Christian witnessing on Twitter

A dear sister in Christ, Juanita, whom I came to know on Twitter, wrote an article entitled "Are Christians wimp?". In it, she asked if Christians are actively witnessing to atheists and if they do support one another in online witness, such as that which often takes place on Twitter. I encourage you to read her full post to better appreciate the context of this article. My response to her was as follows:

Hi Juanita,

This is your fellow Twitterer, Thomas (twhtan).

The Bible says in 2 Tim 1:7 "For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline."

Many Christians are sadly, Christians in name only. They are saved but have yet to bear fruit or experience the power of GOD beyond salvation. They are the spiritual babies the Apostle Paul spoke about in Heb 5:11-14. They are not ready to even testify of the hope they have in Christ Jesus. The growth of a Christian comes about by giving & making ourselves available to GOD, which many Christians struggle with, citing family, personal commitments, etc as reasons. As the rest of us who serve give through our service to GOD, our faith in Him grows, and we receive even more from Him in response to the challenges we face in ministry. We learned to be filled with the Holy Spirit, to drink of the Holy Spirit daily, and to go forth "by His Spirit". We also appreciate the importance of & need to seek GOD daily, spend time in His Word so as to understand His will for us, and to equip us with the right words for the occasion.

In the process, we grow to rely on Him & to share His heart for the lost. We are gradually conforming to His image. We now know His voice as the sheep recognizes the Good Shepherd, and we trust in His rod & everything about Him as David described in Psalm 23. These are the ones who will go into the crowds as Jesus & His disciples did. They are not afraid to stir up controversies by their proclamations or actions arising from their faith in Christ. They are ready, in season and out of season, to share the eternal hope they have in the LORD. These are the ones who will rise up to the challenge, but herein lies the question. Where are they when you need them?

Not all are on Twitter. Some are witnessing offline as I am sure. Some are on Twitter as you can discern. Yet again, not all are online when we are ministering. I have personally had a sister on Twitter pray for me as I ministered, and I believe you did too. Another responded directly to the atheist I was witnessing to, while I slept due to timezone differences. Some prayed and told me so. In a way, these have supported me as far as they could, and I know that even beyond that, they are praying for the lost & those among us who are witnessing to the lost.

I have been sending out calls to brothers & sisters on Twitter to support each other in all ways possible. For those who are not ready to engage the lost verbally, they can always pray and in the process build up their faith as they witness how we witness to the lost. I see this as mentoring via Twitter. Others will come forward with prayer support. For the pastors & Bible scholars out there on Twitter, I would encourage them to play an active role in reaching the lost for Christ. Ministering to the congregants is one thing, reaching out to the lost is another thing which pastors need to keep abreast with, and for which Bible scholars come in handy, since we don't have all facts to respond to the myths that atheists put forward.

Above all, the love of Christ in us must propel us forward to reach these lost ones. We must weep as He wept when He surveyed Jerusalem in Luke 19, and see the lost as He sees them. We are but many members of the same Body, each with his/her own gifts in Christ. Let us exhort one another to grow in Christ first, so that they may join the rest who are serving on the front line.

In His Love,
Thomas

I want to focus on the paragraph in bold above on how Twitter can be effectively used for Christian witnessing today.

I am a new but fairly regular user of Twitter, having started in Mar this year. In the beginning, I used it along the lines of Ephesians 5:19 which exhorts believers to "Speak to one another with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs". It was the perfect platform to encourage & lift up the Body of Christ with GOD's Word, and I know I have been encouraged many a times from scriptures tweeted by fellow believers.

Soon, I discovered another use for Twitter - its "soapbox" potential to preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Since Twitter has a large and growing user base & I linked it to my Facebook account, it provided just the right opportunity for me to share nuggets from the Bible & personal thoughts, aimed at provoking a response from unsaved souls to GOD's salvation plan for them. In fact, it was my tweets on atheism, hell, GOD's judgment and homosexuality that elicited strong responses from unsaved souls, and which first revealed this potential.

As I witness on Twitter, I came across other believers doing the same, like sister Juanita mentioned above. Once, when Juanita was witnessing "live" to an atheist, I prayed and sent her verses in support of her sharing with the atheist, whom I subsequently also witnessed to. On another occasion, I was witnessing to a couple of atheists when I tweeted for prayer support, and received more than that - a brother in Christ actually helped me respond to an atheist while I rested for the night due to timezone differences. Yet on another occasion, a fellow believer helped follow up with an atheist I had ministered to earlier.

These are but examples of how Twitter offers Christian witnessing a whole new dimension. It allows Spirit-filled Christians from around the world to come together as informal teams sharing GOD's Word with non-believers, as the Holy Spirit directs them. Team witnessing also strengthens the bond between members of the Body of Christ as we support one another in prayer and in love. As mentioned above, it also allows Christians to learn from one another as we witness online.

Having said that, we should keep in mind the whole objective of witnessing, that is, to share the love of Christ with the aim of leading the lost to Him. This should never be used to run down unbelievers, especially atheists and gays who often claim to be victims of hate campaigns, or be perceived as bullying. Always pray in the Spirit to ask for directions & wisdom in team witnessing. Also consult & clarify with one another privately, either via Direct Messages (DM) or email when working together. Team witnessing doesn't mean 2 or more believers concurrently tweeting the person being ministered to. Although more than 1 atheist and gay person have ganged up on me & other fellow believers on Twitter, this isn't the behaviour we want to encourage here as it will put the person being ministered to on a defensive mode.

From my experience, it's better to have one person witness at any one time, while the rest pray or offer scripture/domain knowledge support, eg. facts surrounding evolution, flood, interpretation of scriptures, as they can follow the tweets being exchanged. We can, however, take turns to witness to the same person.

It is my sincere desire that mature & Spirit-filled Christians will tap on this opportunity to evangelize on Twitter, and by extension, Facebook and other social networks which accept status updates from Twitter.

In His Love,

Thomas