I had 72 of you respond to my survey over the last couple of weeks, and I’m breaking down the results now. Here’s what it looks like:

54 Men
18 Women

10 age 21-30
22 age 31-40
22 age 41-50
18 age 50+

4 completed High School
10 completed Some College
40 College Degree
18 Graduate School

6 Baptist
40 Church of Christ/Christian Church
2 Methodist
24 Other

30 attend church once per week
40 attend church more than once per week
2 attend a few times per month

6 attend a church of less than 100
4 attend a church of 100-200
20 attend a church of 200-500
12 attend a church of 500-1,000
22 attend a church of 1,000-2,500
8 attend a church of 2,500+

20 on church staff
24 lead small group
20 teach class
6 lead youth group
18 work with children
10 participate in missions
6 lead worship
4 no involvement
30 other

30 blog
60 FaceBook
18 Twitter
30 read through RSS feed
12 read via FaceBook

The following states are represented:

Arkansas
Arizona
California
Colorado
Florida
Georgia
Illinois
Kentucky
Minnesota
Mississippi
Missouri
New Mexico
Ohio
Oklahoma
Pennsylvania
Texas
Virginia

And the following countries:

Canada
England
Australia

As for topics you’ve enjoyed, you left quite a diverse list. Lots of you said you enjoyed and miss the character studies I used to do when I was teaching regularly — especially the series on Moses, David and Daniel. Several of you liked the series on faith I did back in the spring (another series I was teaching through). Community is a topic you’d like to hear more about. And several of you asked for more on how to engage culture from a Christian perspective. Many of you want to talk more about church and ministry-related issues. That makes sense since so many of you are on staff or serve as lay-leaders somewhere.

By far, the most positive feedback I got was about the recent singing posts. Ironically, the posts weren’t really about singing. At least, I didn’t think so. But they touched something in many of you, and, for that, I’m glad.

I want you to know how honored I am that you read what I write. It’s hard to believe we’re coming up on five years this blog has been going. Knowing that I have devoted readers like you keeps me motivated as I continue growing, learning, reading and sharing my thoughts in this forum. Your presence has meant a lot to me as I’ve gone through a tough year. Please continue praying as I continue searching for a good, healthy church where I can use the gifts God has given me to provide for the family he’s also given me.

I realize I have a lot of lurkers still. Let me encourage you to come out of the shadows. One of the things the survey revealed is how much you really like the give-and-take discussion in the comments.

Oh, and Dave Moss won the book. Don’t worry, though. I just got a copy of a new book (not by me) that I’ll be giving away soon. Stay tuned!

Just wanted to remind you that if you take the Faith 2.0 reader survey, you can register to win a free, autographed copy of my latest book, The 52 Greatest Stories of the Bible.

You can also help shape some of the content I write about here, but it’s the free book that really got your attention, wasn’t it?

Click this link to find the survey, then come back here and let me know you did. I’ll pick the winner Friday.

It seems strange to me that I started writing almost five years ago. It seems even stranger to me that what started as a simple online journal for my family and a few close friends now has hundreds of readers from all over the world.

I had no idea when I started just how much blogging would actually help my writing develop. This forum has become a place where I can think out loud, getting your input on ideas I’ve then turned into sermons, articles and books. It’s became invaluably helpful for me, and I want to make sure it continues to be helpful for you, too.

You can help shape this blog by taking a few minutes to answer the 10 questions found here:

Faith 2.0 Reader Profile

Thanks for reading, and if you do take the survey, leave a comment here and be entered in a drawing to receive an autographed copy of The 52 Greatest Stories of the Bible. The drawing will take place and the book will be sent on July 31.

Update: As of about 1:30pm today, my email seems to be back up and functioning properly. However, anything you may have sent to me over the past 10 days may or may not be bouncing around cyberspace oblivion now. Sorry about any inconvenience, but you may need to resend stuff.

The last message I received to my Faith 2.0 email address was on June 27. Initially, I thought I was suddenly unpopular, but — after a few experiments — I have come to the conclusion that my email isn’t functioning properly.

I can send messages, but I cannot receive them. There’s a metaphor in there, I’m sure, for most preachers. We tend to be good at giving sermons because it’s one-way communication.

But that’s another story….

If you’ve been trying to communicate with me and are wondering why I haven’t returned your message or answered your question…now you know.

If you need to reach me via email, try: johnalanturnerATgmail.com

Last night my blog went down for a couple of hours. It seems I somehow managed to exceed my bandwidth allotment. According to my fantastic webguy, I got more hits yesterday than I normally do in a month.

Take that Scot McKnight!

But how shall I explain this massive increase in my popularity? To what may I attribute this sudden spike in information superhighway traffic?

Was it a swarm of spammers come to tempt me with their online pharmaceutical wares and promises of nude celebrity photographs? Did one of those pesky New York Times reporters finally cite my site as the source of their editorial insight? Is there some controversial person out there talking about me behind my back? Is Perez Hilton perhaps taking me to task for my views on gay marriage?

No, my personal theory is that it is a group of angry baristas who want to stop me and my message about the potential dangers of including coffee bars in church assemblies! That’s the only explanation. Every Starbucks on the planet is encouraging its employees to log on and clog up my blog.

We haven’t done any kind of roll call in a while, so let’s try it today. Lurkers, come out of hiding! Who are you? Where are you? How did you come to discover my little corner of cyberspace?

I feel kind of stuck w/ the blog here lately. Honestly, I have loved doing this for so many years, but I let it slip after we moved to California last fall. The website got hacked. I got busy planting a new church. So much is going on, and my thoughts have been kind of muddy about how to move forward.

So, that’s me and the blog right now: stuck.

How would you suggest I get unstuck? Or should I shut the thing down? If I keep going, what would you like to discuss here?

Go ahead; I’m all ears. Well…not really…but you understand what I mean, right?

Earlier this summer (I can still say that for a few more days, right?) I was honored to be the keynote speaker at Redwood Christian Park’s June Family Camp. I did a series called “ReBoot” — about re-examining what we really believe so we can make better decisions that might lead to a better life. I also taught a workshop based on the materials in my book Hearts and Minds: Raising Your Child with a Christian View of the World. Oh, and my good friend Dr. Lawson Stone did a series of lectures based on his research into the books of Joshua and Judges. His teaching was great.

They’ve just posted the audio on their website.

Eventually, I’ll get some of these audio files titled and uploaded to this website, but until then you can grab them here.

It just came to my attention that something’s been a little screwy with my website and comments lately. For a while you couldn’t leave comments at all. Then you had to sign in to leave comments. I think I fixed it so that we’re back to normal, but I can’t figure out how it got messed up in the first place.

Needless to say, if you’ve read the previous post you know how topsy-turvy life has been over the past couple of weeks.

Part of this topsy-turviness is related to the fact that my latest book, The 52 Greatest Stories of the Bible, is about to come out. It should hit stores next Tuesday, in fact. And you can already buy it online from your favorite places like Amazon.com or Christianbook.com.

One of the things we’re working on is a website to go along with the book. You can read the first chapter, and we’ll be adding all sorts of fun stuff in the coming weeks.

Oh, and it would really help me out if those of you who have read the book (or at least portions of the book or maybe you heard me teach through the material) could go and write a favorable review on Amazon.com. In fact, if you do that, I’ll send a free copy of the book to the person of your choice as a Christmas gift.

I am so honored and humbled by all the comments and email I got over the weekend from people who come by the blog on a regular basis. It’s hard to believe that I created this blog four years ago primarily to keep up with our friends and family scattered across the country. It’s grown now to nearly 1,000 hits per day! Thank you so much for your participation.

I was interviewed by a reporter last Friday about Christians and the use of what is now being called “Web 2.0″ technology — social networking sites and blogs that create interactive communities. The reporter said she initially assumed that this was a way to reach out to the younger generation, but, after seeing how many folks come here who are not…er…from the younger generation, she may have to rethink the demographics.

One of the things that really made me happy was how many of you come here because the things we talk about stimulate your thinking. As many of you know, the whole reason I founded Faith 2.0 was to help people live better lives by re-examining what they really believe. I feel that has been precisely what we’ve been doing the past few months here as we’ve explored thoughts about God, about humans, about Jesus, about salvation and, most recently, about church.

These five things (theology proper, anthropology, christology, soteriology and ecclesiology) are what John Stott calls “five foundations for social involvement”. They are the true foundation for developing what he refers to as “a Christian mind”.

And yet….

There are some who seem to believe that we shouldn’t devote too much time to cultivating our minds, our intellectual lives. Some even say it’s “unspiritual”. They say God wants our hearts. They say God wants us to obey whether we understand or not. They say we should not study anything other than the Bible, and that we should merely speak where the Bible speaks and remain silent where the Bible is silent.

Have you ever encountered this anti-intellectualism in churches? Why do you think it’s so important for God’s people to learn how to think critically?

Okay, we haven’t done this in a while.

I have lots of folks reading this blog who I’ve never met — folks from all across the USofA — folks from as far away as Australia (hey, Wendy). I honestly don’t know how you people found me or what you’re looking for. But I’d love to know.

Who are you? Where are you from? What are you looking for?