Robert Duncan has a piece at Spero News - I thank God for Spammers.

He acknowledges he has had to do so through gritted teeth, but it gave me pause. Given the spam this blog has been hit with over the years, I can’t recall ever praying for the persons who started a bot run that buried this blog and wasted untold hours of my seemingly precious time.

Now, I am certainly not placing myself on St Josemaria’s level. But I do think that spammers, to use a trite phrase, might offer us Christians a chance to turn lemons into lemonade. So I’m suggesting to all my fellow Christians out there, that they might want consider the following …  each time you delete a spammer’s comment or email, say a little prayer.That’s right, you read me correctly. Instead of swearing, and getting upset at the tons of spam, try a change in your mindset.In fact, try this. For each spam comment or email deleted, say a prayer directed to God.

Think about it. You got 50 spam items? That’s 50 prayers you can say. You got more spam? Put them into groups: for example, for every four or 10 spam email or comments deleted, say one prayer. 

Still think I’m crazy? You say that you don’t have enough time, well think about this: They don’t have to be long prayers, but can just be on the order of “Lord, make me like you,” or “Christ, I love you,” or “Lord, help me with (and name the subject).” It’s the intent behind the act, which is to seek to make a normal, mundane act a chance to have a conversation with our Creator, and in a small way remind ourselves of our relationship with Him. It’s an opportunity.

I had not thought of spam as an opportunity, but I think he is correct. The people I’m really going to have to work on praying for I think are the religious spammers, the ones that flood my inbox with bible verse browsers and sermon CD’s and other unholy triteness. We are to pray for those that despitefully use us, and I think they use God to make a cheap buck is despitefully using Him, not me. The pr0n, gambling and drug spam is what it is, targeted at our propensity for vice, or a need for medication, I’ve always found the religious spam a bit harder to deal with and a lot easier to be angry at. It’s easier to complain than pray.

And if you can’t say a little prayer while deleting a spam — which requires no extra effort — and instead you would prefer to be upset, then you might want to inspect a bit closer your walk with God.