1 new friend request from: Jesus.‏

People get really down on facebook. Especially people at church. "It's a waste of time" "It takes over your life." "It creates superficial relationships." I have quite a few facebook friends, and I am forever fielding off accusational "but, how many of them are your ACTUAL friends?!" and "do you really keep in contact/want to keep in contact with all those people?!" My honest answer would probably be no. There are some people who I am "friends" with, who I have not seen or spoken to in years. There are people whom if I saw again, I probably wouldn't even recognise, and occasionally, people on my friends list I genuinely can't remember. So why bother?

Whilst my liberal approach to facebook friendships might be criticised by many, it has over the years been the source of amazing blessing. Some of my closest friends for instance, I only had fleeting encounters with, and had we not clicked the respective "add as friend" and "accept" buttons, we would have passed out of each others lives and never seen each other again.

We shouldn't underestimate social networking sites' potential for sharing the gospel; be it with "sharing" links to articles and worship songs, posting an inspiring or challenging quote as our status, or even by expressing our religious views in our bios. My friend told me that they could spend less than a minute on my profile and tell that I'm a Christian. If only I could mirror that in my life so that I stood out so radically.

I don't think Jesus is opposed to facebook. Sure, like anything, when it's misused, or when it starts taking over your life, maybe it's time to re-evaluate, but Jesus was all for meeting people where they were at; getting down on their level. If Jesus was walking the earth today, he wouldn't be lecturing in theological seminary, babbling on about eschatology and hermeneutics; he'd be out on the streets chatting to homeless people, wandering through the red light districts and playing football at the local park with the lads.

When Jesus tried to explain the secrets of the kingdom to his followers, he talked about farming, inheritance and parties: he talked about what they could understand. Because God doesn't care about theology. He just wants his people to know that He loves them. Don't get me wrong, I find theology fascinating, and have many friends who study it, but what I'm trying to get across, is we shouldn't get so academically up ourselves when it comes to God, that we miss the simplicity of the kingdom. Why should we think that we're "too good" to follow the crowd, why should we be above social constructs? Of course we are forgiven and set apart, but we are not elevated, in fact, the very opposite is true: we are humbled by the grace of God. For a while at least, this fallen world is our home, and we have to be "in" it to truly have any impact on it, and the lives of those we come into contact with. The phrase "too heavenly minded to be of any earthly use" springs to mind.

People feel judged and looked down on by the church, so why on earth would they be attracted to it? Judgment doesn't convey Christ's love, and basically means that we're failing as the body of Christ to reach out to a broken and hurting world because we're too scared to get our "holy" hands dirty. What happened to washing each others feet? What happened to loving indiscriminately? It's easy to love those we like, but what about those that repulse us? Can we honestly say we love them?

I want a humble heart and a poor spirit. If God could reduce himself from King of Kings and Lord of Lords, to give up his heavenly throne, be amongst his people on earth, and die on the cross, then I really have no excuse, 'cause I have nothing to boast in other than Jesus Christ anyway.