Communication

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When God logs onto Twitter what does he see? He sees that Matthew is still recovering from partying, while Mary in Arizona is prays for rain, and Larry, a father of three, has too many bills to pay. Fortunate enough, God mustn’t go far, to collect all the requests that are tossed to the stars.

While his Flickr account diligently organizes images of entertaining situations and humorous faces—a vibrant array of all places and races—he warmly chuckles and doles out his graces. Yet, the most impressive part of God’s social networking accounts, is the Facebook page where he watches his friends amount. But the list that is longer is found on the left, between his networks and the list of his friends; it is the names of his children, billions in length, and continuing to grow with each refresh of the page.

Yes, when God logs onto Twitter, what does he see? What happens when all of God’s social networks are synced? From what I have experienced, and personally believe, our posts become prayers, reaching the destination that we should first seek.

The poem that I used to introduce this topic can only mean one thing—people must be praying!!! At every hour (and even by the minute) people are making their requests public, their praises made known, and their interests a topic of conversation. This means that prayer is on the rise in our nation and all over the world. (Well, wherever WiFi is accessible, that is!)

People are finally seeing results when they verbalize the inner workings of their hearts and minds. These results come from their communities of peers, families and friends. Personal testimonies would claim that because of these social networks, requests are being fulfilled, praises are being offered, and interests are being met with similar interests. But the question we must ask is, by whom? To who? And with whose?

Let us make headway in these questions by first showing our appreciation to those who finally came to our rescue. I’m talking about the people who created environments that allow us to pray more fervently, like Mark Zuckerburg (the creator of Facebook), Jack Dorsey and Evan Williams (The Twitter guru’s) and Caterina Fake (the mojo behind Flickr). Thank you for finally creating easily accessible websites that can efficiently answer the cries of the people. We have been waiting for this!!!

If you are unable to sense my facetious tone, then wake up and smell the nearly burnt-out, overworked motherboard! Many of us are unaware that we are taking our needs to the keyboard before we take them to The Creator, The Councilor and The Ultimate Friend.

All too often I will find myself turning to my social networks to cry from the depths of my soul, or to find a solution to my problems and even to cheer for something that is worthy of praise. I repeatedly race to my computer before I fall to my knees in prayer, despite the fact that I know God is the one source who I can go to for anything. He is the only source from which all good things flow and the best part is that he’s available anytime. So, what is it about these websites that make us feel like we’ve been taken care of? Why do we continually return to our social networks, creating more traffic and offering more of ourselves?

Whether it is for more advice, or more socializing or more meaningless banter, we are using these social networks because they deliver results, and not just results… instantaneous results. The way that I think about it us that within minutes of broadcasting a post I can receive a flood of replies from many different people. These responses must have been so overwhelming for some that a short-cut response system has been developed. It’s called the “like” button. Apparently, writing, “I like what you just said, Courtney” takes too much time. Let’s face it, we want to know that our words were received by an audience and accepted by them… immediately!

In addition to timely responses, before I post something I tend to think of the likely responses I’ll receive from my most dedicated “friends”. Ultimately, this leads to me conveying my thoughts in a politically correct fashion that will appease those in my network—it may even stray from what I’m really trying to say. Therefore, I’m technically publishing words that resemble my thoughts and feelings but have been mostly crafted for an audience. This means that my words are being cheapened because I’m gearing them towards an audience, which results in sharing posts that lack authenticity. There is another reason for this besides expedient results and the audience’s reading pleasure—yes, I think that the best name for it is, “trial and error”.

There have been times when I’ve posted an authentic, gut wrenching cry, for no other reason than to get whatever is burdening me off of my chest. But when those posts are not responded too in a timely matter, the burden returns and, without a doubt, has gotten heavier. So, I’ve learned, as I’m sure most of you have, to not post anything that will leave me feeling too vulnerable.

But, wait a minute—if we cannot be vulnerable, authentic, or patient then these posts aren’t prayers at all. Even though we are doing all of the right actions—petitioning our needs, making them public, trusting that assistance with come—we are not directing them towards the correct source. In fact, we are not directing them at any source; which can be more damaging then directing them at the wrong source. When we send the words that define our souls off into cyberspace then there is no promise that they will be detected. So make sure to send your cries to The Source…God. Even though it may seem like he lives in outer space sometimes, he is actually much closer than we think. In fact, he is closer to you than any person who happens to be in your social network.

This is because he already knows the workings of your soul, the thoughts in your mind and the obstacles that you face. Therefore, before you type your thoughts into the 160 characters of allotted space, send a message up to God. He is waiting for you to engage him in conversation. Even though you may not get immediate results, you can be positive that he has heard you and that he will answer you with a solution that is better than you could ever imagine. And while you are at it, why not send up some praises as well. Instead of writing a post about how much you love blueberry ice cream, thank God for blueberries…and milk…and freezers…and Ben & Jerry’s!

The next time that you are about to post a message that will be sent into cyberspace forever, ask yourself whether it is a message meant for your social network or a message meant for God. He wants to hear from you and he wants to answer you… everyday.

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