PaulPrins.net

I’m not exactly sure but I believe that the theme on this blog has been here since summer of 2004. For those of you who are wondering, that is probably the longest a single blog has held a single theme, probably ever. Due to my semi-recent rash of theme making for word press (two in the last 5 months counts) I will likely take an afternoon sometime in the next month and revamp the image here to make it more professional.

This will be a good step since I seem to have become one at some point here. I’m now running my own small business, attended graduate school, and trying to figure out where I fit into ministry (with my wife) here in the twin cities. I also am meeting up with the volunteer coordinator for the Minneapolis Public Library system midweek to try to find a way to volunteer there. Hopefully either by reading to kids, or helping kids learn to/get excited about reading.

Since i can control the theme, there will be something new and snazzy is coming soon.

I also am starting to improve my delineation between my professional/personal lives. As this becomes more clear I will hopefully start blogging here more frequently again.

This theme is actually several months old and has been around the block a bit by this point. It is called Cotolance (Coo-toe-lance) and was developed for the company blog of Nineteen05, my web development company. This blog serves as a way for me to share what is coming up on a decade of web development, marketing, management, and community development experience with the Church as a whole. The latter three of these topics are sorely excluded from the seminal educations professional ministers receive during their masters programs (I’m also currently enrolled at Bethel Seminary in St. Paul, MN)

The design heavily borrows from the main Nineteen05.com website (which was completed by Ned Wright last spring) The main differences are in the layout of the content section of the design, and the sidebar. While the nineteen05.com site is fairly monochromatic for the moment, I wanted to bring more color into the blog and did that through the header and the date boxes. The design will likely mimic that of the company site as it goes through renovations in the future.

Check out the theme in action

Like the Inductaloot theme, this one is also private. If you are looking for a blog of your own check out Insights For Church and get blogging today! It is hosting the official nineteen05 blog, and hopes to host hundreds of blogs for those involved in ministry in the near future.

I’ve launched a blogging community for the church as a whole over at www.insightsforchurch.com and just finished setting everything up yesterday. In the setup process I created a theme for the main WP site and called it inductaloot. After installing several plug-ins and modifying some scripts it seems to be working the way I want it to. Showing the most recent site-wide posts, have a list of the most active blogs (views/comments/posts) on the right, and also will have a site-wide tag cloud as new posts are added (didn’t work retroactively for the 50ish posts already in there).

This theme is a private theme developed for a multi user install of word press. If you are looking for a free blog and are in the ministry at some level (lay or professional) get one! Head over to Insights For Church and sign up for your free blog today.

I can tell that I’ve been spending to much time over at Insights For Church that I only now noticed that I was many versions behind. Now upgraded to the most recent version and it is very nice. Looking forward to the re-vamped layout in version 2.7… Hopefully only a few more weeks away.

Everything is really quite interesting right now. The balance of life, work, and school is quite different then the spring quarter. Just last week I finally got caught up on all my studies by completing an intensive course that met the first two weeks of September.

That course was Global and Contextual Studies that laid a foundation for cross cultural ministry (so both local and non-local missions). Really insightful and helped to further mold my understanding and missional focus. The biggest part of this class that drug on was the research paper, of which I chose to do a study of the city of Paris in France. How to tailor ministry and understand the context that one would be entering into for the purpose of planting a church. Really interesting, but took many hours of research, reading, note taking, and writing.

Since finishing that paper and the final early last week I was able to catch up on some neglected readings for my current course load (Preaching, Hermeneutics, and spiritual foundations). I really am enjoying the current courses. Spiritual foundations seems a bit slow and lethargic (in there as I write this) but my hope is that more practical content is on the horizon.

The biggest struggle has been how to increase the time I spend with my wife, friends, and family without compromising my work commitments and my level of academia. One of the biggest struggle that I had through our time in Minneapolis has been the lack of social involvement. I’ve had a great friend in Matt who has meet with me over coffee almost every week. It was these times that have helped me realize that I need more social outlets.

Being back in school has helped as has setting more time aside to spend with my wife. Still feeling this dynamic out for the best balance to have currently in my life.

Also the dynamic of ministry has been interesting. Jordan and I have been waiting for the next ministry we would be actively involved in since we graduated in December. We are to the point now were we are really excited/anxious to get back into ministering in some way. We shall see what this brings.