Why I'm Tweeting Again

For around three years I've been fascinated by Twitter.  It may be the journalist in me, but there's something intriguing to me about trying to say something meaningful and memorable in 140 characters.  When I read these words from John Piper awhile back, they really resonated with me:

The sovereign Lord of the earth and sky
Puts camels through a needle’s eye.
And if his wisdom see it mete,
He will put worlds inside a tweet.

But for nearly two years, I've done very little tweeting.  I think that's because as I began tweeting, I realized I was doing so not to serve people, but to serve myself.  There is something that feels good about knowing you're being "followed", hoping that more and more people will follow you and be impressed with you. 

But I tweet to a very small audience.  And when I wasn't seeing that audience grow, I just figured it wasn't worth continuing.  But as I pondered that response, I realized that the only reason I thought a minimal audience made my tweeting irrelevant was because I was consumed with pride and self-absorption.  When I came to the conclusion that tweeting was simply an expression of my pride and vanity, I gave it up.

Last week I picked up tweeting again.  I've been going through a discipleship manual called Gospel DNA with some guys, and it was talking about the importance of being involved in one anothers' lives to help each other remember Jesus throughout the week.  The question was asked, "What are some ways you can help each other fight sin by reminding each other of the cross?"

Twitter came to mind.  It's certainly not the only or the best way to encourage others.  But it is one way to regularly encourage a significant number of people at one time (as many as choose to follow along).  So I picked it back up, and I think maybe it's here to stay.

I can say with a pure heart now that I don't want to tweet to gain a bunch of followers.  I don't need my Twitter account to go viral.  I just want to provide some bite-sized pieces of encouragement for the people of God as we carry on our pilgrimage to glory.  So if you're so inclined, you can check out my tweets @larrylaz.

I'm grateful to be at a place where I sincerely don't care if anyone chooses to follow along.  If I never have more than 19 followers (my current total), I'm totally cool with that.  But I hope that as many as do read will be strengthened and nourished as you fight the fight of faith.