Sometimes I’m Afraid to Blog
Language is difficult always, but for some reason, the internet seems to breed more confusion than any other medium. In my ministry life I have had more flames thrown at me over blog posts than sermons. Yet when I consider the content of those blog posts, they often were less confrontational or controversial than my sermons! Why are sermons heard better? Why are writings and responses in blogs taken to such extremes? It seems that the reception culture in blogging is adversarial. For whatever reason many people seem to prefer to throw bile in the comments following the post rather than engage in any kind of meaningful dialogue. In fact, someone noted that the comments section on any internet page is the best argument available for total hereditary depravity!
I have a theory about why this is true: there are no bodies on the internet. When I interact with a blog post, I think I’m interacting, as it were, with a series of 1s and 0s. It is just a blog entry. I do not envision a living, breathing, flesh-and-blood person with parents, a spouse, and children. I do not image a person with a heart that can be hurt or with skin that is soft. I do not imagine blood.
Bodies matter. They keep us human. More than that, they allow us to aspire to something more. Jesus used his human body to identify with our lives so that he could provide us a way into the life of God.
Therefore, when Christ came into the world, he said: “Sacrifice and offering you did not desire, but a body you prepared for me.” (Heb 10:5)
We now use our bodies to touch the world and to touch each other. Where we used to use our bodies for sin, now we don’t let even one part serve as an instrument of wickedness. Instead, we offer every part of ourselves as instruments of righteousness (see Rom 6:11-13). Our bodies are intended for use by the Lord (see 1 Cor 6:13). In fact, our bodies reveal the life of Jesus (see 2 Cor 4:10-11). If we aren’t using our bodies to serve God, there’s no reason to stay in them! We’d be better to use our death as our last act of service to God in our bodies (see Phil 1:20-24).
That’s why I’m nervous about the power of the internet. For all the good it can do, it is disembodied. It is not incarnated. We say our “voice” can now be heard far and wide, but the reader hears no human voice—or if s/he does, it’s an imagined voice or, worse yet, a computer voice. It’s not my voice. The reader can’t see me smile or wince. Nuance is lost. The human touch is lost.
I love to write, and I hope these thoughts encourage someone or spark some thought. But if God believed it was important to take on human flesh to accomplish our salvation, it seems I should not overlook the importance of the body in God’s kingdom. Perhaps we can weigh these thoughts as we consider multiple campuses, streamed sermons, digital Bible classes, or even our use of social media in our churches.
(For the record, this was written with a slightly furrowed brown and a wry grin).
