Church leaders need to be in social media spaces
Social media use is pervasive in American culture today. The various social media platforms we use are the 21st century version of the town square—they are modern-day spaces to exchange ideas, learn the news, and more.
Once upon a time, it was trendy to think that social media was a trend—a cultural oddity of the new millennium that would pass as quickly as it burst onto the scene.
Social media is not going away anytime soon, for better or worse. According to Pew Research Center in 2016, about 79% of adults who use the internet use Facebook, 32% use Instagram, and 24% use Twitter. Of the 68% of all Americans who use Facebook, 76% of them use it daily.
Pastors and church leaders need to be in social media spaces. Here are three basic ways I see pastors and church leaders undermine themselves on social media, and some ideas about how to avoid these missteps:
1. Trying to Become Famous
It makes me sad when I see Christian leaders vying for the attention of people on social media when all they really want to do is make themselves look important. All of us can be guilty of this sort of prideful pursuit from time to time, but some pastors and church leaders do nothing on social media but try to make themselves look more influential than they actually are.
The most common way pastors and church leaders try to make themselves look more influential than they actually are is by purchasing Twitter followers or Facebook likes. Rather than spending the time to build a following of people who are interested in their content, they spend money to pad their stats and build hollow “influence.”
The ways in which trying to become famous on social media undermines the leadership of local church leaders are many.
Trying to become ...
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