My Fellow Writers; My Friends

I am happy to introduce Karen Watkins Hammons to Seeking Peace readers today. I met Karen through Facebook; we both have a few writer friends in common. Karen has really inspired me and she is an amazing woman of God. God has used social media for me as a tool to meet women who encourage me.

Karen really shares a GREAT devo today about friends and social networking. She reminds us that while facebooking is cool, we gotta  make sure and leave room for some flesh and blood. Enjoy!

Rachel

Got Twelve?

Friendship. Girl friends. Chicas. Siestas (for you Beth Moore girls). All different words with one meaning. A bond between women that God uses to teach, change, and encourage us.

Through the past five years God has used friendships to teach me some life-changing lessons, to have me go through some intense battles, and allowed me to experience indescribable joy and encouragement. And I can only imagine what else He will teach me through friendships.

I don't know about you girls, but I LOVE social networking. I live in the middle of it all; Facebook, Twitter, texting, blogging,etc. And it's a great thing. God uses them all to encourage and create some very meaningful relationships. Something I have learned through the social media maze is this; I have lost some of my understanding about friendship. I am not suppose to have thousands of friends. If I desire to live a life that follows in the steps of Jesus, He should be the only one I look to in how to do this thing called friendship. Not Oprah, not Dr. Phil, not even Dr. Dobson. Only Jesus.

So what example did Jesus show about this topic? He had the twelve disciples. Out of those twelve He had a core of three. Then there was one who was most dear to Him. That is how we are to live out our friendships. We are to be friendly, kind, caring, compassionate to ALL. But that deep, walking through life kind of friendship needs to be reserved for only a few.

Jesus could have had thousands of friends while He was here. But God knew an example was needed to teach His precious, imperfect people how to walk in friendship without losing their minds. So God limited His Son's posse' of friends to twelve.

Does that mean we need to delete all our social media accounts? No. I mean, God could be telling you to cut back or delete some. That's between you and God. But I know for me it means I can't make my world consist of only social media people. I need to connect with real, flesh and blood chicas here in South Carolina. I know that He wants me to keep it balanced. I have “met” some fantastic, amazing, strong, encouraging women of God through social media (like Rachel). If I wasn't in it, I wouldn't have “met” those women that God has used greatly in my life. But don't hide in the social media. I encourage you girls to get out there in your own community to connect with other women. We women need each other on the internet AND in real life. Don't exchange one for the other.

Remember your God is enthralled with every, single one of you! Y'all rock!!

“As iron sharpens iron, so a friend sharpens a friend.” {Proverbs 27:17}

Karen is a chica from the South who is passionate about Jesus, loves music, pink hair, the color red, and Sonic Happy Hour. She is wife to the man that melts her butter (Danny) and Mom to two wild little boys (Avery and Alex).

She writes at Jesus and Stuff, www.karenhammons.blogspot.com where it is all about Jesus and everything else is just stuff.

Karen has recently started The Offender's Wife ministry. A Christ-centered place with the desire to reach out to wives of accused or convicted sex offenders with encouragement and hope. You can find her talking about hard life topics at www.theoffenderswife.blogspot.com.