendships, extended family, relationship with God, etc. (in no particular order). My hope is that this blog will provide an opportunity to express some of my “stretch marks” and to possibly hear your thoughts as well. 
So here is a bit more about me: I’m a Christ-follower, husband, dad, son, uncle, engineer, runner, chicken farmer, gardener, saxophone player, operations manager, adventurer, and the list goes on…. I’m extremely blessed to have the best wife in the whole world. We met at Grove City College. We were engaged on top of the Eiffel Tower. We got married in Greensburg, PA. Now, we live in Schwenksville, PA with our two incredible kids, and our black lab.
Great week thus far! I am really, really being stretched yesterday and today. I am the main speaker at our church’s Christmas Eve service which is hosted by the ladies of the church. I have known with certainty the topic of my devotional for tonight and had something written and ready to go. BUT, I could not get comfortable with it. Yesterday I realized God may want me to speak something different. I’m the type that needs to be prepared and practiced before I speak, but I sense the Lord saying, just trust me.
I put out a plea for prayer to several of the ladies participating in the event and a few other friends. Two of those friends called me and basically said the very same thing to me. Leah, this may not be about you and your message. It may be that the Lord is waiting on someone else in order to give you the message He wants you to speak. I had not even thought about that.
So, I have three messages…two written down and one stewing around in my head and heart. Now, I wait and pray and listen. God has never failed me yet and I know He will give me the perfect devo for the evening services.
Whew, talk about being stretched!!
Have a Merry Christmas!
Jon, I just hit my second highest traffic month so far, with a week to go. Sounds like we have some or the same thoughts going forward next week.
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