Why I’m Keeping My Facebook Account

May 20, 2010 in Evangelism,missional with 0 Comments

There’s been a lot of talk recently about why people should quit Facebook. Newsweek joined the game recently and posted why you should quit. Ed Stetzer, a noted author and researcher for LifeWay recently quit and gave his reasons. So what are some of the reasons people give?

“There’s no security and people can see all your stuff!”

“I’m way too busy!”

“There’s too much information coming at me!”

If that’s you, I would challenge you to think about a few things:

1. Facebook is as secure as you want it to be. There’s been this crazy talk about all this “instant personalization stuff” and how your every move is public, and people begin looking over their shoulders as if big-brother-facebook is watching and is going to come after them. Well, it’s true. Not the big brother part, but the info. But it doesn’t have to be. You can take 30 seconds and make stuff so only your friends can see it. That’s it. If someone searches for you on google or even facebook, they won’t be able to see your stuff.

So take a breath. It will be ok.

2. You don’t have to share anything. This is important. You can share as much or as little as you want on Facebook or Twitter. I have a few friends that are scared to post anything because they’re afraid of people knowing what they’re up to, and thinking they might get in trouble if someone finds something they don’t like. But you don’t have to post anything. Here’s the filter I use, even though I have everything set to private for only friends: I only post stuff that I wouldn’t mind the world knowing. I realize that people can take a screen shot of a post of yours and email it to someone to try to blackmail you. That’s probably a little far-fetched, but still. That’s why I only post stuff I don’t mind making public.

3. It doesn’t have to take a lot of time. I’ve written about why I’m on Facebook and Twitter. But people still don’t seem to get this. Yes, you can spend all day on Farmville (which I don’t use) or doing whatever, but it doesn’t have to take much time. I probably spend about 10-15 minutes a day on it in total.

So that’s a small rebuttal for all those that are leaving, but I still haven’t shared why i’m staying. For me, it’s quite simple.

Why I’m Staying:

It’s because a lot of people are there. The Mashable blog reported in February that they had reached the 400 million user mark. That’s a lot of people. That’s bigger than many countries.

As a pastor/missionary I want to be available and to try to reach some of those and tell them about Jesus. So that’s it. I’m not a huge fan of the interface. I do think it’s much too busy and distracting. I rather prefer the simplicity of Twitter, but that’s another topic.

But if I’m not there, I can’t interact, speak, and influence them for the sake of the Kingdom.

That’s why I’m staying.

What about you? Have you had some fears about security? Have you thought about leaving? Have you left? Why?

[image by laughing squid]