Remember those SAT questions? That’s what I was thinking about (hence the title to this post) when I read John Piper’s thoughts about Online Church:
God made us with bodies. He made us to give holy kisses to one another—embraces, handshakes, eyeball-to-eyeball conversation.
He made husband and wife not to have imaginary video sex through Skype. He made them to go to bed together in the same bed. He made them to raise children in the same house, with hands-on hugs and spanks on the bottom and love.
And he made churches to get together to hear each other sing, and to look at each other and talk to teach other, and minister to each other and help each other die well.
John references the heresy of Docetism to form some context around his statement above, which I agree with. There is definitely a model which God and Christ gave us coming into the world manifest in the flesh which we can never completely disregard.
In any case, this is a conversation that is going to take more and more of a center stage as much of what we do in terms of communication, connection, and community are moving toward the web.
If anything, I think John’s final point is one of the best:
There are mysteries here in human relationships that we can’t quantify. And I don’t think that they can be replaced by electronic symbols.
So, what are you thinking? Thanks Ipiphanist for starting the conversation.
[Image from Elvis]