Hiding-My-Face Book

The “Jeanne Zornes” you might find on “Facebook” isn’t me, but someone else who lives in Seattle, half the state away. We met when she came to town to visit relatives. Younger than me, she’s an energetic mother of four grown sons and a daughter. Her internet presence includes her photography business. But don’t look too far in “Bing images” for us. Besides the two “Jeanne Zornes” head shots, there are images of people I know nothing about, including some police “mug shots” of sour-faced men!  Yikes!

The internet can be an amazing tool, connecting me with information and people. But it has a dark side, too, probably greater than I realize. My security software tries to keep me “safe,” but it’s sad how prevalent the malevolent are. Even Facebook is susceptible to misuse and misinterpretation. Insecure people are vulnerable to connecting their “value” to how many Facebook “friends” they have. But “lurking” isn’t the same as “bonding,” and mouse-click connections don’t provide the face-to-face skills necessary for building nurturing and lasting friendships.  

By choice, I am not part of the “Facebook” community at this time.  If I had a page, I’m sure it would have its share of grandchild photos! But I have chosen to “fast” or abstain from this media tool as a reminder to pray for someone with a disabling internet addiction. Ironically, if you want to learn more about this obsessive compulsive disorder, you can search the term on the internet!  But it is a real problem, and making its way into medical manuals catching up with the internet revolution.

I’ve pondered what Jesus would do with “Facebook” and the culture associated with it that emphasizes “looking good.” Isaiah prophesied that the Messiah would have “no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him” (Isaiah 53:3). When He actually did come, his contemporaries questioned whether someone from Nazareth could possibly be the Messiah (John 1:46). We’re not drawn to Jesus by His looks (which are not known), but by His heart.

In seeking to use social media wisely, we need to remember that God sees the real me, not the “virtual me” I want to portray. He sees into my heart’s deepest places, right through pretension and excuses. His Word, the Bible, is “sharper than any double-edged sword…it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart....  Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account” (Hebrews 4:12, 13).

I’m looking forward to the ultimate “Facebook,” one expressed in these lyrics by Fanny Crosby, the prolific lyricist who had no memory of faces in her ninety-plus years of life. She was blinded in infancy. The chorus of “Someday the silver cord will break” goes:

And I shall see Him face to face,
And tell the story—Saved by grace.

Let’s hear it for Gracebook!