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The Year in Review at Students of Jesus

I’m very big in Hungary, apparently. That’s the headline from the Students of Jesus year in review, my annual exercise in narcissism where I look back on the past year. According to Google Analytics, Hungarians are in fourth place among my readers, following the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada.

This year-end review benefits, um, well, me actually--and I’m usually astounded by the disparity between which post received the most page views and which ones were my personal favorites. This year, however, the blogosphere and I were much closer in our judgment than in years previous.

Since you would cripple yourself by missing even one Students of Jesus post, I present this list of top items in an effort to keep you whole:

Top Five Posts (by page views):

Sinners in the Hands of Willy Wonka 2/23/12 ~ This post was six times more popular than any other. Turns out “Willy Wonka” is a frequently searched name. Imagine the disappointment of those who clicked through to discover it was really a post about the grace of God.

Jesus, Friend of Pharisees 4/12/12 ~ This post includes a picture of Jesus driving the money-changers from the Temple. He was pretty angry, and so was I when I wrote this. So this is what I sound like when I’m P.O.’d.

Who Funds Your Imagination?
7/5/12 ~ Whenever things get slow at Students of Jesus, I quote Walter Brueggemann. Either him or someone from FoxNews. That usually stirs things up. This post is about -- well, heck -- just go read it.

Four Lessons I learned from Jefferson Bethke 1/19/12 ~ Meeting Jeff Bethke was one of the delights of this year. In my work as an editor I interviewed him via telephone for an article I wrote elsewhere. I was completely charmed by his grace and humility--even more so because his home church is frequently maligned as heavy-handed and authoritarian. If Jeff is any indication of the fruit of that ministry, then I’m a fan.

Sarah Bessey’s Parable of the Father 5/5/12 ~ Whenever things get really, really slow at Students of Jesus, I ask Sarah Bessey to guest post. She loves Jesus, is way-smart, and wears cardigans. Her post was part of an ill-fated series dedicated to exploring the parables of Jesus. I figured this series would take off, but it turns out we in the blogosphere would much rather argue about really significant stuff like--uh-oh, I should shut up here. Anyway, Sarah is a treasure, and she’ll release a book later in 2013. It’s the charming story of a woman who owns an independent bookstore on the upper east side of Manhattan, when a big evil chain bookstore opens one block away. The woman falls in love with the chain-store owner, but Amazon.com puts them both out of business. (Or something like that)

The one article I wish everyone could read:
Well, all of them, really (I told you I was a narcissist). But if you don’t have time for them all, please check out Lazarus Quenby and the Reasonable Dinner Party.

Thanks for making Students of Jesus the most popular spiritual formation blog that originates from Campbellsville, Kentucky. (Of course, it's the only spiritual formation blog that originates from Campbellsville, Kentucky.) Blessings!

Most Popular Posts vs My Favorites (I Lose)

Apparently, gentle readers, we don’t always see things eye to eye, you and I.  On Monday I listed my twelve favorites posts of 2010. Today, as I list the five most-visited posts, only one of them was among my favorites.

Students of Jesus welcomed readers from 105 countries on all five inhabited continents. Next year I'm hoping the penguins in Antarctica get wi-fi. And Students of Jesus reached all 50 of these United States. I'm particularly grateful to that one guy in Cheyenne for putting Wyoming on the map (I hope he comes back next year as well).
The final week of the year is the traditional time for retrospectives, and I’m nothing if not traditional. So, in the continued spirit of all-about-me narcissism, here are Students of Jesus' most-visited posts of 2010. 
When Famous Christians are Gay When Christian singer Jennifer Knapp came out as a lesbian (with simultaneous interviews in The Advocate and Christianity Today) I ventured away from the center of Students of Jesus and gave my opinions on the church, on sin, and on the abuse of scripture. Not surprisingly, my views satisfied no one--not even myself.  This post generated 25 times the normal traffic to my blog, but it wandered away from the premise of Students of Jesus by commenting on current events and the church at large. I’ve learned that such posts generate a lot of heat and almost no light.
Monday’s Meditation: Sex, Celebrity and Discipleship Just four days later, shocked at the traffic that flooded my little dog and pony show, I tried to get back to the core of my concerns (I'm actually quite proud of this post). I commented on why issues of sex and celebrity draw an audience 25 times larger than the issue of discipleship. Really? Sex and celebrity garners more attention than following Jesus? Who knew? A crazy side effect of this post is that because the title contains the words sex and celebrity it draws traffic every week from search engines around the world. I feel sorry for the people who eagerly click on the link. The average length of a visit to this post? Less than two seconds.
The Great Fall of Wisdom This is the only overlap between my top twelve and the most-visited posts. I suggested that an omniscient God isn’t impressed with how smart we are. I also suspect that the reason it was visited so often is that 22.6% of Reformed-theology seminary students came to laugh at my reasoning (I made that last statistic up, but I stand by it nonetheless). I still like this post, and I would appreciated if all four of my regular readers would email it to Zondervan, Lifeway, and Thomas Nelson.
Monday’s Meditation: Three Important Questions I’m not going to tell you what the three questions are, but believe me, they’re important. This post also generated the most comments of any post all year, but only because I shamelessly ended the article with these pathetic words: I’m begging: tell me what you think.”
Monday’s Meditation: Indigenous Worship (dot com) I thrilled this post was well received because my dearest friends launched a website dedicated to songwriting and creativity in the local church. It’s an awesome site, and you should definitely check it out, but you should always do so by going to Students of Jesus first and then following the link to their site. Then they might buy me lunch.

One glimmer of hope for people who search the InterWeb is that the sixth-place post was actually written in February of 2009. Somehow, among the millions of people using Google-dot-antichrist, several hundred found their way to Students of Jesus by searching “How Can We Humble Ourselves.” That just provides just enough hope for me to keep writing another year.
That’s it, friends. 2010 is in the books, and my prayer for all four of you is that you will experience God’s richest blessings in the year to come. And hey, what would you like to read about in the coming year, I’m begging: tell me what you think!