Critical Comments

I find myself fighting a critical voice that seems to pop up in my head fairly frequently.  It's tempting to pick apart what someone else says as not being the right way to think about Christ or the Bible.  What is the end goal though?  What good does it really do?

Some people are so quick to correct other people.  I have a strong tendency towards that myself.  It can be a miserable way to live.  We have to ask ourselves, what is our end goal here?  Is it to love the other person or to win the argument and prove how smart we are?

I see this especially on Facebook, way more than on Twitter for some reason by the way.  Everyone seems to have an opinion on just about anything.  People are quick to point out what's wrong with something someone else said and quickly enough there's a comment thread that is chasing a rabbit trail.

I find myself getting sucked into that so easily.  I often have to deactivate my account or at the very least log out for days on end.  While I enjoy staying up to date on people's lives and seeing what they're up to; weddings, babies and all that; more often than not I find myself unable to resist commenting on someone's status and getting fired up.  What's the use in that?  What am I really gaining by trying to point out how another person is thinking wrongly?  Chances are if they posted something that's super opinionated, they've already made up their minds on the subject, right?  Do I really believe a snarky comment is going to make them change their minds?

I love debating different topics with friends in person.  It challenges and stimulates my thinking and I like to think it does the same to their thinking.  If it is done over social media though, I don't think it's very useful.  If you can't see the person face to face, a lot is missed in the conversation.  Not to mention just how plain old mean we can all be on there when we're not seeing the other person's face.

People say things on social media about one another that they would never dream of saying to the other person face to face.  Granted, people have always talked behind one another's back and that's not right either.  The meanness I see on Facebook is another level altogether though.  As mentioned before, I'm just as guilty as the next guy.

It's similar to road rage in a way.  People get so angry behind the wheel and think other people are idiots and sometimes yell at them saying terrible things they would never say to their face.  Again, guilty as charged on my end.  

With that in mind, there's something to be said for face to face communication.  It's almost a lost are in some sense.  We're more connected than ever before.  I can get a hold of some of my friends via facebook, text message, regular old phone calls (because I was born in the 80's haha), direct tweet, instagram, email and I'm sure I'm missing one or two more in that list.  

Somehow, we're also more disconnected than ever before.  People watch their kids at sporting events and tweet or post about it, "At my kids' soccer game."  Are you really there?  I mean, are you fully present?  You can thank my pastor for that example by the way haha

People move of course, some of us overseas.  Many times though we don't even meet with friends who live in the same city.  We take it for granted that they're always going to be around.