Five Minute Friday - Close

On Fridays a bunch of brave writers gather here to all spend 5 collective minutes writing on a single prompt. It’s a great way to catch your breath at the end of a long week. This blessed, beautiful place where we open our hearts and let words and tears and the inner workings of our lives bleed and flow and dance across the virtual pages. Yes, this community opens wide and invites you in to share. Come and visit and read. You will be blessed.

This week: Close

Go

In all truth, we are so wide-spread that if this were a hundred years ago – goodness, if this were fifty years ago, I’m not sure we’d even know each other. The wonders of the technological age have allowed bridges to be built and roads and rivers to be crossed in ways that have not happened before.

The community that gathers here around the Five Minute Friday prompt; that spills out from the blog posts at (in)courage – these are some of the most sincere and amazing friendships I’ve made. Ever. It begins with the freedom of a somewhat anonymous exploration through social media – who will see all the cracks and crevices of my real life when filtered through the lens of Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, and Instagram? Who will have to bear with the brokenness of the real me when all they’ll see is my status updates and carefully framed pictures?

Good luck – that doesn’t last. Something happens after a brief while, and the women you’re chatting with online begin to take on a third dimension. Real prayers are shared; real joys are celebrated; real sorrows are lifted up as real hearts shimmer across the bits and bytes of data current to hold each other close and lift each other up.

Other elements are added and relationships bloom in small group communities and through letters that manage to grace real mailboxes at just the right time. How those words curl gently off the page like a wisp of candle smoke – just puffed out – to carry the love and encouragement of a friend you’ve not met in person. Yet.

One day, there will be tea, and leisurely hours spent laughing and chatting – watching a face you’ve known only as a profile come to life and a thousand different ways. A voice you’ve known only as a comforting lifeline on Voxer will be just a heartbeat away through a smile. And the words that have spilled only online in comments on in letters and cards will wrap themselves around you with the hug that you’ve been waiting for. 

There is nothing like community when the heart of that community is Christ. When each member turns towards the other to ask: how can I serve? How can I lift you up? Doors are thrown wide and everyone is welcome. There is a space here for you.

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How to Join
Want to know about Lisa Jo Baker, how Five Minute Friday got started, and how to participate? All the details are here. No editing or second guessing. And then absolutely, no ifs, ands or buts about it, you need to visit the person who linked up before you & encourage them in their comments. Seriously. That is the rule. And the fun. And the heart of this community.

I'd love to connect with you some more - stop on by the Three Bees Facebook Page or connect with me on Twitter @3BeesBlueBonnet. Let's continue the conversation!