7 Themes From Comments on Social Media

My heart is heavy after I read a blog about why Christian parents should force their kids to go to church. Okay, I think force was the wrong word, but I like the post. What made my heart heavy were the comments. (Use your imaginations!) There are over 230 comments and I’ve read about a quarter of them. I noticed some reoccurring ideas from people who comment on articles about religion/spiritual posts. Here are seven of them.

1) Faith. “Faith IS being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see,” Hebrews 11:1 (CAPS mine). Jesus told Thomas, “Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have NOT seen and yet HAVE believed,” John 20:29 (CAPS mine). Faith was not a factor in some of the comments. We are such a society of evidence seekers, but God wants us to have faith for that which we cannot see or understand or prove with science. One comment in the movie God Is Not Dead was, “I cannot prove God exists and you cannot prove God does not exist.” It is a matter of faith either way.

2) Opposite: Satan uses feelings to manipulate us. Most do not understand that. We are told to turn the other cheek. We are told it is better to be wronged and cheated than to demand our rights and show this is how Christians act. We are told to pray for our enemies. We are told to not stop worshiping together. We are told to love our enemies. We are told to be a fool for Christ. We are told to not get drunk. Some making comments do not have the concept of living opposite of what the world and what their feelings urge them to do. The opposite actions are not natural to us. We have to live intentionally doing what does not come natural.

3) Transform. There seems to be no room for the Holy Spirit to heal or mold the heart into anything other than what it is right now. It seems to me people who commented seemed to leave no room for transformation. They are where they are and they are stuck. They feel what they feel and they are stuck.

4) Selfish. We see a car, a tractor, a purse, a watch, another person’s spouse, deceased relatives land and immediately think it should be yours for reasons you ‘logicalize’ in our mind. (yes, I made up a word!) We are to put on a new self of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such there is no law (Galatians 5:22). Those qualities are true freedom in Christ. You don’t see much of these traits in the world, in the news, in a magazine, on the radio, on a billboard. You have to seek them out. We are bombarded with violence, sexual immorality, greed, impurity, deceit, idolatry, hatred, discord, witchcraft, jealousy, drunkenness, selfish ambition, etc, (Galatians 5:19).

5) Desire. It is automatic. Following Christ is not the automatic desire non-Christians have. We have to hear the Word and allow it to penetrate our heart so we can act. Desire for the Lord only builds if we spend time with Him. And back to transformation (#3) no one seemed to give this a chance in their life. This was one of my comments on the post: “I desire to be with God and Jesus and like minded people who are in love with Him. That is why I go to church… When you love someone and are devoted to them, you will want to spend as much time with them as possible. The desire I have for my Heavenly Father and his presence in my life gives me the fuel I need to get through a day with so much irreverence and hostility in this world… Some may scoff, but if you have never had the Spirit indwelt in you, you simply won’t understand how important church is to those of us who live for our spiritual nature (as best we can) and deny our selfish do-what-I-want-to nature. I pray every person responding…falls madly in love with Jesus and what He did for you, and finds a church to fall in love with too.”

6) Representation. Everyone has a first impression. Everyone has an impression past the first one. What impression do you present? If you are not representing Christ, you ARE representing Satan. Are you the same in all aspects of your life? My Sister-in-Law said, “I think life is less about what we do at church 2-3 hours a week and more about what we do the other 165 hours in the week.” She has a great point. Represent Christ in a way that makes others want to follow Christ and fall in love with Him. Think about this: You can’t represent Texas Tech well if you have never been there. (or A&M or UT… pick a school). I could not represent the case that giving blood was a great idea in a public speaking class because I had never given blood. How can you represent Christ in your life if you do not gather with His church (the people) where the church meets? How can you represent the case that His blood was shed for your sins if you do not think that blood is the most important thing in your life and you want to know everything you can about it? We might be the church, but if we are not participating in the church what good are we as a part of the church?

7) Filters: I gave a lesson one time and brought two blue air conditioner filters to class. One said Satan’s Schemes and the other said Word of God. The lesson was about how you examine your situations, how you make decisions, and what drives you in your day to day situations? The challenge was to consider what filter you used most often and how to get to the point to where you used the Word of God filter. Many assume their emotions are right because they evoked such a strong reaction, but when the situation was over, they were filtering their emotions through Satan’s scheme of twisting the truth into a lie. 

I read everything. Not only that of Christians, but also of other very different beliefs. Why? It better prepares me to know how to respond through the Word of God. I pick apart everything and try to find scripture to back writings up. I want to transform more and more into the likeness of Christ. Be open to being transformed and enlightened from the Word of God. Blessings.