A Warm, but Empty Voice? Reflections on Face-to-Face Interactions

by Enoch Wan

You ask, “Surprised by the recent phenomenon of Twitter IPO?” My answer is NO, not really, because social media is the new normal in human interaction, i.e. related, but merely virtually. The tendency is to resort to virtual substitution for real personal relationship(i.e. face-to-face interaction).

Man is created as a social being. In the record of creation, seven times “God saw that this was good” (Gen. 1); but later we read, “It is not good for the man to be alone” (Gen. 2:18). Man was created in the image of God who is the ‘3-in-1 Being’ and humanity is the ‘2-in-1 social being’, the wholeness with male-female completeness (Gen 2:24). The more we are deprived of real personal relationship, the starvation for it ensures that virtual substitution is inevitable.

Members of contemporary society have been deprived of real personal relationship due to multiple factors, such as the broken vertical relationship with God affecting horizontal relationships because of the fall, dehumanizing technology, alienating life-style, etc.; yet at the same time being overwhelmed by virtual relationship (i.e. non face-to-face interaction) through social media of communication technology.

The irony is that new technology enables members of contemporary society to be better connected than ever yet with diminishing return in face-to-face personal interaction. 

For example, we can watch Neil Armstrong’s moon walk from our living room; connected virtually in real time but that’s not face-to-face real personal interaction. 

I can watch my grandson taking his first step at his home in Asia via the smart phone but not face-to-face. 

Siblings with mobile phones can text one another under the same roof from different rooms. Are they connected personally? Yes, they are connected in real time virtually yet deprived of face-to-face interaction. 

Real personal relationship can easily be substituted virtually and the trend is alarmingly strong.

Real personal relationship is a distinctive of Christian faith and practice. For example, there is real personal interaction between the Triune God and Christian in salvation personally. The Father identifies each person; to each person the Son offers the provision; and the Holy Spirit regenerates/indwells each Christian. In prayer, we Christians pray to the Father, in the name of the Son, and by the power of the Holy Spirit – all personally done.  

Real personal interaction should be the hallmark of Christianity collectively. We are members of the body of Christ, fellow citizens of the Kingdom of God, children of the household of God…thus to be engaged in real personal relationship all the time. Yet we are prompt to sacrifice the distinctive of real personal relationship because of our ‘bigness complex’ and for the sake of efficiency we opt for ministry that is program-oriented and outcome-based. We scarified the face-to-face personal interaction at the altar of success with quantifiable and impersonal outcomes.

The Pharisees of the New Testament time were programmatic (i.e. obsessed with the program of Sabbath and circumcision) and not people-oriented (i.e. the healing of the sick). By our obsession with program-oriented Christian life style and ministry pattern, we Christians are the modern Pharisees without personal touch in our talk and walk.   

Unfortunately and practically, real personal relationship of face-to-face interaction is no longer a distinctive of Christian faith and practice because we have lost it in the contemporary socio-cultural context: efficient but impersonal, mass production but lack of personal touch. 

Void of face-to-face interaction, there is hardly any significant difference inside and outside of the Church and for that we have to repent.

The realization that face-to-face real personal interaction is missing in our Christian faith and practice is just the beginning of a long process of reversal. Repentance is the first step in real changes in our attitude and action. 

When a Christian ceases to practice real personal interaction, we are no longer the bearer of Good News of the Great Commission. We become a warm but empty voice. When a Christian ceases to practice real personal interaction, we are no longer the practitioner of the Great Commandment. When we cease to be the hand that feeds the hungry, we will be reduced to fuzzy feelings or resort to non-personal benevolent structure.

We must restore the characteristic of real personal relationship in our faith and practice. We are to revitalize it in our talk and walk both individually and collectively. By so doing, we will have a powerful testimony to the world at large where members of the contemporary society are starving for real personal relationship.We must practice the Great Commandment and carry out the Great Commission by face-to-face interaction re-vitalizing the distinctiveness of our faith and practice. 

Enoch Wan is president of the Evangelical Missiological Society, director of the Institute for Diaspora Studies, and research professor of intercultural studies and director of the Doctor of Missiology program at Western Seminary. Learn more: www.enochwan.com