A little bit of navel-gazing if I may. One of the recent things with regard to this blog that I'm a little bit proud of as of late is that there's a huge upswing in web traffic this way. Now, for us geeks, we're well aware that when we see stats for a website, there's a lot of automated & spam traffic that accounts for that. But in parsing a few different sites of mine, I'm of the opinion that that's less true here than elsewhere.

There was a traffic spike in January that happened on the heels of the infamous Osteen Christmas de-boarding story. Sometimes news like that will put a spike in activity. But as it stands, traffic here is now double what it was in that month. In fact, traffic has nearly doubled in the last three months. In the big scheme of things, this is still a fairly well-kept secret of a site. And that's fine since I don't pretend it to be anything bigger. In one sense, the blog is an outlet for me to reflect and think about activities that I take part in at Lakewood Church. If a huge number of people were interested in that, I'd worry. But on the other hand, there's a side of the blog that tends to be a bit more universal in appeal, when I pore over a book or Bible study that, I'm sure a few other believers out there are interested in.

But my point here isn't to brag on myself. What I might like a bit more is an email or comment about who some of you are, why you drop by, what type of information you like/dislike about the site (the more constructive the better), and whether you're a Lakewood member or not (we love ya either way, though). Or just feel free to drop a line saying "hi" if only for the purpose of introduction.

I'd also like to think there might be a Lakewood reader or two (or more) that might like to take up blogging as well. If you've not blogged, but have an itch to write, think and pray about it. You don't have to know any tech stuff ... just how to type. It's literally as simple as that.

There's a lot more of Lakewood to offer to the outside world, and ultimately it's my hope that a few folks out there either find a new/better relationship with Christ because of this site ... as well as find a church home that they experience renewed growth in (be it Lakewood or elsewhere). And for the inhouse community of Lakewood members, I'd love nothing more than to have some more diversity of coverage on this or another blog. Think about it ... blogging updates from the music ministry, any or all of the youth groups, some of the other Compass Class groups, or maybe even a 'Tales from the Usher'. The possibilities are endless. If you think you might be willing and able to offer a few thoughts here and there (or, more specifically, at least once every week or two), drop me a line.

Just for a bit of historical record, though ...

Unique Visitors in July: 2182
Number of Visits: 3929
Pageviews: 12889

Search terms that seem to find this site:
victoria osteen
jemine leigh
dodie osteen
michael hodge
aimee beard
lisa comes
paul osteen
ragamuffin gospel
carrie hodge
marcos witt
(though, curiously, one day's worth of stats for August have "the significant church" leading this list)

Sites other than mine that tend to link here:
http://www.relevantmessage.org
http://www.yourbestblognow.com (*)

(*) Brandon's site rocks, for those who don't know. I've only recently discovered the links from RelevantMessage.org. Not sure where the links are coming from there, but it's another cool site with a heavy interest in Christian books, so I'll have to bookmark that one.