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2. Your Logo Social media are computer-mediated tools that allow people to create, share or exchange information, ideas, and pictures/videos in virtual communities and networks. Social media is defined as "a group of Internet-based applications that build on the ideological and technological foundations of Web 2.0, and that allow the creation and exchange of user- generated content."

3. Your Logo Furthermore, social media depend on mobile and web-based technologies to create highly interactive platforms through which individuals and communities share, co-create, discuss, and modify user-generated content. They introduce substantial and pervasive changes to communication between businesses, organizations, communities, and individuals.

4. Your Logo These changes are the focus of the emerging field of technoself studies. Social media differ from traditional or industrial media in many ways, including quality, reach, frequency, usability, immediacy and permanence. Social media operates in a dialogic transmission system, (many sources to many receivers). This is in contrast to traditional media that operates under a monologic transmission model (one source to many receivers). (Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, December, 2013).

5. Your Logo We all need to belong. From tweeting your latest accomplishment on Twitter, posting your latest picture on Facebook…, everyone wants to belong to something, somewhere. We believe it will bring value to our lives and enrich it in such a way to make us better people. We learn this from the time we are young children, hanging onto the schoolyard fence in the hopes that maybe that popular group of people will look our way and invite us to join their intimate clique.

6. Your Logo We transform our inner and outward appearance so the people who are most worth our time deem us a valuable part of their community. Then we become adults. We throw off the chains of school life just to cross the threshold of adulthood. We believe now we can become the real us, and we won’t have to fake who we are in order to impress others around us.

7. Your Logo Wrong. Adulthood forces us to address deeper questions regarding our identity: What if I never become a successful person in society? What if I never get married? Is this all there is to life? What’s my purpose in life? We all need (and want) to belong. It’s in our DNA. We can fool ourselves into thinking we can journey through life on our own. With the development and proliferation of technology, it’s possible to meet most basic needs right from the comfort of our own home.

8. Your Logo However, the hole within our hearts goes much deeper than our basic needs. It is buried deep within us and lies at the very fibre of our being. Our need for human connection and contact can never be met in a solo effort. Our validation comes from others, and no matter how deep we try to bury it and strive to fill it with material possessions, wealth, and intelligence, the hole never completely fills. So, we keep searching.

9. Your Logo We search for that group of people who will encourage us in our journey through life. We want them to believe in us, accept us for who we are, and, in essence, validate us as human beings. Hundreds of millions of people are running toward social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter to participate in the relational components of the Internet. Are these networks the next big mission field or an enormous waste of time?

10. Your Logo Should a Christian participate in social networking? The answer to these questions should be determined by whether we can honestly ask God to bless and use our actions for His own good purposes. “So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God” (1 Corinthians 10:31). If we are willing to let God use our participation for His glory, we have freedom to participate.

11. Your Logo Social Media Says More To The World About A Congregation Than You Think Put yourself in the mind-set of someone out in our community, who is not a member of our church, who knows very little about the church other than that it exists. Imagine what goes through their subconscious mind when they discover your presence on Facebook (or some other social media platform). Your very presence makes several statements to them…

12. Your Logo We’re not stuck with the old ways of doing things Let’s face it. In general, churches are not known for their technological prowess. This is understandable…it’s not their role to be a community technology leader. But the impression of an old-fashioned, staid organization can be a strike against the church (in the person’s mind). A presence on social media conveys a sense of being open to new things, of being aware of what’s going on today.

13. Your Logo Things are going on here that you might find interesting and we’d like you to know about it On top of not being stuck in the old ways, what you’re actually sharing on social media provides people with a window into the life of the church. It’s a reminder that a church is made up of people and that people get together as a family or community. What a person sees looking through this window into the church life

14. Your Logo can be interesting and appealing to someone looking for connections, meaning in their lives, a sense of community, and a place to learn about, experience and grow their own faith.

15. Your Logo We’re looking beyond our own four walls A congregation may or may not be especially outward- focused at present. But being on social media is at least a recognition that the congregation is made up of people even when they’re not in the building. It demonstrates a sense of community that extends beyond the church’s four walls…out into the community.

16. Your Logo An outward-facing organization is much more attractive than an inward one. A social media presence naturally shares elements of being outward focused (even if the church isn’t entirely so) just by taking this step of sharing information so freely.

17. Your Logo We’re interested in what you have to say Social media platforms are all about interaction. And the interaction is public. As long as your social media postings invite interaction, when interaction occurs and is responded to, the person gets the message that the church isn’t just about one-way communication.

18. Your Logo We take our message seriously enough that we’re willing to work at sharing it A church that keeps to itself and doesn’t make an effort to share its message sends a clear (and entirely different) message through its inaction. But a church that works at sharing its message makes it clear that it takes its message and its place in the world seriously. This doesn’t mean that it will resonate with everyone. But it does say we care that people hear this message. It says “we’re making an effort”.

19. Your Logo These statements are a powerful secondary message These statements that are made by using social media should be eye-opening to a congregation that has so far resisted, or simply not put much effort yet into, reaching people online. They’re a powerful secondary message expressed simply by your willingness to show up and participate.

20. Your Logo THE STRENGTHS (ADVANTAGES) OF THE SOCIAL MEDIA It Deepens Fellowship At its core, the church is one giant social network. It exists as an intricate, interconnected community. As social beings created by a communal God, we should take courage and not be afraid of modern social media. There are five primary reasons congregations should embrace these tools to aid church fellowship.

21. Your Logo 1.First, fellowship is not an end in itself, but a means to many other goals: community, mission, evangelization, and spiritual growth. Social media amplify each of these elements exponentially and therefore are a potent aid to fellowship. 2.Second, social networking transcends geography. These tools extend fellowship beyond the church walls and stretch it around the world.

22. Your Logo They help us fulfil Jesus' command to Peter, which still echoes for us: "Put out into deep water" (Luke 5:4). Church fellowship must never be exclusive and closed in on itself. It should always be outward-focused and mission-oriented. Members are ultimately connected in the body of Christ (1 Corinthian 12:12), not isolated in local church bodies like disparate tribes.

23. Your Logo 3.Third, social media transcend time. Fellowship in the past was typically constrained to the times when people gathered at churches or in homes. But now conversations about Sunday sermons can linger throughout the week. 4.Fourth, online relationships spark offline community. Social media do not replace personal relationships.

24. Your Logo They supplement them and cultivate new ones. Ideally, online social networking leads to offline social networking, meeting face to face so that our joy may be complete (2 John 1:12). I have recently met with several friends from other states whom I first encountered through Facebook. Even 20 years ago, these relationships would not have materialized.

25. Your Logo 1.Fifth, and most importantly, social media open the doors of Christian fellowship and invite millions of outsiders to join the community. Young secularists who would never darken the doors of a church find themselves dialoguing with Christian bloggers. An atheist YouTube viewer stumbles across a religious debate and becomes intrigued by the idea of God. A Facebook exchange dissolves the distorted images a young mom long held about Christianity.

26. Your Logo WEAKNESSES (DISADVANTAGES) OF THE SOCIAL MEDIA Of course social media come with potential dangers. For example, they can inflate gossip, encourage narcissism, and reduce people to text. But these dangers are avoidable. Once aware of them, we can prevent or overcome their damage.

27. Your Logo It Distorts Reality Social media can merely offer a short-term, technological solution to deeper, more fundamental problems. Social networking can give the appearance of intimacy and community without enabling the substance of embodied friendship.

28. Your Logo The more we wed ourselves to social networking as a strategy for building community, the more we risk forgetting that the problems in our communities do not hinge upon lack of access to shared information about each other's lives. They result from our own reluctance to share space and meals together, and to enter into environments and

29. Your Logo social situations that require our embodied presence. The comforting arm around a shoulder that comes when we "weep with those who weep" will never have an equal virtual substitute. In that sense, while not immediately harmful to fellowship, we should ask whether social media undermine our intuitions about what is distinctive and unique about the gathered, embodied fellowship of the people of God.

30. Your Logo This is especially true now that social networking is increasingly video-centric. Video social networking seems to make online sharing more like embodied presence. This makes it more difficult to see what is unique about being together in body, and may make us think church gatherings are unnecessary.

31. Your Logo Social networking reminds us of our intrinsic sociality, but constantly moves us closer to the point where sociality no longer requires our bodies to be fully human. As Christians, we serve a God who became flesh and dwelt among us. We have a principled reason by which we can say "stop" when technological expansion sabotages our humanity.

32. Your Logo That does not mean Christians shouldn't use social networks. I continue to use them, both personally and professionally. But in doing so, we need to recognize that social networks hold within them the false promise of purporting to help the church's gathering while at the same time undermining it in future generations.

33. Your Logo It Gives and Takes Away Many today assimilate and advance new communication technologies without a second (or perhaps first) thought. Those whom Jesus called "salt" and "light" (Matthew. 5:13-16) should wake up and assess the strengths and weaknesses and the nature of the plethora of technologies that assail us daily and hourly.

34. Your Logo Social media can also restrict the human presence by subtracting the reality of "being there" and "being with." One should not receive Communion while glancing at a text message. One cannot be baptized online. Social media also clutter our field of concentration, rendering our attention to any one thing at one time with any depth nearly impossible.

35. Your Logo Thus, multitasking becomes the norm (even though our God-given brains are not designed for it). We become scattered, flighty, not fully engaged in anything. The Bible prizes the personal and face-to-face dimension of human fellowship that is absent but simulated through social media. John writes at the end of his short epistle,

36. Your Logo "I have much to write to you, but I do not want to use paper and ink. Instead, I hope to visit you and talk with you face to face, so that our joy may be complete" (2 John 1:12). Although God had sent prophets and inspired Scripture for centuries, all was not complete until "[t]he Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth" (John 1:14).

37. Your Logo God's mission is to make Himself known and worshiped as the one true God in all the nations. To that end, Christians have ardently preached and defended the gospel. They have copied and translated the Bible into as many languages as possible. Christ followers have also laboured to spread the message through radio, television, and now the Internet, because

38. Your Logo "how can they hear [the gospel] without someone preaching to them?" (Romans 10:14). We can evangelize through social media and develop forums of association within the church. So, social media both give and take away, as do all media.

39. Your Logo Cyber Bullying and Online Harassment If you are not careful, unscrupulous people can target you for cyber bullying and harassment on social sites. School children, young girls, and women can fall prey to online attacks which can create tension and distress. If you are a victim of cyber bullying, do not take it lying down, but try to take appropriate legal action against the attacker.

40. Your Logo Privacy Social networking sites encourage people to be more public about their personal lives. Because intimate details of our lives can be posted so easily, users are prone to bypass the filters they might normally employ when talking about their private lives. What's more, the things they post remain available indefinitely.

41. Your Logo While at one moment a photo of friends doing shots at a party may seem harmless, the image may appear less attractive in the context of an employer doing a background check. While most sites allow their users to control who sees the things they've posted, such limitations are often forgotten, can be difficult to control or don't work as well as advertised.

42. Your Logo Conclusion I think that the effects of social media have been somewhat balanced, to be honest. There are many good things about it, and many bad things. In the end, if you can keep your own life centred in reality and use social networking as a small part of it, you should be just fine. For those who can’t, it might be time to turn off the computer for a bit and go for a walk.

43. Your Logo As God’s children we must place restrictions as to what we can do on social Medias and what we cannot do. We must not use our liberty to the flesh. Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy—meditate on these things – Philippians 4:8.

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