Influencers

What kind of brand can you really build when you're supposed to die to yourself every day?

One of Merriam-Webster’s new words for 2022 was sponcon. Do you recognize it? For those of us to whom that word is new, here’s their definition:

sponcon noun

spon·​con ˈspän-ˌkän 

variants or less commonly spon-con

: content (see CONTENT entry 1 sense 1c) posted usually by an influencer on social media that looks like a typical post but for which the poster has been paid to advertise a product or service

Kendall Jenner regularly does sponcon on her Instagram, but yesterday, she put a special (and rare) twist on her post for Moon oral care: She went makeup free in the mirror selfie she shared . —Alyssa Bailey

…Fishel did spon-con for Cinnamon Toast Crunch-flavored CoffeeMate … —Rebecca Alter

Using influencers to sell products to the sick can be a particularly insidious form of marketing …. With today's ambiguous regulations, health care sponcon will continue to saturate our feeds with posts that appear sincere but end up being misleading. —Suzanne Zuppello

(Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, s.v. “sponcon,” accessed January 16, 2023, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/sponcon)

Some good news: this post is not sponcon. Kendall Jenner is not going to be posting mirror selfies here anytime soon (although I am sitting at my computer, totally makeup free). No advertisers are lining my pockets so we’ll tell you the things they want you to hear - that you would look better or be more organized or just like yourself a little bit more, if you would only follow my advice (based on their advice) to use a certain product. There are no influencers here, except in the way St. Peter writes about the relationship between himself and the early Christians and their Lord Jesus Christ:

…make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love… Therefore, my brothers and sisters, make every effort to confirm your calling and election. For if you do these things, you will never stumble, and you will receive a rich welcome into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. So I will always remind you of these things, even though you know them and are firmly established in the truth you now have.. (2 Peter 1:5-12 NIV)

“I will always remind you of these things, even though you know them…,” says Peter. Who’s influencing who, in this scenario? Peter knows they know. And they know Peter knows they know. And Jesus knows Peter knows they know Peter knows. They all know!

I hope we all know, too, that ultimately, Jesus is the source and the end of all influence. He is the reason for all of it. Be influenced by Christ alone and seek to influence others for Christ alone - confirm your calling and election, Peter says, and you will never stumble.

Peter knew this truth from way back, because he’d already stumbled - quite a bit. Even before he denied Jesus three times in the wee hours of Good Friday morning, Peter stumbled by trying to get Jesus to focus on creating a brand - on being the leader of an influential team of powerful disciples changing the world according to Peter’s own designs, not God’s. He’d struggled through the very real temptation to be an influencer of crowds, an influencer based on popularity and power, not service and self-denial.

I mean, can you imagine what Peter’s reaction videos to Jesus’ miracles might have looked like, trending on TikTok? Can you picture the reels Peter could have created for Instagram showcasing Jesus’ parables? He’d have racked up all the followers and then made the most of any brand-expanding sponcon deals that came along. Except that’s not how God’s influence works.

Then [Jesus] called the crowd to him along with his disciples and said: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.” (Mark 8:34 NIV)

Deny yourself and pick up your cross, Jesus tells Peter, and the crowds, and us. Not very influencer-y sounding. Opportunities for sponcon? Severely limited. A brand that dies and is recreated each and every day? Impossible.

Because that’s how Martin Luther would have us remember the call to take up our cross every day, as we remember our baptism into Jesus’ death and resurrection. In the waters of baptism, our old sinful nature (our Old Adam, he calls it) “should by daily contrition and repentance be drowned and die with all sins and evil desires, and that a new man should daily emerge and arise to live before God in righteousness and purity forever.” (“The Sacrament of Baptism,” Luther’s Small Catechism)

I still stumble. If I have a brand, I have to confess it would be “sinner.” Like disciple Peter in Mark 8, there are times when I deign to rebuke the Lord over His plans for my life and He, in turn, rebukes me, saying, “You do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.” I still like the idea of being an influencer based on me-myself-and-I, even if I lack the requisite skill for mirror selfies and response videos.

But, in the end, I hope I can say along with apostle Peter who had witnessed the empty tomb, and who saw and spoke to the resurrected Jesus, “I will always remind you of these things… I think it is right to refresh your memory as long as I live in the tent of this body…” Because I know you know. And you know I know you know. And we both know it’s about Christ Jesus and his cross.

Today’s wannabe influencer is dead. Tomorrow’s new creation will be raised to life in Christ.

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This video has haunted me since I first saw it a few months ago. Not easy to watch, but I think it’s helpful for understanding the online ecosystem of influencers & audience.

“The caricature quickly becomes the influencer's distinct brand, and all subsequent attempts by the influencer to remain on-brand and fulfill audience expectations require them to act like the caricature. As the caricature becomes more familiar than the person, both to the audience and to the influencer, it comes to be regarded by both as the only honest expression of the influencer, so that any deviation from it soon looks and feels inauthentic. At that point the persona has eclipsed the person, and the audience has captured the influencer.”

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