Friday, June 26, 2009


Facebook-A Witnessing Tool?


"On February 4th, 2004 Mark Zuckerberg launched The Facebook, a social network that was at the time exclusively for Harvard students. It was a huge hit: in 2 weeks, half of the schools in the Boston area began demanding a Facebook network. Zuckerberg immediately recruited his friends Dustin Moskowitz and Chris Hughes to help build Facebook, and within four months, Facebook added 30 more college networks.

The original idea for the term Facebook came from Zuckerberg’s high school (Phillips Exeter Academy). The Exeter Face Book was passed around to every student as a way for students to get to know their classmates for the following year. It was a physical paper book until Zuckerberg brought it to the internet.

Over 1 million new users signed up every week, 200,000 daily, totaling over 50 million active users. Facebook received 40 billion page views a month. Long gone were the days of Facebook as a social network for college students. 11% of users are over the age of 35, and the fastest growing demographic is users over 30. Facebook has also seen huge growth internationally; 15% of the user base is in Canada. Facebook users’ passion, or addiction, to the site is unparalleled: more than half use the product every single day and users spend an average of 19 minutes a day on Facebook. Facebook is 6th most trafficked site in the US and top photo sharing site with 4.1 billion photos uploaded. "

This Brings me back to the question at the beginning. Have you thought of Facebook as a witnessing tool? Many people have. Its easy to set up an account. Its free. People can only have access to your page and info if you approve them. You control what information is available to others. We hear many horror stories about this or that. Truth is, if someone wanted to "stalk" you, they can usually find you in the phone book.

I've been able to connect with old friends I haven't seen in years and meet new ones with similar church and networking interests. Some of my friends are Christians and/or pastors. Some are not. What a great way for unchurched friends to be exposed to those who are, as many churches are in an individuals profile or favorites page.Most people I know with a Facebook page also post church events and Bible verses from time to time. Jesus told us to be the salt and light in this world. I believe that he would want us to use any and all means at our disposal while we have the opportunity. With all the recent attacks on free speech, we don't know how long these opportunities will be available. That's something to think about.(To check out my page, just click on my name above my Facebook badge in the left-hand column of this page.) ...God bless, keith 1 Cor 13

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