#212 "Platforms"

Do you blog? Do you have a Facebook page? Do you "tweet?" Are you on Google+, MySpace or Tumblr? Xanga or Vox? Whether we like it or not, and whether we agree with the concept or not, social media is a part of our everyday life. Most people engage themselves in at least one of these avenues of communication with other people several times a day. 

If you spend any time at all on any one of a host of social media sites, you have been given a platform. You are standing on a figurative soapbox sharing a little something with a lot of someones. 

Lest I be labeled self-righteous, let me be clear and confess that I blog, I "tweet", and I have a Facebook page. My intent is not to tell you that social media is wrong or to suck the fun right out of it. My intent is to make somebody aware of the fact that they have been given a platform to speak. The question is, speak about what?

When we sit down with our fingers poised above the keys of our PC or laptop, what do we choose to share? 

We all do it. We plug our books. We blog hop. We share our websites. We advance our political views. We post funny, amusing and laughable things. I do it. You do it as well, and there is nothing wrong with that. But every once in a while I believe that we need to use the social platforms God has given us to say something of worth and value. To share some kingdom stuff. To share some not so fun, serious stuff.

There is a great big world out there,

beyond our four walls and our own backyards.    

It is with this very intent that I will share with you today what God has been pressing on my heart.

"URGENT: The most severe drought in decades is threatening the lives of more than 11 million people — especially young children — in the Horn of Africa. Famine has been declared in parts of southern Somalia, and threatens to spread further if nothing is done to prevent it. Kenya and Ethiopia are also severely affected by the crisis, with millions in critical need of food and water."

World Vision

Mission Feeding

"A child dies every 15 seconds from diseases caused by a lack of safe water and sanitation, that's 1.5 million children dying from preventable diseases such as diarrhea, cholera and typhoid every year."

Holden Uganda

"An estimated 27 million people are held in slavery worldwide, meaning there are more slaves in the world than were taken from Africa during 300 years of the trans-Atlantic slave trade. Each year, more than 1 million children are exploited in the global commercial sex trade. Between 18,000 and 20,000 victims are trafficked into the United States annually. Many who work with this issue believe this number is considerably higher. 100,000 to 300,000 children in America are at risk for sex trafficking each year."

RESCUELIFE

The A21 Campaign

These are the particular issues that are near and dear to my heart. They are the ones that keep me awake at night. They are the very situations that I feel helpless to do anything about and the ones that make tears stain my cheeks. They are the ones that compel me to open my check book and write numbers.

I send. I pray. I hope.

Today I'm choosing to use my God-given platform to share some serious things. As one blogger put it, "I don't want to be a Debbie-Downer", but I must. God wants me to. How do I know?

"Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute. Speak up and judge fairly; defend the rights of the poor and needy." Proverbs 31: 8-9

"I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me." Matthew 25: 40

We are all given platforms to speak. I have them. You have them. What will you do with the platform you've been given?

"What I ask of American Christianity is not to show us more creeds, but more of Christ; not more rites and ceremonies, but more religion glowing with love and replete with life,—religion which will be to all weaker races an uplifting power, and not a degrading influence. Jesus Christ has given us a platform of life and duty from which all oppression and selfishness is necessarily excluded. While politicians may stumble on the barren mountains of fretful controversy and ask in strange bewilderment, "What shall we do with the weaker races?" I hold that Jesus Christ answered that question nearly two thousand years since. "Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do you even so to them."  Francis Ellen Watkins Harper

**All organization names are clickable links.