“There is a fine line between social networking and wasting your life.”
That’s a paraphrase of how New Yorker humorist Andy Borowitz puts it.
Maybe he has a point, and maybe it’s not even just facebook, maybe it’s just about every other thing “social media. “
Maybe it‘s not just Hosni Mubarak lamenting the consequences of social media, maybe it’s you logging in for the 13th time today to check how many “likes” your previous post has gathered.
Clearly, the early Christians had no such distractions but the attitude they saw in Apostle Paul concerning what matters would be helpful to today’s believer. In 1 Cor 6:2, Paul displays the attitude of not allowing himself to be “mastered by anything”.
What if we all carried the same attitude, an attitude that says,
I will give audience to the person in front of me now, by turning deciding not to turn to my incoming watsapp message I know this meeting is boring but since I work “as unto the Lord, and not unto men” (Col 3:23)”
I refuse the temptation to log into my Gmail now. What if “loving our neighbor(Matt 22)” meant turning off your facebook messenger at the school party, so you can cheer on the performance of your workmate’s son?
What if we started owning our smart phones rather than the other way round? What if straightening your boyfie’s collar or complimenting the girl’s new hairstyle took priority over facebook zero?
What if facebook inbox was replaced with actual Saturday visits? What about taking a gift for your friend’s newly born rather than “retweeting” their mother’s post? Maybe then, we would understand Paul, that indeed, as Christ followers, we “should not be mastered by anything “, anything – facebook, Twitter, whatsapp – all of it.
But be able to look at these as, “tools for his glory”. Tools not just for updating our new hangout location on facebook. But tools to identify our new heart location as we communicate the things our God cares about – Saturday visits, our daughter’s speech day, hair compliments, your workmate’s family and hubby’s conversation.
Talk of “not being mastered by anything”. Believers can recover from the damning effects online interactions subtly steal from our social lives, promising connections yet often leaving us as “slaves”.
The very state we were redeemed from.
true that yo saying my brada from another mother.
how i wish the govt had stringent restrictions on facebook twitter whatsapp that during working hours they are completely off and can only be on from 10pm buy that time yo tired and u cant do much.
i personally do not accept an invite request via e-media. give me a call. that show you really thought about it and invested into me…but this wolokoso of everyone….sorry doesnt work for me.
Asher ,hope you keep away Twitter when you are interrogating our teeth
or to say it this way,where a man’s iPhone is…
Muleefu you right! Where a man’s treasure is so is his heart
or to say it this way,where a man’s iPhone is…
Asher ,hope you keep away Twitter when you are interrogating our teeth
Hmm you just have a way of putting these things to word, l keep hearing the song ilove by triplee, some of us are engaged to those i’s, iphone, ipad etc.
HEHEHE @Annette…….dis-engage to ‘theypad, theyphone…
Annette ,i need that triplee album-some?
But then I would not be able to read such nice articles…lol. Anyway well put Mrefu. I was reflecting on how for me as a woman, social media may amount to eating the bread of idleness (Proverbs 31) and how it can easily become an idle.
Leletu,ate there is too much bread of idleness in London,uh?
Ohhh Muleefu.. this one has gotten me to act…ur a great writer!i better start sleep instead of poking my phone all night long like a crazed caterpillar.
Kasami ,how do they deactivate facebook zero?
Muleefu. You could not have said better! Preach it man! I hope you will practice it too!
Annette ,i need that triplee album-some?