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Facebook Blues

We can often get so caught up in the busyness of our lives that our fellowship and relationship with the Lord suffers. When that happens, we seldom stop and think how that affects and hurts our Heavenly Father. I’ve recently gone through an experience that gives me some insight as to how my Lord may feel when I pass up opportunities to be in contact with Him.

I’m a recent member of facebook. I delayed in joining, but when I kept learning of former co-workers and friends who were members of facebook, I reluctantly signed on and joined. For those who are not yet members, let me explain how it’s possible to connect with friends.

When joining facebook, you are given the opportunity to post a picture of yourself and add a profile. The profile can be as brief or detailed as you want it to be. Also, you can set up restrictions to control how much of your personal information can be seen by others. However, your picture and your name are accessible to everyone.

I have learned two ways to locate people. One is to type in a name in the search box and click the search button. Everyone who is a member of facebook with that same name, or a variation of that name, will be displayed. If you find the person you’re looking for, just click on either their photo or name, and their facebook account will open up to you. From there, you can submit an “Add as Friend” request to that person. When they receive the request, they have the choice of confirming or ignoring it. If they confirm you as a friend, their photo and name will then be displayed on your list of friends. Therefore, if you were curious as to who my friends are, a photo list of friends is available to you to look through.

That’s the second way to locate a friend, by looking through the friend list of someone whom you think might be a mutual friend of the person you’re looking for. If you find the person you’re searching for on someone else’s friend list, you can proceed to click on their photo, and their facebook account will open. From there you can submit a friend request, and continue as above.

It’s through this latter way that I found a number of former friends with whom I had lost contact. One was a girl from my childhood home church with whom I had become good friends during high school. She had gotten married shortly after graduating from high school, and I had no idea of her married name. So, searching for her by her last name just wasn’t possible. My brother is one of my friends on facebook, and one day my long lost friend’s cousin was targeted along with my brother in a photo. Up to that point, I hadn’t given any thought of searching for her cousin. Anyway, by going into her cousin’s facebook account, I was able to scroll through his list of friends until I found one that was a fit. To my delight, after sending a message to her, she returned a message also expressing excitement that we had found each other.

That has not been the case for a couple of friends whom I found while scrolling through another’s friends list. Not only did I submit an “Add as Friend” request to each, but I also wrote both a lengthy note, exclaiming my pleasure to locate them on facebook.

I waited expectantly for a return message. I just knew they would respond back with a note expressing an equal amount of excitement and pleasure that I had contacted them. Within a few days, I received back a “Friend Confirmation” from both, but no additional message. I thought to myself, “they’re probably busy and waiting until they have a few extra minutes to write me a note.” But, I kept waiting. And, I waited. To date, I have not received any personal note from either of them. I am still waiting expectantly, but I am very disappointed that I haven’t received even a one-sentence acknowledgement that they received my note, or that they were glad to hear from me.

Experiencing this disappointment made me think of how disappointed my Heavenly Father must become when he has to wait for me respond to Him. After all, He has written numerous love letters within the Holy Scriptures to me. At times, He waits expectantly for me to read His Word, and then to respond back to Him of my love and my pleasure at reading His love message. Sometimes, though, He waits. And, He waits.

As I was disappointed that these people I considered friends couldn’t take a minute out of their lives to respond to me, even if it was just to say, “So glad to hear from you,” so must Jesus, whom I consider a friend, be disappointed when I don’t take the time to respond to Him. In the end, He is hurt by my silence.

I don’t know why my friends haven’t taken the time to respond to my personal messages, but I am not responsible for their actions. But, I am responsible for mine. Therefore, it is my desire to never leave my Heavenly Father, my Papa, waiting expectantly for me to respond to His love messages. After all, why would I want to?

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