Social media has given a voice to anyone who wants one. When I first started blogging I blogged 5 days a week pretty religiously. If something came out in the news that connected with faith I tried to give my opinion on it. If there was some new big archeology discovery…I made sure to write something about it. If I read a book, I would make sure to mention it.
Since taking on Wineskins, moving to California and beginning a new ministry, my blogging has definitely slowed. In the process I have learned to have peace about not having to say something about everything. I have learned that there are topics and threads and stories that will get along just fine without my “voice of reason” and “super snappy wit” having to be interjected in the mix. I have found myself deleting a lot of facebook comments before clicking the little post button…sometimes multiple times.
There is an entitlement to being heard that social media breeds and if we aren’t careful, we get sucked into the vortex of feeling more important than we really are. The truth is, the world got along fine without us and will continue running long after we are gone. We are all valuable but none of us are so important that we are the sole authority on something that the world just can’t do without. So I am trying to listen a lot more than I speak and that is hard for me but I am working on it.
2 Responses
Me too, brother
It is always harder to listen than to talk. Talking for a long time (rambling) is easy. That is why sermons usually last so long. Sir Winston Churchill said that the shorter his speech, the longer it would take him to prepare it.
One benefit of social media is to get feedback from people who ordinarily have no voice. Another is to give those people a voice to air concerns. When church leaders refused to listen to or answer the younger generations and females, they took their concerns to the blogs and message boards. Some found people like Dr. Patrick Mead who would answer questions that were on very sensitive topics. For better or worse, some people need to search themselves and their congregation/denomination to see what is being said and asked. It will shock some to the core. However, calling attention to the particular site or blog and lashing out at the people on it will make matters much worse.