Last night I listened at our church men’s meeting to a man lamenting about what he found on MySpace. He had heard about MySpace and decided to check it out. On a whim he looked up some kids from his old church. As you may have already guessed he was shocked by what he found. One of those he looked up was a youth minister in training but on his MySpace site he had vile language and images and links that where at best questionable, at worst pornographic.
There followed a spirited discussion with a church elder who played devil’s (sic) advocate. His position, and it is an understandable and reasonable one, is that any technology can be used for good or evil. However, he did not come close to condoning what was found on those horrible web pages.
I can understand both positions. For instance, what about renting space in a building? If you are going to open a Bible bookstore, would you want to rent a space in a building that also houses an adult video store? Probably not. But how far do you go with something like this? If the Post Office rents a PO box to me, but also to that same adult video store, do I rent the PO box? Most people don’t worry about things like that but I do. And so does Carl, the gentleman I spoke of ealier, God bless him.
I originally started my blog on MySpace. But as I looked around I was shocked by what I saw. It wasn’t just kids expressing themselves. There are countless pages by girls who profess a belief in God, but on the same page have pictures of themselves barely dressed in provocative poses. There are countless pages of singles looking to “hook up” with someone…anyone. There are swingers. There are occultists. There are witches. There are prostitutes. There are young men who post the most vile, female-debasing, authority-hating, rhetoric I have ever had the displeasure of reading. And now, there are murderers on MySpace. John 8:44
I had to ask myself, do I really want to be associated with this? I closed out my MySpace web page and brought it here to Blogger. But I see many of the same things here on Blogger. They do a better job of removing questionable content to be sure. But again, how far do you take it? I also have a website, AirPrayer.com. Do the servers that host it also host pornographic websistes? I don’t know for sure but my gut tells me that probably they do.
So what am I to do? So what is any Christian who has a presence on the Internet to do? I think we need to excercise due dilligence when setting up a web site or choosing a provider. I am challenging myself and anyone who reads this to not turn a blind eye to where you set up shop. You wouldn’t open a business in a building that had a porn video store in it. Don’t set up your web presence on a site that carries evil, un-Godly content. As for myself I’m going to begin a search for a Christian web hosting provider to transfer my web site to. Since I know Google owns Blogger, and that Google does a fairly decent job of keeping pornography off of Blogger, I’ll keep my blog here for now.
I challenge all Christian web users, take a stand. Don’t be part of an establishment that helps to further evil behavior. Do some research. Find out if your hosting provider hosts pornographic sites. If it does, move your site. Take your business to a “building” that doesn’t rent to pornographers. Maybe even build next door to a church?
Air Prayer 