Living the Simple Life

We live in a blog crazy world, don’t we?  Every where you turn around there is a new blog devoted to something different.  Just for the fun of it, I went to google.com and typed in the word “blog”.  Do you want to take a wild guess on how many listings were found on that word?  Go ahead, I will give you about 5 seconds to give it your best shot…1….2….3….4….5…ok, time’s up.  What is your guess?  Nope!  Nice try!  Not even close!  Are you kidding me?  Guys, those guesses weren’t even close.  Here is the answer: 1,480,000,000.  Oh yeah, almost 1.5 billion listings on the word blog.  I would be willing to guess that at least half of those are actual blogs, maybe more.
We live in the constantly, ever changing technology and social media age.  I guess the numbers I just listed was one of many reasons why I started this new blog.  With blogging comes influence.  Yes, of course, people can be negative influences with their words (Job’s wife in Job 2:9 “Are you still holding on to your integrity?  Curse God and die!”)  When you are married, how many of you know the one person you don’t want to be a bad influence on you is your spouse?  Come on somebody!  Not only was she a negative influence, but she actually used the words, Satan wanted her to use (Job 2:5).  In this day and age, people can be extremely negative influences in writing, not just talking verbally.  Like I said, I guess that is one of the reasons I wanted to begin writing for God I want to be able to be a positive influence to all people verbally, through my life, and through my writing.  I know for a fact that my blog is one of many that is devoted to edifying the Body of Christ on the internet (hey ya’ll, we still need more). I have many friends who blog and I love to hear their hearts.  Great stuff guys!
Let me share with you one way that a blog can be super influential in the community around you.  My wife and I are currently working at a church plant just outside of Washington D.C.  This is such a great place to live for many reasons that I don’t have time to get into right now (maybe in another blog).  The church we are laboring at uses this coin phrase all the time and it is modeled perfectly by Jesus himself in the New Testament.  We talk about “meeting people’s Felt Needs”.  If there isn’t a greater felt need today, than convenience on the internet, I don’t know what is?  Jesus was all about the felt needs too, as I mentioned.  One perfect example is in Luke 5:17-26.  In this familiar passage, Jesus heals the paralytic who was brought to him by his friends.  If you remember, The house Jesus was in was packed out and this man’s friends were so determined to get him in to Jesus, they took him on the roof.  Alright, hang on.  I got to break the biblical flow here for just a second.  You have to take a moment and just try to imagine the paralytic’s face as he is being lowered into a small home from the roof in the middle of what could have been hundreds of people.  What does it look like?  I bet his face would be a “Kodak Moment”.  I bet he also crowd surfed for a little while…maybe not, but you never know!  Anyway, back to the story.  The paralytic was lowered in front of Jesus to recieve a miracle and what does Jesus say?  he says, “Friend, your sins are forgiven”.  This guy is probably thinking, cause I doubt he would have told Jesus this, MY SINS?  MY SINS?  I want my legs back, give me my legs back!  Yes, this man recieved the most incredible gift and that is the forgiveness of our sins, but he also had a felt need, and later on Jesus, meets his felt need too.  You see, blogging can meet the felt need of many people who have been sucked in (like myself) to the age of technology.  It opens up a whole new world for people to learn, enjoy themselves, be entertained, and much more.
As I wrap up this for now, I want you to think on how you can be a positive influence in the world around you and how can you meet people’s “Felt Needs”!  We have a mandate from Jesus himself to Go and preach the gospel.  Blogging is one of many ways we can preach and reach!
Just some thoughts.  Have a great day!