ConneXus Blog

By Julia Fowler, Worship Arts Pastor

Text: Mat. 11:28 “Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest”.

“As with many new communications tools Twitter is already a productive source of new vocabulary. The messages are "tweets"; the people signed up to get them are your followers - or tweeple, or tweeps (although there are people pushing twerps and twits as the proper nomenclature). 

The Twittersphere (or Twitterverse) includes both the Twitterati (or Tweetstars) who have lots and lots of followers, and those who have just a few. It even includes tworkers - people whose jobs involve using Twitter. 

A twoosh is a message that fits the maximum of 140 characters exactly, without editing; there are also mistweets, retweets, and - when sent under the influence of alcohol - "dweets."

Twittering too much may get you accused of Twitterhea, or cause your tweeple to "unfollow" you. Unfollowing might also be the punishment for other breaches of Twitiquette, such as using Twitter to send spam tweets (or speets).

The convention of replacing the first letter of any word with "tw" to signify some kind of connection to Twitter can end up sounding like a stream of semi-demented baby talk. The words twaiting, twalking, twiking, and twirting for waiting, walking, biking, or flirting while using Twitter show up mainly in lists of words about Twitter, and not so much in actual unselfconscious use.” (Source: http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2009/02/08/all_a_twitter/)

All in all this ‘simple’ form of communication has quite a diverse and comprehensive protocol in order to reach its ultimate goal – relationship.  Unfortunately the virtual kind we are trying to escape to is cold and void of the very thing we truly desire.  Jesus said, “Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”

While  I too enjoy the conversations, fellowship and fun that can be shared through these experiences I am reminded that these cannot be a substitute for the authentic relationship I must nurture with my Savior.

I encourage you to evaluate how much time you are spending in the virtual world, versus the real one.  Spend some time with the Lord and ask Him to help you balance appropriately between the two