This time the challenge he’s set before the community of Christians who like stuff is:

Can they raise enough money in 24 hours to provide 1,000 people in the Nakaseke District of Uganda with a malaria net?

The project is in partnership with SafeWorld Nexus,  a non-profit that serves the people of Uganda and Haiti to promote community health, clean water, and protecting children.

You can follow the project’s progress on:

• the Stuff Christians Like blog,
• SafeWorld’s website,
• or by following the #SCL10K hashtag on Twitter.

But really what you really should do is:

Donate $10 to buy one mosquito net.

What do you think, will they reach their $10,000 goal in 24 hours?

…

Of course they will.

Well done, Jon.

As you may know, I’m a big fan of Jon Acuff… Big – but not too big. I mean I think he’s great and all but it’s not like he’s all I think about all the time. Wow, that sounds crazy.

I’m being serious though, I’m not some crazy Jay-Cuff super-fan all foaming at the mouth, flipping through my notebook of drawings I’ve done of Jon side-hugging a unicorn or anything like that. That’d be weird.

I can prove that’s not me: one time I gave Jon a ride to a Starbucks and I didn’t try to kidnap him or anything….

I mean I totally could have. But didn’t.

See, not crazy.

But I digress. As I was saying, I am a fan of Jon and I appreciate his writing at Stuff Christians Like. I’m also consistently impressed with the caliber of guest post-ers that he is constantly have write for SCL.

But today was different.

Today Jon’s guest, Kevin Ring, posted the single worst post on a blog I have ever read ever.

Now, I am familiar with Kevin Ring’s other web work. His brilliant comments on Abraham Piper’s Twenty Two Words demonstrate a level of intellectual panache that haven’t been seen since Bob Keeshan graced the airwaves. And as a long time commenter on SCL, his poignant observations bring a level of heart-felt levity that nicely compliments the serious tone of the site. I truly had high hopes for Mr. Ring’s inaugural guest post.

Nope.

Today’s post was so bad that after I read it I immediately regretted every single life decision I had ever made in the past 32 years that had led me on a path to that moment. (Except marrying my wife… love you Cutesiebuttons!!)

In his post, Mr. Ring presents the “five best tips for planting a great Christian blog”. What he should of called it was the “the stupidest, most inane, imbecilic, moronic, formulaic and asinine abuse of the English language ever.”

As someone who has started a Christian blog, I take personal offense at his recommendations. Among the “pearls of wisdom” that he offers:

• When deriving a name for your blog, “make your blog the ‘intersection’ of two things”.
  UGH. How about I explore the intersection of my fist with your face?
• Or, “don’t make waves” with your writing because you might offend your pastor.
  I started this blog because I know I can write better sermons than my pastor. If that hurts his feelings, tough.
• And in what can only be called a desperate attempt at being clever, he ends with “always leave them wanting…”
  What an obvious and juvenile joke. Really? An ellipsis?!?! Are you serious?!?!! My two year old could have written that!

  [Funny story. My two year old actually did write that. Originally the advice was "Always leave them wanting to take some kind of action". The point I was trying to make was that your writing should be inspiring, but I was having trouble getting the wording right. "Be inspiring" would have worked. Seems kind of obvious now. Anyway, I guess I accidentally highlighted part of the sentence and the subsequent paragraph and then got distracted and stepped away for a minute. While I was gone my two year old came up and pressed DELETE, probably saying "boop" as she did it - that's the noise she thinks the keyboard makes. I'd like to think that she exclaimed "DELETED!" as she did it but probably not. - Anyway, long story short, I didn't catch it before emailing it off, blah blah blah, always leave them wanting...]

In response to this blogging atrocity (this blogtrocity! – I totally just made that word up!) I say for shame Jon Acuff, for shame! (BTW, you can click here to Tweet that if you want.)

I understand if you were razzle-dazzled by Mr. Ring’s towering frame and serious beard. What I don’t understand is how this made it past your Editorial Board.

And I urge you, dear Reader, not to subscribe to Kevin’s blog feed.

And please do not follow Kevin on Twitter.

And whatever you do, DO NOT leave a comment on his blog complimenting his writing and inviting him to guest-post on your blog!!

We must take a stand. I’m counting on you. Good day.

Sincerely,

• Jon Acuff of StuffChristiansLike.net is inspired by his 6 year old daughter’s sense of injustice that there are hungry children around the world;
• Jon, still reeling from how many people have come to enjoy and support SCL gets an idea: leverage the power of the community to do something big for a charity;
• Jon reaches out to the community for inspiration as to what charity to work with;
• Jon settles on Samaritan’s Purse and works with them to coordinate the building of a kindergarten in rural Vietnam… all Jon needs is to raise $30,000.

Which brings us to today. This morning Jon shares his idea, asks the readers to support the project and raise the $30,000. Jon sets a goal of raising the funds by December 31 of this year.

Throughout the day, we watched as the donations came pouring in. No one expected to raise this much money so quickly.

This evening, sometime around 10:30 pm Eastern timezone, the total donations given in support of this project surpassed $30,000.

The Stuff Christians Like blog community raised over $30,000 for charity in 18 hours.

The StuffChristiansLike.net online community raises over $30,000 for charity in one day!

I’m am so excited to process this, synthesize what happened and share any insights. But for right now, I’m just going to sit back and enjoy the power of what Christ has done and how God has been and will continue to be glorified through it.

[Update:] We’re not done. The tremendous momentum built up yesterday can’t be just cut off, so Jon and Samaritan’s Purse are asking everyone to continue their support and raise another $30,000! That’s right, the goal is now to build two kindergartens for the people of Vietnam. Let’s do it!

Read the updated post here: http://stuffchristianslike.net/2009/11/lets-build-a-2nd-kindergarten/

Click here to donate: https://www.firstgiving.com/scl

And be sure to follow the #SCLVIETNAM conversations on Twitter.

For me, high school was the first time I ever witnessed a fight. I’d seen fights on TV and in movies but in high school I actually experienced a number of fights close up. I remember vividly how I felt every time I witnessed a fight. I felt scared. I felt kind of sick. I’ve talked before how violence is unnatural and it affects us profoundly whenever we are exposed to it. That is what I experienced those times I was around when a fight would break out.

I say all this because in the past week, I’ve witnessed in the Christian blogosphere a number of “fights,” examples of Christians trash-talking other Christians. And just like in high school, the commenters on those blogs crowd around yelling (in essence) “Fight! Fight! Fight!” I’m not going to link to any examples because I don’t want to perpetuate these fights. But if you read Christian blogs you know what I’m talking about.

What I witnessed this week left me with that same sick feeling I felt in high school. I honestly thought to myself, “How can you write such things and still proclaim to love Jesus?” I know deep down that all Christians are flawed and left to our own devices our sinful nature will inevitably screw everything up, even the profound blessing that God’s Kingdom. But still…

So this morning when I read about the kindergarten project on Stuff Christians Like my spirit was immediately lifted. “Yes! This is what it means to be a Christian!” I thought (mental fist pumping and everything). So I immediately blogged about it, added my support via the comments (made a few jokes as well; it’s a satire blog after all.) and have been tracking the status of the fundraising all day.

As of the time this post is published, the Stuff Christians Like community has raised $18,486.79 dollars to build a kindergarten in Vietnam. $18,486.79 dollars!!!Now you have to realize something, this has only been going on for six or so hours. That’s $3,081 per hour!!! We’re already at over 60 percent of our goal! On the first day!

This is what it means to be a Christian!

This is the immeasurable, incomprehensible, incomparable power of Jesus Christ at work redeeming this world.

If you haven’t already (I say as if I have readers), please please PLEASE go to the donation page and help. Be encouraged by your Christian brothers and sisters actually loving others and not just talking about loving others. This is a chance to love and serve the poor, to bless the children of Vietnam and to proclaim the glory of God before the nations. Please be a part!

The link for the donation page is here: http://www.firstgiving.com/SCL

The project on Stuff Christians Like is here: http://stuffchristianslike.net/2009/11/this-cant-be-real/

And some additional details of the project can be found here: http://twentytwowords.com/2009/11/09/22-questions-to-jon-acuff-about-raising-30k-to-build-a-school-in-vietnam/

Go!

The one of the main things I like about Jon (other than his ability to pull off the “down-filled vest” look) is that he gets that the point of all of this is not just to have a blog, not just to be funny. The point is to use what God has given us to love and serve others all over the world and in doing so, proclaim Christ as King to the nations. We are to use our influence to glorify God and advance the Kingdom.

Jon gets that. (In case you’re thinking it’s not that big of a deal, go read his blog. The reasons Christians “like” all that “stuff” is because we don’t always get it.) So that’s why I like Jon. And the vest thing. And because he knows there’s more to books than just the content on the pages. But I digress.

While at Cultivate Jon mentioned that God has put something huge on his heart and that he was beginning to work on this new project and hoping to use the scale and reach of SCL to make it happen. Today Jon announced that the Stuff Christians Like blog community is building a school in Vietnam.

Cool, right?

Jon is asking his readers to join with him and Samaritan’s Purse to build a school in Vietnam. Kind of like this one:

Want to help bild a school like this one for the kids in Vietnam?

If you want to be part of something big, bless the people of Vietnam, and have a few laughs along the way, head over to Stuff Christians Like, read about the project and add your support by either donating or sharing this with your friends. Thanks.

Link to Jon’s post on Stuff Christian’s Like: http://stuffchristianslike.net/2009/11/this-cant-be-real/