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How to Make a Difference on Social Media - Part 2

10/13/2020

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BY STEVE LONGLEY

In our last post I mentioned four changes that can make to make a difference on social media.  You can read those HERE. 
 
In this post I want to continue that conversation by mentioning a creative tactic you can use to make a difference on your social media feed. This is by no means a whole social media campaign to promote what is important to you, instead it is one tactic you can use to make a difference without engaging in the typical hateful debate common on social media.
 
Here’s why it will make a difference:
 
It will be different.
Remember to make a difference you will have to do something different.  What I’m about to show you will look and feel very different than the current divisiveness common to social media.
 
It will capture hearts.
Arguments are about issues, stories are about real people.  You are going to tell a story.  When an argument influences someone at a heart level it is usually because they’ve become offended or angry.  Your story will engage the heart at a deeper level.
 
It will be positive.
I know, there’s so much information on social media that you’re just itching to correct, but remember, that just adds to the pile of negative waste.  Again, lets do something different.
 
Enough of the preliminaries, lets dive in.  Here are three steps to help you make a difference on social media. 
 
Step 1 – Get personally involved.
 
The greatest difference you will ever make won’t be what you post online.  It will be what you actually do with your time, your talents and your treasure.
 
If you sense God has placed a cause on your heart find a way to get involved.
 
Find a reputable organization in your city that is already working to make a difference in the arena you care about.  Contact them and offer to volunteer. Most organizations would love to have someone give an hour during a week helping them do things their busy staff has no time to do.
 
One of my most treasured experiences was volunteering as a caseworker for an organization called Meet the Need.  Their simple mission is to help the working poor keep working and to help them survive the gap between income and expenses.  I served about two hours a week connecting working families with desperately needed resources.  And over the two years I volunteered I was part of a process that helped hundreds of families keep working.  The experience changed how I view the issue of poverty in our smaller towns.
 
I know, it already sounds exhausting and we haven’t even talked about how this makes a difference on social media.  We’re about to get to that, but first here’s what this kind of involvement does for you:
 
You’ll get first-hand experience. 
Getting involved in the issue will give you a hands-on perspective that simply isn’t available from a distance.  You’ll see the issue with greater clarity.  You may even find out you were wrong about some of your initial assumptions. 
 
You’ll get in touch with individuals.
The issues we discuss online are often no more than cold, detached opinions.  However, once you meet a person who has been affected by the issue, it’s suddenly much more than a topic for discussion, it’s someone’s life.  Individuals turn an issue into something intimate.
 
You’ll gain credibility.
What most of us lack when we post about an issue is the credibility of having skin in the game.  When you volunteer, when you give something your direct involvement over time you are making an investment.  With consistency you are on your way to becoming a person who has the credibility of personal experience.
 
Step 2 – take it public.
 
You’ll take it public by posting to your social media a picture and a simple statement about your involvement with the organization.  
 
I’ll give two examples using Meet the Need as an illustration.
 
Example #1 - A picture of or selfie with the staff and volunteers.
Post it with a simple statement.  Something like this:
“Today I got to work alongside these great servants who work tirelessly to connect working parents with the resources they need to care for their families.”
 
Example #2 – Get a picture with someone who has been helped by the organization.
Then you can say something like:
“What an inspiration meeting Anna today.  As a working single mom, Meet the Need helped her through a rough patch last year with such love and grace that she now serves as a volunteer helping hundreds of other families in our area.” 
 
An important note about posting pictures:  Always make sure you have someone’s permission before you post their picture or name online.
 
Notice a couple of things about the above posts:
  • They are short.  One to three short sentences is enough. 
  • They are positive.  You are focusing on what is being done to help.
  • They aren’t about you.  This is about the issue God has placed on your heart, not about getting likes or compliments.
  • They tell a story.  As you create similar posts over time you are beginning to craft a story about the plight of the working poor (or other issues) in your city.  You are also showing the positive work people are doing to make a difference.  It is no longer an issue, it’s about individuals facing difficulty and the good ways people are coming alongside them to the glory of God.
  • They are attractive.  By this I mean that people will look at a post like this and at least pause long enough to think, “Wow, that’s great.”  They may even find something tugging at their heart saying, “You could be doing something like that.” If so, hearts have been engaged.
 
Ok, you’re well on the way to making a real difference through social media, but there is one more step to take.
 
Step 3 – Get other people involved.
 
Because what you are doing is different, positive, heartwarming, and attractive, people will comment on your posts.  Most of the comments will be positive, but believe it or not, some will be negative.  Either way that’s OK, because you’re not going to engage the content of their posts personally, and because getting likes or comments isn’t your end goal.  You will, however, seize the moment if they do.
 
Whether they comment positively or negatively your goal is to graciously connect them with the organization you’ve been volunteering with for more information.  And you will encourage them to volunteer.  When it comes to making a difference, a social media post that helps a few people engage with the issue by volunteering their time talent and treasure is worth way more than a snarky rant even if it generates hundreds of likes.
 
What does that look like?  Let’s say a friend comments, “I absolutely love this!  Thanks for making a difference.”  You would respond something like this, “Thanks, I’ve been so blessed by the people at Meet the Need, and I just can’t keep it to myself.  I would love for you to experience what God is doing through them.  You should go with me next week?”
 
But what if someone posts a negative comment?  Let’s say @grumpyguyontheporch posts something like, “Help, really?  Looks like a hand-out more than a hand up.”
 
No worries.  You won’t comment on the content of his remark, you simply reply.  “I’m sure the director of Meet the Need would love to show you around, answer questions and share their policies with you.  They’re wonderful people but be warned they’ll probably get you involved.”
 
There you have it.  Even if grumpy guy posts something else negative, you leave it at that.  Do not be pulled into further negative conversations.  It won’t end well.
 
Of course, Meet the Need may not be on your radar, and you may not feel particularly connected to issues of poverty in smaller towns.  But this can be adjusted to most of our pressing issues.
 
Racial harmony, Plight of single parents, Health and support of police, Poverty/Homelessness,
Foster care and adoption, Underserved communities, Youth poverty, Voter Registration, Public Education Reform, International missions.
 
The list could go on and on. 
 
This is just one example of how we can make a difference by elevating the conversation on social media.  With discipline and creativity, there are hundreds of ways social media can bring glory to God and do good in our city.


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Gone - I am the Righteousness of God

10/2/2020

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Many of you have asked about a phrase in the new song Gone, by Elevation worship.
 
The phrase in question is one we repeat several times, “I am the righteousness of God.”  Which seems an odd to say, and rightfully so.  After all God is the righteous one - as proven by His covenant faithfulness in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus.  So why is this OK to be singing, “I am the righteousness of God”?
 
One reason is that the exact phrase comes from a passage in 2 Corinthians 5:21 which reads:
 
God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
 


What does that even mean?

First, I’ll go out on a limb to say what I think the lyricists are getting at.  In keeping with the message of our sins being gone, I believe their instinct is to make this a statement about our virtue or a status that makes us righteous before God.  This is a hot topic in theological circles and there are different camps for interpreting this statement. 

One camp believes it means an actual state of moral rightness before God.  That God by grace empowers us to be fully and actually obedient to him (imparted righteousness).  Another camp believes it means a state of moral rightness which is only our reality because God by grace calls us righteous and treats us as though we are (imputed righteousness). 

If I understand the theological leanings of Elevation worship, I believe they understand this phrase to mean that God has imputed His righteousness to us.
 


A New Brand of Wrench

If a discussion about imputed and imparted righteousness isn’t complex enough, I’ll throw a different brand of wrench in the works.  Both of these meanings are an odd fit when you look at the whole of Paul’s statement in 2 Corinthians.  It would be like talking with a friend for the purpose of healing some misunderstandings in your relationship and then at a key moment saying, “I like eggs.” 

That kind of odd.  Allow me to “splain.”
 

2 Corinthians In Context

When reading the whole letter of 2 Corinthians you realize Paul is trying to smooth out what’s turned into a rough relationship with the people of the church.  This letter follows a “sorrowful visit”(2:1) and an earlier “painful letter” (2:4) possibly rebuking the church members for the way they treated him during the sorrowful visit and urging them toward reconciliation.  He longs to go back to them once again to make things right, but for now he can’t, and so this letter will have to do. 
 
He knows the people of the church at Corinth are so steamed at him they aren’t even sure they want him to visit again.  If he does, his personal authority is so eroded in their eyes that they want him to bring new “letters of recommendation” (3:1) from other reputable apostles.  1 Corinthians tells us they’ve decided his personal presence and speaking style were now out of line with what they wanted in a leader in an up-market city like Corinth.  And most painful of all, they are questioning whether he really is an apostle, someone truly sent by God.  If Paul is an apostle, he certainly doesn’t fit the mold of one with the kind of blessed life the people of Corinth would expect. 
 
If Paul is ever to see them again, he has to defend himself.  He is not playing at being an apostle – he is an apostle.  A suffering apostle.  In fact, the only letters of recommendation he needs are the very people of Corinth themselves (3:2-3) and the scars of suffering for the gospel he bears on his body (4:7-12).  Suffering is what happens when a person is sent to preach a gospel of reconciliation to an unreconciled and hostile world (4:7-12), but those scars, much like the scars of Jesus, have resulted in a most amazing kind of reconciliation.
 
Reconciliation is already taking place in Corinth because there, as in many places, Jews and Gentiles are becoming one new humanity by worshipping Jesus together as the family of God (4:14-15).  This remarkable ethnic reconciliation is proof of Jesus’ resurrection and the power of the gospel.  It is why Paul tries to persuade people to follow Jesus (5:11). It is also why Paul needs to come to them so he can be reconciled to them.
 
So, Paul will come to them, and he will come, not to judge people from a worldly point of view but from the view of Christ’s love and new creation (5:16).  It is Jesus who wants reconciliation for the whole world, and He is the one who also wants reconciliation between the people of Corinth and Paul.  So, Paul prays they will be open to full reconciliation through Christ.  This is why he is coming, no, it is why he’s being sent, he’s an ambassador of reconciliation. 
 
And like any good ambassador who comes as a proxy of the dignitary who sent them he will come representing Jesus in such a full and thorough way that his very presence will be the living embodiment of God’s covenant mission, for which he uses a shorthand phrase to describe, and that phrase is, “the righteousness of God.”
 
So, when Paul says, “we are the righteousness of God.” He is saying, I come to you on behalf of the sinless Christ as his ambassador and when God sends people like me to be with you it is as though Jesus himself is with you, as though Jesus himself is making the appeal of reconciliation to you.
 

Conclusion

In conclusion, I’ll have to say, it is a fun song, and I get what these gifted servants of God are trying to do.  They’re trying to say in Christ my sins have been washed away (and they are) and that we are now righteous before God whether by impartation or imputation (and we are). 
 
I also think what the passage in 2 Corinthians 5:21 is actually saying is immensely more powerful but in a different way.  When God uses us to share the gospel which has the power to make all things new, Jesus himself is present making that appeal through you. In fact, he took on all our sin so that in that moment you could stand as God’s ambassador, his representative.  Your presence in the life of another becomes the way Jesus himself is present to that person. In that moment you are the righteousness of God.

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