How do we let others know we are happy? A happy face emoji is
ideal. 😀
Although this picture may not be worth a thousand words, in the era of instant
messaging a little happy face says a lot. In fact, it is possible to convey a
whole range of sentiments and ideas with these little icons. We may not have
reverted to ancient Egyptian style hieroglyphics, but much of our 21st
century communication is pictorial.
In 2015, the Oxford English Dictionary word of the year was 😂
or ‘tears of joy’. Emojis have become commonplace, only a couple of decades
after their invention by Japanese technology designer Shigetaka Kurita.
Some emojis have different meanings or are interpreted to
resemble different ideas from the designers’ original intentions. For instance,
the High Five symbol 🙏 for celebration is often used to mean ‘praying
hands’ to express our needs or gratitude to another. Praying seems to be a fundamental human
instinct; we want to appeal to a higher power outside of our circumstances.
Christians pray to God to express our dependence on him, and to praise Him. The
first prayer a Christian must pray is often referred to as the ‘sinner’s prayer’, when we humbly repent of our sins and ask God to accept us through the
sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ on the cross. ‘God be merciful to me a sinner’ – Lk 18v13.
Have you ever prayed like this? 🙏
Some feelings and emotions do not have direct emoji
character representations. For instance, there is no official Emoji symbol for
forgiveness. (Official emojis are published and recognized by the Unicode Consortium.) There is a public campaign at forgivemoji.com to produce a
forgiveness emoji, since this is such an important concept for life in general and
for the Christian faith in particular. ‘If we confess our sins He is faithful
and just to forgive us our sins’ 1 John 1v9. God fully and freely forgives
sinners on the basis of Jesus’ death and resurrection.
When sinners repent, the Lord Jesus explains that there is
‘joy in heaven.’ 😀 is the right response to people being
saved by God’s grace.
