Learning from Social Media

Definitions to consider:
  1. a network of friends, colleagues, and other personal contacts: Strong social networks can encourage healthy behaviors.
  2. an online community of people with a common interest who use a Web site or other technologies to communicate with each other and share information
I spent a day this month in a meeting learning about social media as part of being on a task force for our company. The above definitions really got my attention especially some of the key words above such as “Encourage Healthy Behaviors” and a “Community of People.”

About 4 hours into our meeting it hit me that the really cool piece of this online community is that most people don’t have a clue about what anyone looks like or what they use to be known as in the community etc, so you guessed it the prejudices that are unfortunately built into us from a young age don’t exist. We just simply connect with people based on common interests, and sharing information and we don’t let anything get in our way like we do when we are face to face with individuals.

This really started to bother me as it became obvious to me that for the most part my Social interactions face to face are not as unbiased as what it is in Social Media, and I don’t think this is the kind of community that Jesus called us to create.

Acts 10:27-28: While talking with him, Peter went inside and found a large gathering of people.28 He said to them: "You are well aware that it is against our law for a Jew to associate with or visit a Gentile. But God has shown me that I should not call anyone impure or unclean.

This scripture is very clear that we are to take down whatever assumptions that immediately jump into our head when we see someone walk into our church, coffee shop, restaurant, place of business etc and we are to simply see them as someone that Jesus loved enough to die for and therefore we have that in common. Isn’t this the “Healthy Behavior” that Jesus is calling us to have in our social settings?

Galatians 3:28: There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus

This scripture above is very clear on this and it is clear to me that as much as there is value in social media as a way to build communities and connect with people, we need to do a better job of that right now wherever we are and with whoever is sitting, standing around us. Regardless of any differences we might think are there, they do not outweigh the common Love the Jesus has for us.

We are all getting connected around the world with social media with people that are different than us, and the challenge that exists for all of us is to connect with someone different than us today face to face and share the Love of Jesus by putting their needs ahead of ours.

- Matthew Likens

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