Day: January 14, 2013
Book review: “Will You Be My Facebook Friend: Social Media And The Gospel” by Tim Chester
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[/amazon_link]I first came across Facebook when I was working with International Students for the Heath Evangelical Church. It was 2007. The network was still quite young, but growing fast. I had been told that I needed to maintain a presence if I wanted to reach studenTs out, because they spent a lot of time on Facebook. I created a profile and hardly ever used it for a while. I started using it a bit more a few years later. It is now part of my daily routine.
“Will You Be My Facebook Friend” is a small book with only 48 pages. Unlike “You, Your Family and the Internet”, which was aimed at people with little understanding of the Internet, it was written to people who use social networking websites. It highlights the positives sides of social networking, but also draws attention to their negative effects. Through searching questions, Tim Chester invites us to think through our use of social networking sites. For those of us who may be spending too much time working on our online profile, he doesn’t content himself with telling us to use the network less. He goes much deeper and shows that idolatry is really at the heart of the use many make of social networking websites. He then brings us back to the heart of the gospel, the cross, in order to give the right motivation to use Social Networking sites in a more Godly Way.
I found this little book helpful and challenging. Why not buy a few copies for your young and not so young people?