telling others

I wrote this piece for my Church news magazine...
Trying something new.
This week, I tried to do something I have never tried before. I blogged.
What? (I hear you ask) does this mean? Is it contagious? Will she ever recover?
I published a web log - shortened to blog – an online diary of my musings for all the world to see. This is potentially even more dangerous than sending them to the local newspaper. Why? Had I suddenly become an exhibitionist? No, I have been participating in a course at College which required me to leave my comfortable understandings of communication and reach out beyond myself. For me, my blog is a symbol that challenges me, exposes me, and helps make me a life-long learner.
It sometimes frightens me where our world is heading at break-neck pace, and occasionally, I want to wind back the clock to an easier, slower time. But all we have is now, and only now. Younger people spend hours on the internet, for information, entertainment and even spirituality. Can we learn this language, so that we can connect with them, meet them where they are, instead of insisting that they change to ‘fit in’ with where we are? It also gives us a chance to encourage them to be counter-cultural – to challenge if where they now are is where they really want to be.
When the Apostle Paul arrived in Athens, that great Greek cultural centre, he began speaking about Jesus by complimenting them on all their statues and temples – I see you Greeks are religious people – and then proceeded to tell them about the unknown God. When we respect where others are, they then can have a chance to respect us and our message. Every person is a unique and necessary wonder, hand crafted by God.
I can now blog, and that makes me a blogger – a new word for a new age. The same message in a new package – a new language for a new time. I have found it empowering. Anne