GIve a Call

The way many of us relate to each other has changed dramatically in the last two years alone. Social media is exploding in it’s usage in our society. Consider just these stats from pingdom.com:
126 million – The number of blogs on the Internet (as tracked by BlogPulse).
350 million – People on Facebook.
50% – Percentage of Facebook users that log in every day.
500,000 – The number of active Facebook applications.
90 trillion – The number of emails sent on the Internet in 2009.
247 billion – Average number of email messages per day.
1.4 billion – The number of email users worldwide.
1.73 billion – Internet users worldwide (September 2009).
27.3 million – Number of tweets on Twitter per day (November, 2009)
4.25 million – People following @aplusk (Ashton Kutcher, Twitter’s most followed user).
2.5 billion – Photos uploaded each month to Facebook.
30 billion – At the current rate, number of photos uploaded to Facebook per year.
1 billion – The total number of videos YouTube serves in one day.
12.2 billion – Videos viewed per month on YouTube in the US (November 2009).

Those are some staggering statistics aren’t they? They don’t even include the billions of texts sent over phones each year. Obviously, the social media presents several opportunities to individual Christians and the church of our Lord Jesus. They can assist in creating community as people share comments, photos and videos about life events. Social media can also aid in communication and extend the reach of a church around the world. Social media allow instant and remote communication. The social media may even provide inspiration and instruction through tools like blogs. So there are many ways the church can leverage social media to their advantage in this new age of communication.

However, at the same time there are some drawbacks to the social media. Ed Stetzer is a researcher, futurist, and extensive blogger (edstetzer.com) who I heard present some comments on social media two weeks ago. The five concerns about the social media he voiced were: 1.) the wrong people may be in the social media (unengaged, social outcasts can find a haven in it), 2.) It can trivialize important things, 3.) It can create a false sense of community. 4.) It can create pride (numbering your fans, followers, readers), 5.) It can promote impertinent speech (by offering communication without accountability).

I would add one more concern I have as a local pastor about social media. I wonder if it is possible that we might insulate ourselves in a social cocoon through the social media. I wonder if social media allows us to feel in touch with others, when in reality we are only in touch with a small portion of people. So while it seems we are sending our messages to more people than ever, the quantity of people you are actually dialoguing with may be fewer than ever.

I write this not to denigrate the usage of social media, but rather to say we cannot allow ourselves in the church to restrict our communication to these forms. While facebooking, tweeting, and texting are great, sometimes we need to simply give a call to someone.

The summer is a time when many of us are traveling. It is easy to assume someone is on vacation, when in truth they may have fallen into discouragement and be drifting from God. If someone like that comes to mind or is absent from your small group why not just give them a call. Hearing your voice of concern may serve as a tonic and be just the kind of invitation needed to get them back in fellowship with the Lord and His people. Then again, maybe you can write them on facebook or twitter.

Regardless of how you communicate with those away or inactive in the life of the church this summer I do hope you will remember how you can get in touch with God. His preferred communication tool seems clear (kidding!) from this verse some refer to as God’s phone number—Jeremiah 33:3: “Call to me and I will answer you and tell you great and unsearchable things you do not know.”

So this summer let’s make sure we don’t forget to “give a call”—to the Lord and others who need to hear from us.

Grateful He answers!
Pastor Scott