From the title, some of you are already questioning where this post it going.
Why would she just do it at night? Isn’t that the worst time to do it?
You aren’t wrong when you say that being engaged on your phone at night is the worst thing you can do. That is true. But I have a point.
I was just coming off the heels of the anniversary of my dad passing away. It was the day after to be exact, and I swear there was a bull’s eye on my forehead. I have never experienced warfare like I did that day. I questioned my intensions when I would go to get alone with the Lord. Was I doing it because I felt like I had to or because I wanted to? I picked up my phone multiple times to text someone but listened to the lie being whispered in me ear that if I did I was just showing emotional attachment and dependency on them. I wrote in my journal that afternoon, “I just don’t feel like I have a place.”
The whole day I was exhausted and just wanted it to end. That evening was the closest I have ever come to tasting depression. It was like a dark cloud had been following me around all day long and finally decided it wanted to pour. I sat on my couch with the T.V on but I wasn’t watching it. I had tears streaming down my face because I had never felt this way in my entire life. I felt like there was a weight pressing down on my chest making it hard to breathe. But in the end, I felt so incredibly lonely. So I finally texted two of my closet friends out of desperation asking them to pray for me.
Back up a little and there is this song I have had on repeat in my car for weeks now. It is called “Tremble” by Mosaic Church. The bridge says over and over: Jesus, Jesus, you make the darkness tremble. That line has been a soundtrack in my head. It was a truth that I was making my song. Was it a coincidence that the darkness was the very thing I found myself sitting in that night? I don’t think so. Because I think God prepares our hearts. He gives us the chance to build a foundation to stand on when things start breaking apart. He gives us a song that we can sing even when the sun isn’t shining. That phrase from that song was a distant thought in that moment and I don’t think that means I did it wrong. I don’t think it means that I didn’t build a good enough foundation for myself. I don’t think it means that I didn’t memorize the song well enough. I think it just goes to show that moments will come when we forget the words. But the beautiful thing is that Jesus calls Himself: The Word.
When you are staring face to face with death, cancer, addiction, depression, anxiety, doubt, etc… it is no secret that it is sometimes hard to start reciting scripture or a lyric from a song in those moments. It is no secret that words fall so short that you sometimes cannot even manage to mutter a prayer. All these things are great and I am the biggest advocate for them all. But what I am saying is that when you can’t remember the words you only need to remember The Word. I like to think Jesus did that on purpose. It is almost like He knew we would have these moments. So He gave us a way to still have a Word when we desperately needed the lyrics on the screen so we can sing along once more.
It’s Him.
I needed to say nothing more than “Jesus.” I need to say nothing more than that one word because that one word is the most important word and that word is The Word.
You can cut yourself some slack when a night falls and you cannot remember the very thing Jesus has been speaking into you for months. It’s okay to forget the words. Just remember The Word.I didn’t plan on writing any of that but I feel like that was for someone.
So what does this have to do with social media?
Throughout that entire day I scrolled through my news feed for hours on end. I wanted to detached so much from my situation that I allowed a phone screen to be an escape. When loneliness fell it was when I was looking at what everyone else was doing and seeing who they were with. I was questioning why I wasn’t somewhere or why I hadn’t been invited.
I think it’s funny that it is called social media because it completely steals any sense of social aspect of our lives at times. We are out to dinner with friends and we are all on our phones. We are in the car with our parents and we are on our phones.
I am not knocking social media. I think it is a great platform for a lot of different reasons. But I think that we have gotten to the point where social media has become the loudest voice in our life and our phone screens have become the brightest light. Our phone screens have gotten brighter and brighter and our influence “light” in the world has grown dimmer and dimmer. Our news feed has become the biggest mirror for comparison.
The biggest problem, is that social media has become the doors we walk through to start our day. It is the first thing we do when we wake up in the morning. We barely have turned off our alarms before we already have the app open. The way you start your day will determine the course of the entire day.
So you can either start with the world, because that is what social media is, it is just the world. OR you can start with the Word.
If you have ten minutes to check every social media app, you have time to read one Psalms.
I am preaching at myself when I say all these things. Because I saw at the ended of that dreaded day;
- I started my day on social media.
- I scrolled through it all day long thinking being anywhere but where I was would help.
- I became so enthralled with what everyone was doing that I probably missed so many moments where there could have been a light beam coming through that cloud of darkness.
- I looked down all day long (physically and spiritually).
The next day I decide that I was just going to try to go about my day differently just to see if it would help. Because I couldn’t handle another day like I had. I did it one time and have done it ever since.
The difference was unreal.
I am so much more present. I have eyes to see so much more around me. I have had so many more meaningful conversations with people face to face, even if it is just a car ride. I am SO much more productive. I am more content. This one is crazy, but I am so much more patient. I think we see so much in so little time via social media that we start to move at a pace faster than reality. We can see what fifty people are doing in minutes, so when we sit down to hear about someone’s day we get antsy and want them to just get to the point. Okay, maybe that was just me. But I am telling you my patience has grown so much.
Here is the greatest thing: when you are engaged in your own life, when you are present in your own life, social media really isn’t as exciting as you thought it was. I’ll get on at night and scroll through and before I have even caught up from the day I am over it because what everyone else did in their day is not nearly as important as what I did in my day.
God is doing more in your life than you think He is, but you have to be willing to look around to see it.
So yes, I only use social media at night. I am not going completely crazy and saying, “never again” because I do love keeping up with people and reading posts that are packed with truth. But I am saying that my brightest light can’t be my phone screen. I am saying that social media cannot be the way I enter into a day. I am saying that social media will not have the loudest voice in my life. I am saying that the moments when my phone is shut off and I am alone are not bad moments, but instead moments that I can be even more intimate with the Lord.
I challenge you to see how changing your social media use could affect your life. If you are up for the challenge I would love to hear how it goes.
Eyes up my friends, we have been looking down for way too long.
