I love fake Twitter accounts. Here are my favorites, in no particular order
Be sure to click on the links and follow these people.
Who did I miss?
“Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven. (Matthew 6:1 ESV)
I wonder what it would look like if the Pharisees had a Twitter account. It would probably look a little like this:
Maybe it isn’t so hard to imagine…
There is a fine line between facebragging and giving God-honoring information. I’ve been working through taking the log out of my own eye before attempting to take the specs out of my brothers and sisters.
I started out by making a list of a few rules for determining if it’s God-honoring or facebragging. Then I realized that sounds too much like what a Pharisee would do. In reality it all comes down to my heart. Am I posting stuff in the hopes you’ll wake up to my awesomeness or to somehow praise the Lord and point to Him?
Here is the central question: Do I want to be seen by men or do I want to be a window by which people see the beauty of Jesus?
That is a question that I want to ask myself before I tweet things that tip-toe towards facebragging.
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By the way that “My new ride” link works.
I should also mention that Twister is a crazy fun way of creating fake tweets like the ones above.
Whoever meddles in a quarrel not his own is like one who takes a passing dog by the ears.
I’m convinced that Twitter has left many people smarting from wicked dog bites. Most of its ever flowing content is nothing more than a passing dog. Many, myself included, have tugged on this old passing dogs ears and gotten bit in response.
That’s the thing with grabbing a dogs ears.
You can really give yourself the impression that you’ve got this pit-bull mastered. You might even have a pretty sweet ride for a moment. But eventually he’s going to wiggle those ears free and he’s going to be ticked off enough to bite you.
With Twitter all it takes is holding down the Shift button and a strike of the @ button to convince yourself that you are significant.
But beware when you enter into a quarrel that’s not your own. You might ride it with joy for awhile but eventually your soul is going to get bitten. It might breed in your heart factionalism. Perhaps pride. Or if we’re lucky, God in His grace, will expose us for the posers that we are.
Of course this isn’t to say that there aren’t rabid dogs that ought to be grabbed by the ears and wrestled to the ground. But let’s be honest with ourselves, a good chunk of what we spend our time arguing about is nothing more significant than a passing dog. It only becomes a big deal because we were dumb enough to grab it by the ears to have a little fun or make a name for ourselves.
Next time you enter into a quarrel—even a little spat on Twitter—ask yourself whether or not it’s really a dog worth fighting*.
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*That’s not a shout-out to @MichaelVick.
My brothers, show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory. For if a man wearing a gold ring and fine clothing comes into your assembly, and a poor man in shabby clothing also comes in, and if you pay attention to the one who wears the fine clothing and say, “You sit here in a good place,” while you say to the poor man, “You stand over there,” or, “Sit down at my feet,” have you not then made distinctions among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts? Listen, my beloved brothers, has not God chosen those who are poor in the world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom, which he has promised to those who love him? But you have dishonored the poor man. (James 2:1-6 ESV)
I imagine if James 2:1-6 were updated to reflect social media it would read something like this:
“My brothers, show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory. For if a man with 10,000 Twitter followers and a couple of books published decides to follow you and Twitter, and a poor chap with only his mom and grandma following him also decides to follow, and if you pay attention to the chap with 10,000 followers and say, “Thanks for the follow. 
You are amazing. Check out all my stuff and be sure to retweet how awesome I am to your followers”, while you say to the lonely guy…well nothing really (why would you talk to this dude?)…have you not then made distinctions among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts? Listen, my beloved brothers, has not God chosen those who are poor in the world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom, which he has promised to those who love him? But you have dishonored the poor man.”
The problem in James 2 (both then and today) is that when you start focusing on the rich man you change your message to suit the rich guy and let the poor guy starve. You start trying to feed the ones that do not need it so that you can convince yourself that you’re more important than you actually are. If you’re writing, tweeting, and doing the book Face for the glory of God then your aim is to feed hungry souls the life-giving truths of God.
If God happens to expand your influence through a guy or gal with more influence than you retweeting your stuff, the goal is still the same—feeding the hungry. For me this provides a test for my heart and to decide if I’m writing for the correct reasons.
Am I just as excited when Roger the Shrubber (with all of his six followers) decides to subscribe as I am when Tim the Enchanter (with all 10000 of his followers) does? If I am more excited about the Enchanter following me is that because it will feed more hungry people? Or because it will feed my gluttonous ego?
If your conscience convicts you and you’ve been showing partiality, the answer probably isn’t to quit writing. It’s probably to repent and get back to working for the right reasons.
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This isn’t a one-to-one comparison because many of those that are “rich” in social media are that way because they are faithful to the gospel and the Lord extends their influence as a means of spreading His glory. That is why I did not quote verse 7. I’m trying here to get at the heart issue of the one that shows partiality and not make a comment on those that might be wrongly/rightly honored.
I would wager that every college and high-school student in America is vaguely familiar with CliffsNotes—even if they erroneously call the Cliff Notes. The
se little survey’s have helped confused students navigate through the confusing Old English language of books like The Canterbury Tales. Though some use them as a means to not read the original work they can be very helpful to grasp the overall structure and thought of a work of literature.
Tony Reinke, in his helpful book Lit!, encourages readers to write all over their books and make them their own. In his twelfth chapter he gives ten reasons to mark up a book. His fourth reason states I write in my books to trace the skeleton of the book. He continues
The publisher often leaves the reader with spacious white margins. I fill those margins with my own notes as I trace the author’s arguments. Often, after I have completed a chapter, I return to the first page of the chapter to jot down a simple summary. My goal is to make a skeletal structure of the chapter more clear and obvious as I progress, especially in nonfiction books. (Reinke, Lit!)
I have been doing things like this sporadically for years, but Reinke’s words here not only motivated me to be more intentional but they also gave me an idea to benefit not only myself but my readers.
Introducing TweetNotes
For a little while now I have been more intentional in following Reinke’s advice. After every chapter I have attempted to summarize the chapter in the form of a tweet (140 characters or less) and compile these to organize the entire argument of the book.
The first TweetNotes will be posted tomorrow as I review and interact with Stephen Altrogge’s latest book Create: Stop Making Excuses and Start Making Stuff. I hope to also go through many of the books that I have already read and compile TweetNotes for your benefit and mine.
I encourage you to pick up a similar practice. It keeps you engaged in what you are reading and it forces you to really chew on a chapter to digest it into 140 characters or less.
