The Facebook ‘Others’ Folder… how I hate thee…

Because of what I do, I get a lot of emails / texts / FB messages etc each day.  I don’t always get to them straight away, but I always make a concerted attempt to reply to all the messages that come in.  Especially if people are in need.

But for some reason I always forget about the FB Messenger ‘Others’ folder.  The one time every few years that I remember it’s there, I end up scrolling back through the lists of people who tried to contact me, and now probably think I hate them because I never replied.  All because Facebook in it’s infinite wisdom decided what was ‘important’ and what wasn’t.  Thanks Facebook….

Now, I’m a preacher, so nearly everything that happens to me can be turned into a preaching story in some way.  This is no exception.  So here is the sermon illustration…

I’m convinced that God is speaking to all of us regularly.  There are ways that we expect Him to speak to us – perhaps because that’s how He’s spoken in the past – so we’re ‘Friends’ with those ways, and any post shows up on the regular ‘newsfeed’ of our heart and mind.

However, God also speaks to us through ways that we’re not used to.  Ways that we’re not ‘friends’ with yet.  Maybe we’re looking for a word from a prophet, but God is giving us a dream at night, or a gentle encouragement from a family member.  Sometimes there’s important and powerful messages He wants to get through to us – but they end up in our heart’s version of the ‘Others’ folder.

By all means, keep checking your newsfeed, but don’t forget to check the ‘Others’ folder too.  God will use many ways to communicate to you – and you want to be open to all of them!

[Sermon End] 🙂