As probably most everybody knows at this point, Matt Chandler and his family received some bad news over the holidays.
Like many people, I sometimes find it hard to understand God’s ways when it comes to stuff like this. I don’t know Matt personally, but as part of the Acts 29 Network, he has had a huge influence on me through his teachings at various conferences and through his podcasts. Clearly Matt is being used mightily by God…which is why it’s baffling and quite frankly disheartening to hear that he has a brain tumor.
I know the intellectual arguments that God is sovereign and glorified in all situations, including this one. And I believe them. But still, it is always hard to see them in action.
This morning, as I was studying the Psalms, I came across this passage:
For the righteous will never be moved;
He will be remembered forever.
He is not afraid of bad news;
his heart is firm, trusting in the Lord.
His heart is steady; he will not be afraid,
until he looks in triumph on his adversaries. (Psalm 112:6-8)
This was of great comfort to me, because though I don’t know Matt personally, I know him to be this kind of man.
I want to thank you, Matt, for being an example of how a righteous man responds to bad news. My prayer is that God is most glorified by bringing you back to miraculous health. Grace and peace to you and your family through our Lord and savior, Jesus Christ.
The following is a post I made on the Praxischurch.com blog:
Life is Tweet
Last March I was in Raleigh, NC for the Acts 29 Network (A29) Boot Camp with the Praxis Church elders and some of my fellow elder candidates. It was a great time of worship and teaching, with some world-class speakers and a lot of very practical information.
Everywhere I looked MacBooks were open and people were clicking away little “tweets” about the conference using the #a29 hash tag. If you don’t understand any of what I just wrote, God bless you. They were on Twitter. It piqued my curiosity, and I signed up for an account to follow the goings-on.
Fast-forward seven months or so, and today you’ll find me very active on Twitter (to the point that Pastor Tim unfollows me regularly because I tweet too much!) And as someone who is very active with many social media forms, including Facebook, Twitter, and blogging, I can attest to the fact that they can be both significant time wasters and narcissistic vehicles that give the appearance of community but lack any true substance. And before you know, if you let them, your social media accounts can take over your real life! Yet, they can also be very valuable and rewarding tools.
Internet Ministry?
When I came onto staff at Praxis as our communications manager, part of my job was to create a comprehensive strategy that used social media.
Early on, the biggest danger I recognized was that our online efforts could create a community that was engaged online with each other and church information, but that had little-to-no engagement with the actual body of Christ outside of that.
So, from the beginning I’ve intentionally not been satisfied with just interacting with people online. Rather, I want our online efforts to result in what I call incarnational interactions. The word incarnation is a theological word that refers to Jesus coming down from heaven, becoming human and taking on a body like ours, and living among us. Paul talks about the incarnation in Philippians 2:5-8:
“Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on the cross.”
For me, it’s important that our online interactions as a church result in incarnated moments – times when we come together in person, ditching the computers for a deeper, more fulfilling relationship. At Praxis, we have no interest in building an awesome online community in and of itself. Everything we do online is engineered to bring you into physical (incarnate) community with our church. It’s easy to hide behind a monitor, breaking off relationships with people who challenge you with the click of a mouse. It’s much more messy, difficult, and challenging to walk shoulder to shoulder with the people whom God has called you to be in community with, a community that celebrates with you in the good times and mourns with you in the bad times. A community that is called to incarnationally live out the gospel, just as Jesus did, to each other and to the world.
The Kentucky Connection
I’d like to share a story that illustrates how approaching social media this way might work. When I first started using Twitter, I naturally spent most of my time finding interesting people to follow and interact with.
My first searches were for people who were connected with the A29 network, since I have a vested interest there. One person I came across was Chris St. John, who is now a good friend online.
Chris lives in Somerset, KY. As we began to interact, I learned that Chris had a brother in Scottsdale, Craig. Later, I learned that Craig went to Praxis on and off, but wasn’t sure he wanted to commit. Chris in Kentucky introduced me to Craig in Arizona. As I got to know Craig better online, we decided to get together and hang out. Today, Craig is now a part of my missional community and a regularly attending Sunday services at Praxis.
In Craig’s words, “He was ready to get off the wall and commit.” All this happened because I met Chris in Kentucky, who introduced me to Craig in Arizona, and because I intentionally moved the relationship from behind the monitor to a handshake. That is the essence of an incarnational interaction.
So I encourage you to put some thought into how you use the Internet and social media. Are there ways that you can better utilize them for the gospel? Are you taking your online interactions and turning them into incarnated moments? If not, please consider doing so. As a body of Christ, we’re called to live life together – both online and offline.
You can follow Praxis Church on Twitter @praxischurch and on Facebook – just don’t make that your only interaction with the church!