Spiritual Insight: Social Media and Community

Dear God of Love and Justice,

Deuteronomy 10:19 commands us plainly: "Love the stranger, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt." The early Anabaptists understood this in their bones — hunted across Europe, they found refuge in the homes of people who owed them nothing. Strangers sheltered strangers because that is the shape of Your kingdom.

Now we scroll past strangers every day. A refugee mother in a comment section, mocked for her broken English. A teenager posting into the void at 2 a.m., hoping someone will notice. A neighbor from another country sharing a meal on their front porch in a photo no algorithm will ever promote. Deuteronomy's stranger has a profile picture now, and the question is the same one it has always been: Will we love them?

The Anabaptist tradition teaches that faith without community is just philosophy. So here is the harder question — can we build genuine Gemeinde, true fellowship, in digital spaces? Not the shallow solidarity of a shared hashtag, but the costly love that shows up, listens, and stays? Lord, make us the kind of people who type slower, read more carefully, and remember that every username belongs to someone made in Your image.