Posted by: pastor on 05/18/2009 12:28:36
Eastr 6 sermon (May 17, 2009)
Facebook Friendship & Gospel Friendship
In the Name of Jesus:
I intend to get a picture of myself—at least one—up on my Facebook page sometime in 2009. No idea what Facebook is? I’ll avoid any pejorative descriptors of those of you who for one reason or another are not yet familiar with it, but honestly, ignorance of this phenomenon might be an indication of being somewhat out of touch. Facebook was started by a bunch of geeks computer science majors at Harvard, originally as an intramural social networking medium, and now appears to be the preferred site of teens and twenty-somethings—and, increasingly, middle-aged folk who need a dose of youthful mojo, and for whom a sports car is too costly, a motorcycle too dangerous, and an affair too indecent an avenue for a mid-life crisis.
It costs nothing to join, and allows users to make cyber connections with other users based on geography, past or current school, or place of work. Each user creates a personal profile, including information about age, marital status, religious affiliation, political persuasion, and so forth. On Facebook one adds contacts by “friending,” which is akin to befriending, but saves two letters, which is evidently an important economy in 21st century communication.
Facebook puts human features on the worldwide web (at least among those who include photos with their profiles!), allowing users to connect with friends and friends of friends and fellow fly-fishing aficionados all around the world. The first person to friend me was an au pair from Turkey we hadn’t seen in ten years.
One friend of mine has accused me of using Facebook only as a way of collecting friends, and it’s true that I do very little with it—so far, anyway. But I explain to people every now and then that I signed on only incidentally: Hannah wanted to start a page, and at the time I’d heard so much negative publicity about MySpace.com that I wanted to be confident that Facebook would be a safe medium for her. Going through the sign-up process was the simplest way to get familiar with it.
So…Is it safe? I suppose so, as long as the user exercises reasonable caution. (I do actually know all of those I count as friends on Facebook). But, as with any other pastime, there are those for whom it can become something of an addiction, consuming hours of every day…One has to wonder: should that many people know that much about what anyone is thinking, feeling, reading in the news—or, on the basis of a quiz, which Dr. Seuss character they most resemble?
One you have an account—a page—friending is easy: one can search for friends by name, or have potential friends suggested by current friends, or receive direct requests from other users to become friends. I reject my friend’s accusation that I’m on Facebook only to accumulate friends; my Facebook friends number only in the double digits, whereas those who practically make an Olympic sport of gaining friends may number them in the high triple digits, or even more. It’s terribly easy to find friends on Facebook—that’s its main idea—but Facebook friends have no obligations to one another; there are no expectations, no accountability. And perhaps that’s part of the idea, too.
Lest you think this is a sermon on “ the Gospel according to Facebook”: In the Gospel reading for today, continued from last Sunday’s, Jesus has a few words about friendship—some that remind me a little of Facebook friendship—and some that make clear that Gospel friendship is markedly different from Facebook friendship.
“This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that one lays down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I heard from my Father I have made known to you. You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you…”
Friendship with Jesus evidently means significantly more than does friendship on Facebook. In the latter, friendship may nothing more than knowing one person in common, and loving enjoying the same band or mint chocolate chip ice cream; but we are commanded to love one another as Jesus has loved us—as he who withholds nothing from us. That is a pretty heavy obligation!
Friendship with Jesus: Is it safe? That is perhaps the most ridiculous question ever asked—except that we so rarely ask it, or consider that the answer might be “no.” Friendship with Jesus: consider what happened to him, and to many of his disciples. Andrew: crucified; Bartholomew: crucified, then beheaded; James: stoned to death; Peter: crucified…and so on. John died of old age. And I’m not speaking only of 1st century disciples. The 20th century saw those such as Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Martin Luther King, and Oscar Romero die for their faith. But when we consider that all of these died willingly for Jesus’ sake, then perhaps safety isn’t the highest value in Gospel friendship. Can Gospel friendship, like the Facebook variety, become all-consuming? Apparently so.
Jesus calls us friends, he says, because servants don’t get to know what the master is doing, whereas he has let us in on what he’s about—not exactly the real-time stream some Facebook users feed us; but the big picture of Jesus’ life & work is an open book to us. It’s not easy, but neither is it very complicated: love the least, the lost, and the last (with credit to Robert Farrar Capon)—or as they say, die trying. Either way love wins.
Unlike Facebook, there is a cost for joining; but Jesus has paid it; there’s an open account, waiting for new members all the time. What do you and I have in common other friends of Jesus? Some like Bach, some the Beatles, there are technophiles and technophobes, city slickers and country folk, people of every hue, every ethnic background. There are rich and poor, old and young, fans of Rush Limbaugh & fans of Bill Maher, PhDs and some who never learned to read. Jesus’ is not just a worldwide web; it’s a cosmic web, spanning space and time: with him, through him, we have friends in every time and place. It’s not what we have in common but whom we have in common, Jesus.…And even that’s not quite right: we don’t have Jesus; he has us.
Remember?: “You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear much fruit.”
Ah, yes, here we are, back to the expectations of friendship with Jesus. Bearing fruit. Loving like Jesus. It’s hard, impossibly so, except for this: that he has also said that whatever we ask of our heavenly Father—who is, by the way, perhaps the first once-distant friend we have made through our connection with Jesus—whatever we ask, he will give us.
In other words, we have in this network with Jesus—he likes to call it a vine—every possible resource to do as he commands, to grow fruit that will last, to love as Jesus has loved us. Or live and die trying. Either way, love wins. So go out and friend somebody, for Jesus’ sake. Amen.
