We want to keep the “Presbymergent Bloggers” list for those who would self-identify as a presbymergent blogger. But we wanted to have a space for those who are interested in the conversation, but who wouldn’t necessarily want to be labeled as a presbymergent.

So, if you’re currently listed as one of our Presbymergent Bloggers, please email us and let us know which subheading you’d prefer to be listed under: Presbymergent Bloggers or Friends of presbymergent.

Also, if you’d like to add any other churches or worship gatherings, email us with those links as well. Thanks everyone!

One other note: when you do write posts, please remember to select a general category for the post, as well as inserting in some Tags directly below the area where you write the post. These can be more specific, and they help connect different posts with each other, as you’ll see if you click on the “Related” link under the post title.  Thanks!

1. Welcome to Presbymergent.org! With this short post, a community is born. The brainchild of Adam Walker Cleaveland and Karen Sloan, Presbymergent aimed from the start to “serve as a portal for all who are interested in connecting with Presbyterian and emerging pastors, leaders and lay people who are interested in and wrestling with how to live in and work in a ‘presbymergent’ world.“
2. The blogosphere begins to take notice of Presbymergent, and people start to subscribe, comment, and add their blogs and church sites to our directory. Additionally, Presbymergent begins to accept User Driven Content, allowing any registered user to post articles and blog entries.
3. Presbymergent’s panel of editors kick off a series of posts on the theme “Why I Am Presbymergent.” Notable guests like LeRon Shults, Nannette Sawyer, and Troy Bronsink, weigh in with posts of their own.
4. Presbymergent passes the 100 member milestone, and the Presbymergent Facebook group makes its first appearance (March, 2007)
5. Presbymergent Parties bring presbymergents together face to face at conferences spanning the country, including our very first 100% Presbymergent Conference in Pittsburgh.
6. Presbymergent is featured in an article of the Prebyterian Outlook, and later several presbymergent members take over the Outlook to produce an issue on Web2.0.
7. In November, Presbymergent.org passes the 200 member mark, while The facebook group reaches 248 members.
8. The website gets a fresh new look, some upgraded functionality. and even some pretty faces!
9. The PCUSA reaches out to Presbymergent.org to help find and fund Emerging Presbyterian churches with grant money: The Open Door (Pittsburgh) and The Living Room (Atlanta) are awarded funding.
10. Some of the year’s most popular posts (by comments) were:
    • Wrestling with Angels (Demons), by Steve Clark
    • Collaborative Sermons, by Neal Locke
    • Are Seminarians Trained to Lead the 21st Century Church? by Jan Edmiston
    • Presbymergent for Noobs, by Shawn Coons
    • A Challenge to Emergent Authors, by Neal Locke

It’s been a tremendous year, bringing together new faces, friends, ideas, and ideologies. Through all the blog posts, comment threads, conferences, conversations, and shared meals, we hope that God’s spirit has touched you in some way, and brought you closer not only to the presbymergent community, but to a King and a Kingdom - one that is (especially around here) often full of “loyal radicals” and “reformed reformers.” Happy New Year, and see you in 2008!

How and to what extent does your congregation utilize new media as an implement for evangelism?

I know that we blog, and that we’re open to integrating media into new forms of worship. This is good. But that we have connectivity within our respective fellowships doesn’t speak to how deeply we utilize internet media as a tool for bringing those outside our churches/faith communities into relationship with us.

I’ve been encouraging my little church to view our suite of web-based materials as a support for relational and affinity-based outreach. Between our website, a Google groups, a YouTube channel, and my own compulsive text and video bloggery, there’s a tremendous level of congregational and pastoral transparency.

The issue, as I see it, is moving those essentially passive media into a more engaged and active mode. The potential seems great, but I’m not sure what to do other than working to teach and empower my flesh-and-blood congregation to view our blogging and vlogging as a vital resource for our outreach efforts.

For those of you who’ve been actively using new media as part of your congregational life…how have you seen this played out? Are there any good best-practices resources in this area?
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As a side note, as I reviewed the Categories to tag this post, I noticed that neither “Evangelism” nor “Outreach”…nor any other variant of those concepts…seems to be present. Hmmm.

But we want to hear from you - what do you think?