Conrad recently added a blog post recalling how he first came to join Facebook, and reflecting on the benefits he has reaped over the years.
As I commence 2017, Facebook is among the many blessings I am thanking God for. Let me explain. My journey on Facebook began a few years ago. I remember the day quite vividly. I had been preaching for a pastoral friend in the USA and while there on a couple of occasions he asked me why I was not on Facebook. I cannot now recall what my answer was. He kept insisting that “a guy like you needs to get on Facebook” but I kept up with whatever excuse it was that I was giving him. Finally, as we came to my last night and I was preparing to go to bed, he told his eldest daughter to get my laptop and open a Facebook account for me. When I woke up in the morning I was given my laptop back with the news that changed my world: “Conrad, you are now on Facebook!”
I recalled that it was in precisely the same way that I started blogging. Again, I was preaching for an American pastor and while I was having lunch with him he raised the subject that I should start blogging. I gave every excuse in the book as to why I could not but he kept insisting, “A guy like you needs to have a blog”. Finally, with lunch out of the way, he took me to his son’s office and asked him to open a blog for me. Within a few minutes I was told that I had a blog.
But I digress. I was talking about Facebook and me. Once I got over the initial shock of seeing thousands of “friend” requests streaming in—compared to a few hundred followers on my blog—I sat back and asked myself the question, “How was I to use this power that was suddenly at my fingertips?” I noticed that many people used Facebook to talk about inconsequential aspects of their lives—what they ate the other day, what they saw yesterday, where they visited today, etc. I came to the conclusion that each person must determine what he or she will do with this power that was now in his or her hands. I felt that I wanted to use it for a greater purpose.
I decided that Facebook was going to do for me what my regular prayer letters did. Once I settled that in my mind, I was ready to fly. I processed it this way. Missionaries and pastors of a former generation kept journals, which were often published many years after events had happened, sometimes after the writers had already died. Readers were challenged to greater heights of Christian living and service by the feats of these servants of God. Although that was not my generation, I too became a pastor before I had access to the Internet. I would type out prayer letters on a manual typewriter, duplicate them, and send them by post. Within a week my friends would know what was going on in my life and ministry and feel a part of my life. Enter the Internet and Facebook! Now, in the providence of God, I can do what God’s servants were doing and what I used to do but this time the waiting period between writing and reading is a millisecond.
Read the rest here.