Today I return to blogging on a regular basis. Since last December I have posted only twice. I had promised myself that I would return to posting regularly on October 1. And here we are; it is November 2 and I am still promising to return to a regular schedule.

Several reasons have deterred me from posting regularly. First, I took almost a year off to write my book on divine violence. The draft of the book is finished; however, a publisher suggested some revisions to the manuscript. Thus, I will be spending time in the coming weeks and months revising the manuscript.

The second reason is that my wife and I moved into a new house. This means that we had to spend days and weeks preparing for the move. After living in the same house for thirty-three years, it is exceedingly difficult to downsize. We are still working on downsizing. Our son bought our house and allowed us time to get our possessions out of the house.

Recently, in preparation to return to blogging, I took some time to look at my blog again. Over the years, more than two million people have visited my blog. Visitors have come from 209 different countries and territories.

The USA recognizes 195 countries in the world. If one would count Taiwan as a country, then there would be 196 countries in the world. The United Nations recognizes 251 countries and territories. This means that my writings have reached most countries and territories in the world.

One thing that needs revision in the next few days is my biographical information and my blogroll. According to Alexa, my blog is linked to 127 different sites. However, most of the blogs listed in my blogroll no longer exit or no longer link my blog to their blogs. I will be removing and adding new blogs to my blogroll in the coming days. If you have a blog and want to be listed on my blogroll, send me a note and I will add your blog to my blogroll.

One benefit of downsizing is that you find a lot of things that are old and forgotten. In downsizing my office, I found a lot of material that I have published over the years. I also found lectures I gave in different venues. A lot of good material is found in these lectures, even though some of the material is dated.

I have decided to publish this material on my blog in the coming weeks. Some of these writings are based on the New Testament. They are a series of lessons published in a newspaper in Missouri. These lessons were published while I was teaching at Southwest Baptist University in Bolivar, Missouri.

Another issue that needs attention is for me to finish some of the series of topics that remain incomplete. My series on suicide, the Deuteronomic concern for women, Old Testament mothers, and Solomon’s oppressive policies were never finished. My goal is to finish these series and begin new ones.

While I work on the revision of my manuscript, I will not post every day. My goal is to publish three times a week for now.

As always, I want to thank all the readers who subscribe to my blog and those who read my posts on Facebook or Twitter. Your words of encouragement motivate me to continue promoting the Old Testament to all those readers from the 209 nations and territories who visit my blog. To God be the glory.

Claude Mariottini
Emeritus Professor of Old Testament
Northern Baptist Seminary

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