Dealing With Disagreement

https://odb.org/MY/2022/01/06/dealing-with-disagreement

With profileration of social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook, we tend to give comments quite freely and publicly. I’m not familiar with Twitter but for Facebook our comments may be limited to a wall of a friend but it is nevertheless accessible by whoever the friend allows access to his wall and most Facebook accounts are defaulted to public viewing. Even if limited to the friend’s friends, it is still “public” as there are bound to be people we ourselves do not know among the friend’s friends. That is why most companies have policy on what an employee could write on such sites. This is because if people know where you work, your comments may have implications on your organisation or employer.

The issue today is how do we write on such social media platforms as believers? Do we get carried away with the prevailing sentiment? Using curse words to curse and scold is definitely out of bounds as that so wrongly reflects us as bearers of the Light. But beyond that, how do we conduct ourselves?

I think it’s necessary that we write with decorum and respect. Even if the prevailing sentiment is to condemn and rage on, we should exercise restraint and write with compassion and understanding, forgiveness and love. We may be anonymous in the sense that few may know us publicly (unless we are a public figure ourselves). But anonymity must not be an excuse to hide our true self as a son of God. Just because we are in the shadows doesn’t mean we are not or don’t have to be children of God. As believers, we carry the same face, in private, in public, at work or in church, outside or in the security of our home. Even as an anonymous keyboard warrior, we must never forget who we are in God, a child grafted into the family by the blood of the Lamb. As Christ has love and compassion for us and in His love has forgiven us, we must likewise be loving, compassionate and forgiving on others, in the physical realm as well as in cyberspace. Our words should reflect our identity in Christ. We stand against injustice, unfairness, incompetence and mediocracy but always taper it with love, compassion and forgiveness. Others may swear, curse, condemn and shout with rage and anger but we must write and respond with cool heads, knowing who we are in Christ, taking the character of Christ as guided by the Holy Spirit.