About four years ago I had to Matthew 5:23 someone in our church. That’s what I call it when we are obligated to go to a brother or sister in Christ and resolve an issue that we have with them (or vice versa). Matthew 5:23 basically says if a brother or sister has a grudge against us, that before we leave a gift at the altar, we are supposed to go to that person and work out our differences. Then, and only then are we to return to the altar with our offering. By the way, my Matthew 5:23 record is 0-2 and 1. That’s no wins, two losses and one tie. Oh well.
My issue with my sister in Christ was that she was forwarding emails to me that were just plain crude. Ah ha! Has a loophole in the Bible just been exposed? Right there in Ephesians 4:29 it says something to the effect of: “…don’t let any unwholesome stuff come out of our mouth.” Bingo! My sister in Christ thought she had an out… a loophole of sorts. The trash she was forwarding wasn’t coming out of her mouth… it was coming out of her computer! Well ain’t that a fine howdy ya do?
I can’t believe the Apostle Paul did not have the foresight to warn us about forwarding profanity. I’m thinking he must have been a low-tech kind of guy… probably didn’t even have a laptop. Go figure! How in the world did history’s greatest evangelist think he was going to evangelize the planet if he couldn’t Google Greece or MapQuest Babylon? I just don’t get it.
Now some of our readers out there probably think I’m exaggerating, huh? Well, I wish I were. Interestingly enough, just as I began writing this morning I received an email from one of my cousins. He is a professing Christian, but we wouldn’t know it from his emails. Actually, that’s not fair. I would say a majority of his emails reflect his Christian faith, but unfortunately, a few do not. This morning’s email was a cute little story about attitudes. And it was chock full of expletives. Only problem was, they weren’t deleted.
I honestly believe that some of us must think God isn’t paying attention when we forward profane material via our computers. We must believe that forwarding profanity is not nearly as serious as actually saying it. Hello! Not only is forwarding profanity a sin, I think it’s actually more destructive than when it comes out of our mouth. Why? Because instead of one person being exposed to our “not so wonderful Christian witness,” it’s a different story when we send it out into cyberspace. If we forward it to our friends and they forward it to their friends, sooner or later the entire logged-on world would theoretically be exposed to our irreverent emails.
The book of Ephesians does a good job of warning us about unwholesome language coming out of our mouths. But a verse in the book of James just flat knocks it out of the park! That verse, James 1:26, says in effect: “…if any man is religious but does not watch his own tongue, his religion is useless!” Now I’m sorry people, but it 0 doesn’t matter whether we say it or we send it, that scripture applies.
And here’s another issue I have with forwarded rubbish. Why do they send it to me? I don’t think I’m going to like my answer but here goes. Maybe it’s because they think I enjoy it. And maybe that’s because I have never had the courage to tell them I don’t. Yep… I’m guilty as charged. You see, half of the problem is me.
I could have put a stop to the practice of friends sending me this trash if I had simply said, ”Please don’t send vulgar emails to me.” Imagine if we all sent everyone on our email list a notice that we are no longer accepting any off-color jokes, forwards, etc. What a witness for Christ that would be! And you know what-all it takes is a little courage.
Do some of us lack the courage to tell our friends to stop forwarding garbage? Do we think it will make us look like a wuss? Do we think it might ruin a friendship? Probably all of this stuff, huh? But regardless, some of us need to put a stop to it and that will take courage. And I’m thinking if God could give David the courage it took to go up against that big ole ugly Goliath dude in the OT, he can surely give us the little thimble full of courage it would take to type a “please stop” note and hit the send button. Wow… asking God for a tiny snippet of courage, imagine that!
And now back to my sister in Christ, the profanity-forwarding mama! When I first started explaining to her that I felt she was emailing trash, she was offended. Then she went into the denial mode. Next she tried the old “it depends on what your definition of is is” excuse. Wow! She had elevated our conversation to the next level… it was almost presidential, if you know what I mean. I could tell I was getting nowhere fast… so it was time. Yes, it was time to pull out the dreaded f-bomb. I hate even thinking the word, much less saying it. But it had to be done; it was the only way to get through her thick skull. By the way, I am an expert on thick skulls; mine was 7 .5 inches of solid bone until Jesus showed up in the late Nineties.
Anyway, we were sitting in McDonald’s and just when she least expected it; I opened my brief case and pulled out one of the emails she had forwarded to me. I began to read it in a rather loud voice… and yes, it included the f-word.
It was a knee-jerk reaction as she barked, ”Shhhh! People can hear you from here to the parking lot!”
“Yes,” I smiled, “and when you send out those emails people can read you from here to Afghanistan.”
She just sat there… blank stare and all. Then it finally registered. She realized that what I had just done was completely staged. She was embarrassed. Better yet, she was finished, finished sending out profane emails. In fact, she sent me an email the next morning that would become the title of this chapter.
So the next time we might be tempted to forward an email of questionable content, let’s just ask ourselves the same question my sister in Christ now asks herself… W.W.J.F?
What Would Jesus Forward?