As is my way with Internet fads, I greeted the Twitter craze with a world-weary “What’s the big deal?” … only to try it and find myself rather instantly hooked. I particularly like the fact that third party apps allow me to enter a Twitter update and have it appear on my facebook, myspace, and newsblog pages, keeping my presence on the Internet fresher than it has been historically.

Doesn’t that sound all marketing-ish and sensible? The truth is, it’s really fun. Trying to sum up what’s going on in your life at any given moment in a pithy 140 characters or less is an entertaining challenge. And watching your friends do likewise is enjoyable too.

I’ve gotten so into Twitter that I’ve even read a few blogs on how to do it well, from hardcore tweets like Third Day’s Mark Lee and Thomas Nelson’s CEO Michael Hyatt. Blogging guru Darren Rowse even has a new blog (TwiTip) entirely devoted to the tweeting art.

Most of the discussion revolves around exploiting Twitter’s marketing potential. But I’d like to put forth an alternate raison de’ twitter etre (with my apologies to the French language): Twitter can be a great discipleship tool. Seriously.