Since May of 2009, I’ve been self-hosting this little web presence with Dreamhost using the Wordpress platform.  First of all, I stand to benefit financially from you signing up from Dreamhost, but I can’t more highly recommend them.  Why?  It’s cheap, and it’s novice-friendly setup for Wordpress users is perfect for newbies like me.  Seriously, cheap and easy.  If you’re interested hit that Dreamhost badge over to your right, or just click HERE.

If you’re not currently on Wordpress, then make it happen for yourself.  It’s so much easier and tweakable than any other platform.  And the added bonus of using Wordpress is that you instantly join a community of people willing to help and offer input.  Collaboration at it’s Wordpress best!

The plugin feature of Wordpress has been my favorite part of the experience.  In that spirit, here are a few plugins that I’ve found to be highly beneficial since moving over to Wordpress:

All in One SEO Pack
This little plugin easily ties SEO data into each blog post.  As a newbie, I didn’t quite get it’s benefit at first; but now I see that it really makes my posts easier to find through search engines.  I took the time to add SEO data to old posts, and it even drove traffic to those lost and lonely post from years pasts.

W3 Total Cache
I don’t totally understand this plugin, but I know that since I moved from WP_Super Cache to this my load times have been lightning fast.  Fast is good in the web world, right?

Amazon Associate Filter
This little plugin is magic.  It automatically ties in all Amazon links to my Amazon Affiliate ID.  Cha-Ching!

I moved over from a Blogger platform to Wordpress, and I found these three plugins to be life-savers:

Batch Categories
When I migrated over to Wordpress, I spent hours changing my categories and working to make old posts easier to find. Then I found this tool and did what had taken me hours in about 10 minutes. It allows you to do what the name of it is. Change categories of posts in a batch, instead of individually.

Blogger To Wordpress Redirection
This is a great plugin that automatically moves old blogger permalinks to your new wordpress permalinks. This was important for me, because I changed my naming setup when I moved to Wordpress.

Maintain Blogger Permalinks
This works in conjunction with the other plugin, and maintains all those original http://littlepastor.blogspot.com (Don’t ask!) links that exists in the Internets.

There are other plugins I use, like Askimet, Feedburner, Woopra, Google Analytics, and other Wordpress tool plugins.  It wouldn’t be an adequate Wordpress blog help post, if I didn’t mention the help that John has provided at www.human3rror.com and www.churchcrunch.com.  It was even from his site that I picked up the cool toolbar over on the right side of my blog!

I’d love to know what you’re using.  What am I missing out on?

I’ve been absent from this site for a few weeks.  But I’m still here!  No worries.  Today I’d like to share some of what’s been going on in and around my reading over the past few weeks.  From books to blogs to magazines:

BLOG: If you’ve ever worked with curriculum of any sorts (good or bad), then you need to add your two cents to the discussion happening at www.childrensministryonline.com Listen as Kenny rails against the system, or the man, or the whatever you want to call it… It’s blogging at it’s best.  An Open letter to Curriculum Publishers. In true Kenny Conley fashion, it’s about 10 posts long; but worth every minute of reading.

BOOK: I’m not sure how this has slipped my reading over the years, but somehow I’ve just now found myself reading through The Fabulous Reinvention of Sunday School by Aaron Reynolds.  This book is blowing my little teaching mind right now.   At risk of sounding like a total tool, I’ll say that I’m a pretty comfortable storyteller and public speaker; but Aaron’s book has been really challenging my setup and structure for teaching kids the Bible.  I’m reading through it right now with my Elementary Ministry Coordinator, and it’s really been fantastic!

BLOG: Sam Luce and I have a little ministry secret.  I’ll let the cat out of the bag…we’re both recovering Pentecostals.  That being said, he might have some Holy Spirit blogging gold on his hands with some new posts on the Holy Spirit this week.  Check it out:
The Role of the Holy Spirit in the life of a Child
What is the Holy Spirit’s role in Children’s Ministry

MAGAZINE: I electronically opted out of the swimsuit issue in Sports Illustrated.  I didn’t tell my wife, but when she got the card telling us that we would be missing this issue; it turned into a great gift that she still talks about today.  Do it guys, just do it.

BOOK & BLOG: Henry has hosted a special Think Orange blogging tour over the past week.  Go to www.ElementalCM.com and see what everyone else is saying about what I’ve already said a ton about!

BLOG: Warning: Shameless Self-Promotion!!!!   My wife is the editor for our church’s women’s ministry blog.  Anyways, she wrote something nice about me and my daughter for Valentines Week.  The Love of a Father

I’m out.  Now go back to something more important.

For this entire week I have written about how I have worked  the 5 Elements of Orange into my ministry strategy.  Catchup on my earlier posts:

#1 Integrated Strategy

#2 Refine the Message

#3 Reactivate the Family

#4 Elevate the Community

#5 Leverage Influence

I hope that you’ve taken the time to read and see what everyone else has said this week in regards to these same things.  I’ve tried to share personal experiences, and how I’m trying to effect change from the bottom up.  Just know we’re all in this together!

Dan “The Orangest of them All” Scott

Sam “Yankees are like the Church” Luce

Jonathan Cliff

Matt “White Pants” McKee

Kendra “Curriculum Guru” Golden

Anthony “Let me complain about 65 degree weather” Prince

JC “the lesser” Thompson

In the spirit of giving, I want to offer a free giveaway this morning!  On Thursday, January 21st I will be selecting one person to receive:

How do you win this?  Easy…ok maybe not that easy.

First: Leave me a comment here on this post tell me why your better than everybody else and deserve this free $40 value gift.

Second: Twitter this blog post! For example you could say, “@jonathancliff is the coolest person I know.  Go to http://www.jonathancliff.com/2010/01/orange-giveaway/ and see what I’m going to win in his Orange Week Giveaway!”

Third (in case of not having twitter): Go to your Myspace account and say something nice about Kenny Conley.

I’ll select one person that is the most creative in leaving a twitter comment directing others to this blog to win the Giveaway!  Stay tuned!

UPDATE: We have a winner! http://www.jonathancliff.com/2010/01/winner-winner-chicken-dinner/

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If you’re not making plans to attend the Orange Conference in Atlanta this Spring, then start making them now.  I’ll be there, and many more important people as well.  Come see if an Orange way of thinking can help you integrate strategy with your entire Next Generation ministries at your church!

Easily the most popular blog posting series I’ve ever done was on the 5 Things I Hate about Children’s Ministry.  Give it a chance and read it again for the first time.  If you left comments, then I really appreciate you taking the time to do so.  Kudo’s to you for coming out of the corner and being involved!

I promise I wasn’t trying to being mean, I was just looking for a fancy way to drive some traffic to something I had written.  I know that I’ve received a few emails worried that I’m slamming people when their down, but that was never my intention.   As proof, above is the Wordle from the entire series.  See how that “Hate” word is so much smaller than the other words?  I’m really a nice guy, promise…

Go to www.wordle.net to make your own!

Here is the listing of the 15 most popular blog postings read on www.jonathancliff.com during 2009.  Have you read anything here that you remember? I know that my favorite was #11 by far!

1. The Children’s Pastor that Ignores the Little People
2. Throwing Hate Down
3. Don’t Be Irrelevant
4. Don’t Be a One-Man-Show
5. Sinking Ship Syndrome
6. The Ungrateful Children’s Pastor
7. Why I Work with Kids
8. What the Dedication Class Looked Like
9. THE Parent Sunday
10. Weakness is the Advantage
11. To Know and Follow Hard After You
12. Replacement Volunteerism
13. Children’s Ministry Magazine Article
14. Puppets Can Be Awesome, Sometimes
15. The Bible + 90 Days = Whew!