What If Facebook was a church?

So, I'm constantly bombarded with technology in my job. As most of you all know, I'm the creative arts director/worship leader for our church, The Journey. And because we are constantly trying to find new and innovative ways to present the Gospel of Jesus, we are always trying to keep what we do culturally relevant. Now don't here me say that we are only about presenting a show. Cause we're not. If we didn't have stage lights, projectors, live bands, creative short films, or any other piece of technology... the Gospel of Jesus would still be preached, and we would still (as one of my best friends and our lead pastor, Erik Reed, says...) still charge the gates of Hell with a water pistol!

But why should we? Why should we be stuck in our ways and not be cognizant of the technology available to us (the church). Jesus said to be in the world... not of it. So what does that mean? Does that mean that since we are the church, we should remove ourselves from society? Absolutely not. Think about this.... if God is good, and He created all things for good, Genesis 1, then it stands to reason that the entire world, and everything in it, was created and meant for good. Or.... God is a big fat LIAR! And I don't think anyone is going to go there.

So, because of our sinful nature, we then corrupt that, which was meant for good, and deem it unusable by the church, because it's "Of this world". That's gotta be the biggest bunch of bull crap I've ever heard! Are you serious? Matthew 15:9 says this: "They worship Me in vain; their teachings are but rules taught by men." We make up these rules that say, we cannot use this or that for the church because its "of" the world. That is a rule and a tradition that we should evaluate by a closely. And traditions aren't always a bad thing. Even the apostle Paul points this out in his letter to the church in Thessolonica. But when they become the difference between the lost hearing the Gospel, and not hearing the Gospel, they cannot be allowed.

So, back to the original question and the title of this post. What if Facebook were a church? I would say to some extent, it is a church of sorts. It is a large community of people interacting, sharing life, standing up for causes, and connecting to new and unknown people. Sounds like a church, doesn't it? Except for one thing. There is no actual human interaction. (oh, and the point is not to propagate the message of Jesus) And the problem is... people are more concerned about updating their facebook status, than they are about their neighbor, or their father, or their friends, or their children spending an eternity in Hell, separated from the love and grace of the God of the universe, who loves them and created them. But yet, those of you who call yourselves Christ followers, and have facebook accounts, have one of the greatest social networking tools that the world has ever given us. The question then becomes, what will you do with what you've been given? Will you use it to REALLY connect with people, and find out how you can physically minister to them? Will you invite your network to come to church with you sunday? Will you use that, which is "of " the world, to help spread the only message of TRUE hope that can change a person's eternity? Or will you just see how many people you can be "friends" with, or how many followers you can get on twitter?

Tough questions. I hope they truly weigh on you.

-robbie