Fellowship of Appreciation

Wanting to share what you appreciate with others in an age of faction

Mar 16, 2025

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Once you view one of them, you start getting a lot of them offered to you. That is how social media works, of course. That is the algorithm. So, just a word of warning at the top. If you click on any of these links, you’ll see more every time you go to YouTube. I know this from experience. I am talking about what are called reaction videos. These are videos of people reacting to other videos. I know that may sound strange to the unfamiliar, but I find them unexpectedly appealing. A better way to describe them is to see them as someone from one part of our culture, someone who is young, for example, discovering an artist from an earlier time and appreciating them. Entire channels are devoted to this idea. People suggest a video to react to - usually a song, because they like the song, they like the reactions, and they want this person to like the song that they like. And that is what these channels promise - they are all reactions of appreciation, no negativity here.

The title picture is from the YouTube channel of Sebs Duran who describes himself as a Chilean immigrant who has lived under a rock for most of his life, so most things are new to him. Above, we see him reacting to the rock group Yes performing their song Roundabout from 1971. He really likes it. He is surprised by it. He is into it. It is a song I like - so I enjoy his enjoyment. As do the other viewers of his channel. It is a fellowship of appreciation. Most of these are music reactions, but there are other subgenres. Like sports video reactions - often someone who is younger reacting to a player from an earlier era, perhaps a player they suspect is not as good as current players, but are surprised to appreciate their greatness. Here is Polo, a Lebron James fan (who also reacts to lots of songs and so has a reaction channel) reacting to old video of Larry Bird.

He is deep in appreciation mode here. He now fully appreciates Larry Bird. It becomes a mutual appreciation society - those who already knew how great Larry Bird was and those who are just finding out. Or those who already knew how great Fleetwood Mac was or the Beatles or Stevie Ray Vaughan - and those who are just finding out - like this young woman from the UK who didn’t know if Stevie Ray Vaughan was a person or a band. Or this classical guitarist, who exclaims at one point, “that is the first time I have seen anything like this!”

If you watch this performance, having never seen Stevie Ray Vaughan play the guitar, you might also say you haven’t seen anything like it. Or, if you have, you may just enjoy the reaction. More than that, you may enjoy sharing that reaction, a reaction you have already had, with someone who is experiencing it for the first time.

Or you may share that first time experience. Here is a therapist reacting to James Blunt’s Monsters, a song sung to his dying father.

It is a powerful song, a powerful reaction, and a powerful experience. One we can, in some small way, share with the therapist reacting, share with James Blunt, share with everyone on the precipice of grief and loss.

If you browse these reaction videos, you’ll see people of color reacting to Bill Burr’s humor, or Norm MacDonald’s, for the first time. You’ll see young people reacting to Neil Young or Pearl Jam or Fleetwood Mac. You’ll see a rapper reacting to Dire Straits. You’ll see sports fans from the UK reacting to Barry Sanders highlights. In all these cases, there is a shared discovery and a shared appreciation. That is the appeal, the sharing of appreciation. I love Larry Bird or Barry Sanders or Stevie Ray Vaughan and I want you to appreciate him with me. I love this group, this song, this athlete, this experience. I watch to enjoy your enjoyment of it, to share it with you. It is something we now have in common. It is a coming together. It is a fellowship of appreciation.

It is the same sort of thing we do in other ways in our life - We might say to our wife or husband “come and see this movie with me” or to a friend, “check out this restaurant”. Or we might want to take a friend or to tell them about a new movie or restaurant. Or perhaps we went to Yosemite and want our friends to have some sense of the beauty we found there. I appreciate something and want to share it. I think we may do this less than we did a few years ago.

I’m not exactly sure what it is, but there is something here for us to consider. What is this vicarious appreciation sharing taking the place of? In what ways did we do this previously but no longer do? What do I want to share, and with whom? There is a fellowship here, sort of a faux fellowship that can exist in the online world since we will never actually meet these people. Nor will we meet any (or very few) of the other members of the fellowship who are appreciating along with me - from Idaho or Belgium or wherever. But a fellowship nonetheless.

At The Embassy, this platform (substack) gives us a share button. You or I can share the website or this particular article.

I appreciate it when people subscribe to The Embassy because it says something about what I am sharing with them and how they are receiving it and that they want that to continue. But, for reasons I never thought about, I really love it more when they share this article they are reading. It is a tiny fellowship - I read something and I thought of you - I wanted to share it with you. I appreciated it and I wanted to appreciate it with you.

I have friends who send me quotes and clips and weird links. Here is the latest one I got from a friend a couple of days ago. I just replied back to him “Delightful”. That was it, the whole interchange. A tiny fellowship of appreciation. We need more of this.

Taste and see that the Lord is good …

Psalm 34:8

It is what the psalmist says here - “taste and see”. The implication is that the psalmist has tasted and seen the Lord’s goodness. And, with no market motivation, with no follower building strategy, he wants us to have the same experience. He wants us to share in it with him. He desires fellowship with those who have also tasted and seen or who are tasting and seeing for the first time.

Church is a divinely inspired and created part of God’s plan for the world. It is also a gathering of fallen and imperfect people, who can wound and disappoint. Yet, it is where we have a fellowship of those who are called to taste and see - to appreciate the goodness of God and share that goodness. I believe we are made for this particular fellowship of appreciation, of worship, of service, of mission, of love - this particular collection of “one anothers”. Not to experience transactionally, but as members, as fellow followers. That is the invitation and the challenge - taste and see, then invite others to taste and see with you - to this fellowship of appreciation.