Frank Viola and the New Roman Road

Recently, I’ve been enjoying author Frank Viola’s blog posts, especially as he’s been engaging more and more with those who follow his writing on the Internet. If you’re not familiar with Frank (the author, not the baseball player), he’s the author of a series of some extremely thought-provoking and faith-stirring books including Pagan Christianity?, From Eternity to Here and others. Today, he posted an interesting article on The New Roman Road. As someone who believes in the power of social media, I can’t help but repost. He says:

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Many scholars and historians have speculated that one of the reasons why God chose to send His Son to planet earth in Century One is because of the Roman Road. By that road news traveled all across the world.

Today’s Roman Road, it seems to me, is the Internet. In particular, Email, Google, Blogs, Facebook, Twitter, etc.

Information, knowledge, resources, and ideas spread quickly and widely via these modes. And sometimes they can have a viral effect, reaching thousands, even millions of people.

Yet . . . scores of Christians do not use these tools.

To my mind, every follower of Jesus should get on the Roman Road and use these tools to share what they are learning about the Lord Jesus Christ, God’s purpose, and what He’s doing. Especially those who are motivated to see change in the Body of Christ. They of course are also useful to share Christ with those who do not know Him and are seeking to find Him.

I wholeheartedly agree with Frank. Well, ok, email is sort of on its way out, especially as a mass communications tool–but that’s the point. These technologies change fast and the active individual owes it to herself to use the means of communications that communicates best when it communicates best. And far too many Christians and ministries shy away from social media. I fear most Christians and ministries today will start meaningfully using social media about the time the next big thing comes around–and miss out on everything it has to offer now.

Click here to read the rest of his post. And go ahead and take action. You can influence the world with your writing, whether it’s in a printed book or bits and bytes!

Photo: Roman Road by Pot Noodle.