The road to Emmaus is one of the best biblical accounts of how social media works.

I find it striking that in this 2000-year-old account of a resurrection appearance of Jesus Christ we have the very fundamentals of social media. But then again should I be surprised? The Gospel is, after all, always astonishing.

In this passage, Jesus appears to the disciples, although they do not yet know who he is. He walks with them along the long and dusty road. He comes into relationship with them. Jesus dialogues with them and lets them open up to him about themselves and what has just transpired in Jerusalem. Jesus does not force the conversation or push “content” upon them. Instead he builds a relationship.

After a time, once a relationship has been established, Jesus continues to dialogue with them, but he also begins to offer His own content. He opens their minds to scriptures. This is tricky of course, because this is the moment when we would want to push more content on people, but Jesus demonstrates that the time is not yet right. Instead, He focuses on building the relationship, understanding a subject (namely the scriptures), and walking with his disciples.

On the road to Emmaus, Jesus demonstrates something fundamentally important about relationship building that we lose at times in social media. We push content on the web: posts, blogs, sermons, images, tweets, etc. We push content in the hopes of gaining new followers and new “likes”. We purchase ads to further our reach and further the reach of our communities. But by doing so we can forget what Jesus talked about so long ago, and that is to come into relationship with people.

Pushing content seems natural to us. Having something new on our Facebook pages and websites seems critically important in a world increasingly based on consumption. Yet, I think that on that long and dusty road, Jesus demonstrates that instead of consuming, we ought to be coming into relationship with one another.

So while content is important, so also is it important to stop, engage and interact with those that like, comment, or share our posts. Take time in your day to read what others share on their social networks and work on building relationships. Enter into dialogue, discuss, and get to know one another.

In today’s media savvy world, it is critical to not only use social media tools, but to use them effectively. Social media is just that: social. Effective use requires two-way dialogue and engagement. And remember we count success not in number of likes, dollars on the plate or even growth. Success is best measured in spreading of the Gospel message and coming into real relationship with those we encounter.