Well I got another one! I liked it, and the next thing I know there are directions in my inbox. It was another one of those forward commitment deals; we’ve all gotten them at some point in time. The message instructs you to forward to 10 people as a display of faith. If you don’t, then you hate Jesus and you’re going to hell. Or a testing of love where you must say, “I love you” back to the person you sent it to then send it to your closest friends to see who really loves you. I never participate in these things because I don’t like them!

I believe that these messages are empty and meaningless because of their very request: you must do this. When I get one of these messages from a loved one, I feel like they’ve unnecessarily cornered me into confessing my love for them. I love all my family and friends dearly, so I am constantly concerned for them and their well-being. I usually don’t like the wording of the message, and, most of the time, the message requires me to do something that isn’t necessarily the way I show my love for others.

Nevertheless, I have received the message. This particular message struck me as profound. Here is what I received in my inbox:

“I saw that you liked my "God is..." status. The purpose is to fill Facebook with these statements daily: Day 1: God is real! Day 2: God is good! Day 3: God is faithful! Day 4: God is my strength! Day 5: God is my shield! Day 6: God is love! Day 7: God is alive!”

Now the first part kind of upset me because I felt like I was tricked into it. I saw a buddy’s post that said “God is real!” and I thought, “Well I agree with that.” So I clicked like! Then I received the message and tried to remember why I liked the guy. As I read through what was going to be required of me this time, I couldn’t find anything too horribly wrong with it! The main focus was to try and fill my friends’ feed with faith-filled statements about our God.

When I scroll through the various social media platforms, all I seem to see is the things of this world and this era. People are posting, tweeting, and snapping about the recent election, the commercial Christmas, and whether Kim’s butt has gotten any bigger. These statements didn’t seem like too bad of an idea.

This definitely sounds cliché, but the days leading up to Christmas are meant to remind us of our need for a Savior. Because God is real, good, faithful, love, alive, and my strength and shield. He sent his Son into the world to bear the cross for all people of all times. So, for the next seven days, I will have one of these statements describing God on my Facebook. And remember: Jesus is the reason for the season!

Anticipating the coming of my Savior,

JS