Reengagement Again: My Online Conundrum
Resuming My Dormant Newsletter and Reflections on the Digital Age
After an extended period of absence, I’m resuming my newsletter. Over the last year, it has fallen by the wayside, but I’m now recommitting to weekly postings. Despite my absence, many of you have discovered this newsletter over the last year and subscribed. Welcome! And I hope my forthcoming articles will be a source of encouragement and refreshment as I write reflections on Scripture, theology, history, and culture.
I’ve always wrestled with the nature and the extent of online engagement. While I’m quick to pick up new technology (and can certainly keep abreast of online conversation), the social internet has always made me waffle. Perhaps there is an inner Luddite waging war within this techno-optimist millennial. I see the replacement of incarnational community with digital as a net negative. My instincts have been to focus my attention and ministry on those I regularly interact with face to face—namely, my family and church. I think this is the priority, and I lament that many exchange anonymity in their local communities for notoriety online. I’d much rather be a godly influence in my local community than be an influencer in an online community. The great benefit of the web is that it instantly crosses any geographical boundary between persons. Still, its great weakness is its tendency to make a soul untethered from any locale, to form geographically agnostic souls, and to make us both everywhere and nowhere simultaneously. Many float about in amorphous digital slop rather than digging roots, grounded in the real world, at a specific local and a place where one can be truly known. So because of my instinct to prioritize my local community, things like this newsletter are often the first thing to go in all the joyous busyness of pastoral ministry. However, there can be great value in using these modern tools to minister to others outside of my immediate sphere, and that is what I will aim to do through this newsletter. Yet, I do recognize the dangers before me.
If you’ve spent time on social media for any length, the vitriol and obsession of those online conversations both disorient and discourage. The platforms of this digital age cater to pride—a sort of self-obsessed narcissism craving for attention. And while online platforms can be tools, they are fraught with danger. The human heart is desperately wicked, and the temptations are great (including, if not especially, for Christians) to boast of our accomplishments, to draw attention to our good works, to solicit pity in self-loathing, to self-promote in vain glory, or to craft a facade of an imaginary and projected life to impress others. Within such an environment, it’s difficult for God’s people to cloth themselves with Christ-like humility (1 Pet 5:5). But to “keep oneself unstained from the world” doesn’t necessarily require boycotting the internet, nor signing off social media, nor canceling your interest service provider (Jam 1:27). We can “walk in a manner worthy of the Lord” in any culture, informed by the Word of God and guided by the Spirit (Col 1:10). In matters of digital technology, I consider myself the weaker brother. My conscience is weak on these matters, and yet, in the freedom of Christ and with a desire to honor the Lord, I will resume writing online for the spiritual good of others and the glory of God.
So I hope you will you will stay connected and informed. I’d love to hear from you on how I can make the Miscellanies the most helpful for my readers. I plan to post at least once a week. I also will be posting my sermon manuscripts here (along with the audio). I hope you find them as an encouragement to your soul. Thank you for your reading, your prayers, and your support!