Recently in Blog Reviews Category

You may have been inspired or you may have overwhelmed or even disappointed from the Nines conference, but how did you view most if not all of those who shared their 9 minute message? Always ask yourself what you are thinking about what you are observing because our thoughts can be tricky and are not always our own.

I think I make a correct assumption that the word "peer" is not one of the words that comes to mind - at least not a peer like you see most of the peers around you. Which isn't surprising because the marketing did not condition that mindset. Which of course is understandable because it would be difficult to draw 10,000 people to a venue on leadership without conditioning a mindset of expectation from "top" leaders. What I think we all failed to realize was the result was pressure on speakers to perform and live up to that expectation along with us attendee's expecting it. 

Depending where you are at in your spiritual journey this then produced a wide range of feelings. One thing I have found very liberating in ministry is to intentionally not let myself fall into the I must perform.. live up.. deliver.. strive.. etc mindset. That mindset withered the fruit of the spirit in my life and ministry and was toxic to my heart and relationship with the Lord. I never want to be more like the wizard behind the curtain than the characters living the adventure walking the yellow brick road. 

I remember years ago when I was sharing my passion for ministry before I was ever given the vision for this ministry. I was at a retreat and just out of college at 23 and was sharing with a man maybe 10 years older than me at the time. After I finished sharing he told me wow I am impressed and your going to really make a difference in the world. I was somewhat shocked and taken back by what he said and I asked why do you say that? To which he told me something I have never forgot. Everyone else here is talking about all these great big ministries and dreams and goals, but you are talking about how you have helped individuals and I see your passion from that and they have in turn gone on to minister to others. Most people dream big and think of large ministries and big accomplishments, but you really care about people and helping them so much they are compelled to then go help others. That's that's rare people live and think like that and that's revolutionary.

It was about two years after that when God gave me the vision for this ministry. He didn't give it all to me at once and rightfully so because I would not have had the faith to step out in it. God began to reveal a small part of a big vision and has since then brought me closer to that mountain. It didn't look so big at first, but the closer the Lord has brought me to it - the more I can see on that mountain.

So to my friend who was overwhelmed by the Nines. Don't worry, ministry and walking with God is much like us as a young boy (or girl) with our feet in the ocean right beside our dad. He is there with us and we are not the father, but the son (or daughter). We don't have to be the teenager trying to act like we know it all, but we can and rightfully should be the young son who trusts his father. Even if we later realize we made mistakes and didn't know better along the way - we can be like the young son (or daughter) in our underpants splashing our feet in the ocean right beside our Father. As time goes on our Father will father us and we will grow through the stages of life, but those are stages of maturity and growth we must journey through with the Lord. 

So where ever you find your walk with the Lord in ministry - remember your father is right there beside you. 

While I have found it easy to find lists of very popular Christian blogs what I am really looking for are blogs who are not yet main stream or really popular in terms of readership numbers. They should have good content, unique views and come from a biblical world view in the areas of heart, mind and vision and these guys blog is very much vision focused and as well as some on the mind too.

When I started my quest to find fresh content blogs from unique perspectives with biblical world views I quickly realized there are a few popular ones every one seems to link to with authors who are no longer seen as people just like you and me.

I am often encouraged and inspired by popular Christian teachers, pastors and preachers, but passionate people that we tend to see more like us have an ability to motivate and inspire us to take action in our lives in a very powerful way. We don't see the decades of hard work and experience and obstacles well know speakers have gone through to get where they are and if we try to gauge our advance in things in according to how we see them doing it we will quickly become discouraged. 

Yet, how many times have you done something after seeing someone else do it because you thought if they can do it then I could do it. You were able to relate to them and identify with them and seeing them do big and great things we then tend to find courage to for the same.

While I have some disadvantages in being a relatively unknown person in ministry I have the advantage in that more people will from my example think "if Matt can do that as a ordinary guy then I can do it too". I want to find other people like you and me who are doing and believing God for extranoradiry things. To spur people on in the life map process of walking with God I want to help people find inspiration and awaken a passion in people and this is one way that tends to work well to do that.

So today when I heard these two brothers on Focus on the Family who started a blog a few years ago as teenagers to inspire others to do great things I started to search for their blog and found it. 

You can read Alex & Brett Harris's blog at:

They started this as teenagers. I was a pretty big dreamer as a teenager myself and was encouraged by these guys story. 

I came to know Christ through a personal relationship and found assurance of my salvation at 15 having grow up religious, but that faith would not really be set on fire until I was 20. These two guys starting with such a passion as teenagers really is inspiring.

I found on their blog another story on Zac Sunderland a 17 year old Christian guy who just sailed around the world alone on a sailboat. You can read one of the blog posts Alex and Brett did about him at:

Zac now also has a blog at:

If you know of any other blogs on the heart, mind or vision from young passionate believers or any age with good insight and content please post them in the comments. I'm wanting to come up with a top 10 or top 20 or maybe even a top 100 list of young Christian bloggers as I have yet to find a list like that. If you would post ones you think should be on the list in the comments that will help.