social media

Take Up Your Cross

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“Jesus called the crowd together with His disciples, and said to them, “If anyone wishes to follow Me [as My disciple], he must deny himself [set aside selfish interests], and take up his cross [expressing a willingness to endure whatever may come] and follow Me [believing in Me, conforming to My example in living and, if need be, suffering or perhaps dying because of faith in Me]. For whoever wishes to save his life [in this world] will [eventually] lose it [through death], but whoever loses his life [in this world] for My sake and the gospel’s will save it [from the consequences of sin and separation from God]” (Mark 9:34-35, Amplified Bible).

Don’t get me wrong. I do love me some social media. I love being able to connect with new people and reconnect with old friends that I haven’t seen in years.

I also have noticed lately that social media has a way of turning people more and more myopic and narcissistic. It becomes all about “me and my,” as in my life, my spouse, my family, my home, my career, etc.

I’ve also noticed that people can very easily become thin-skinned and defensive if there is even a perceived threat or criticism of how they behave or talk.

I confess I’m guilty of being way too inward focused. The old saying about humility remains true– it’s not thinking less of yourself but thinking of yourself less.

Jesus’ call to take up the cross and follow remains as true as ever. That’s the only true way to find yourself and what you were meant for — namely, by losing yourself and your preconceived notions of how your life should go. By losing the notion that you are in control of your own destiny.

I hope that my life’s purpose will echo the call of John the Baptist– that I must decrease so that Jesus may increase and be glorified and magnified in my life more and more with every day that passes.

 

In Response to All the Nonsense on Social media

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“O God of every nation,
of every race and land,
redeem the whole creation
with your almighty hand;
where hate and fear divide us
and bitter threats are hurled,
in love and mercy guide us
and heal our strife-torn world” (William Watkins Reid, Jr.)

If you’ve been paying attention to social media, you know there’s a lot of hate and fear dividing this nation. It seems to me that both the hate and fear are bipartisan as both seem to exhibit both, but in different ways.

Some days, it feels like there will always be a divide running through the land. It seems like people will never cross the political aisle to at least try to see things from a different perspective.

Lately, there is no middle ground of any kind. The mantra is that “my side is 100% right and holy and just and righteous, and your side is 100% wrong, therefore you must not only be wrong but stupid and evil as well.”

This is where believers step in. Jesus calls us to be one as He and the Father are one. He doesn’t give us any loopholes. This isn’t optional.

It means praying for your enemies instead of bashing them on Facebook. It means loving them instead of publicly wishing them harm. Again, that goes for both sides.

Above all, it means realizing that as a believer in Christ, your ultimate allegiance isn’t to a political party or a platform. It’s not to an ideology. It’s to a King and a Kingdom that will last beyond all the kingdoms and republics of the world, including the one we’re currently living in.

Maybe instead of casting blame, it’s time to look in the mirror and start repenting of hateful attitudes and critical spirits. Maybe it’s time to start being the change we want to see in the world.

And that change starts with love.

 

The Best Gift This Christmas

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I’m still in shock over the absolute devastation that’s taken place in East Tennessee. So many people lost everything, including some that lost loved ones. I can’t even begin to fathom the grief they’re experiencing right now.

I’ve decided that the best gift you or I can give this Christmas isn’t so much presents but presence, as in you and I being fully present with our families and friends during this Advent season.

By fully present, I mean more than just sharing the same room. I mean making full eye contact and actively listening to what the other is saying. I mean you being glued to the other person and not to your smart phone.

I confess I’m guilty as much as anyone else of choosing technology over people. It’s easy to do when your phone is doing everything to get your attention, up to the point of saying, “Hey! Look at this comment to your status right this very minute!”

I have yet to meet anybody who regrets not checking their latest Facebook updates. I don’t know of anyone who will shed tears because they failed to reply promptly to a comment on one of their Instagram photos.

I do know that people’s biggest regrets are those moments when they wish they could go back in time to tell a friend or family member how much that person meant to them. I have a feeling some will look up from their phones and realize they missed so much. It’s better to take time away from social media to have that meaningful conversation with someone than to wait too late and have to talk to their headstone.

You have an incredible opportunity to speak into the lives of your spouse, your children, your parents, and your friends. You have the blessing of having them speak healing and life into you. Never take that privilege for granted. You never know when it will be taken away.

 

Get Away

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“I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived” (Henry David Thoreau, Walden).

Sometimes I think Thoreau had the right idea. Lately, I feel overwhelmed by the amount of information coming at me from every direction at literally every waking moment. I deliberately stay away from watching any kind of news programs, yet I still feel like I’m drowning in a flood of images and stories, mostly tragic and sad.

Every now and then, it’s good to get away from all things electronic and technological. Every once in a while, it’s good to lose yourself in the beauty of nature and drink in deeply the silence of the woods.

I love Radnor Lake State Park because it is as close to Eden as I can get these days. It’s as close as I can get to how we used to be before we became social media junkies, craving the next Instagram or Facebook fix. I saw a woman walking through Radnor with nature in full bloom all around her who would not look up from her phone. That’s a sad commentary on what we value and where our priorities lie.

Nature has a way of resetting the default on our brains to where they’re not always running like a computer with 50 tabs open at the same time. I still believe that nature is a place where we can better hear the voice of God, away from the distracting noise and clatter that constantly demands our attention.

I think I could live in a place like Walden Pond for a year or more. I could use a break from all the media madness. Maybe I’ll settle for reading the book.

 

Wisdom and Correction

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“The one who corrects a mocker
will bring dishonor on himself;
the one who rebukes a wicked man will get hurt.
Don’t rebuke a mocker, or he will hate you;
rebuke a wise man, and he will love you.
Instruct a wise man, and he will be wiser still;
teach a righteous man, and he will learn more” (Proverbs 9:7-9, Holman Christian Standard Bible).

“One who isolates himself pursues selfish desires; he rebels against all sound judgment” ‭‭(Proverbs‬ ‭18:1‬, ‭Holman Christian Standard Bible).‬‬

In my quest to read through the Bible in 2016, I’ve made it to the book of Proverbs. That means that I am over halfway through. It also means that I’ve been reading quite a bit lately about wisdom.

It’s hard to read Proverbs and not see how precious and priceless the gift of wisdom is. A number of verses tell us to treasure it about silver and gold, above diamonds and rubies. The last time I checked, those trinkets weren’t cheap.

Still, I confess that I see a culture where we value knowledge and belittle wisdom. I scroll through social media posts and don’t see a lot of wisdom.

Recently, God has been showing me that one very important sign that a person is wise is their ability to take a rebuke. No one likes to be told they’re wrong, but those who treasure wisdom seek any opportunity to resist complacency and embrace growth and maturity.

Most people bristle at rebuke. People get very self-defensive at even the hint of correction or negative feedback.

“How dare you judge me?” will get thrown around a lot, mostly as an excuse to avoid any kind of accountability.

But the wise not only endure rebuke; they embrace it. They know that part of Christlikeness is the discipline to put off those habits and actions that contradict our faith message. They understand that spiritual growth may sometimes involve denial and pain, choosing sacrifice over comfort.

Correction does hurt. Still, the amount of hurt from a rebuke is often nowhere near the level of pain that results from a series of bad decisions and poor choices left unchecked. 

I freely admit that I’m not the best at taking correction. Not even close. I get defensive and make excuses whenever I sense that the feedback is heading in a negative direction.

Still, I truly believe that it’s far more dangerous to cocoon yourself from any rebuke. For the record, it’s one thing to distance yourself from verbal and emotional abuse, slander, and hate (which is wise) It’s quite another to close yourself off from constructive criticism of any kind (which is very foolish).

The worst place to be is where you’re only surrounded by “yes-men” who will only agree with you and say what you want to hear but never what you need to hear. The absolute most dangerous place is outside of any kind of accountability.

So may we all seek wisdom, even if it leads to painful places and hard lessons. The payoff will be more than worth it.

 

The Lost Art of Face-to-Face Conversations

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I have a list of memories of events that fundamentally changed the core of who I am today. Almost all of them involve conversations where I looked the other person or persons in the eye. Almost none of them involve staring at a text or post on a screen.

There is so much healing and release that happens when you’re able to look into someone’s eyes and find true acceptance there. There’s truly something transcendent that takes place when you’re able to hear the words and read the facial expressions and catch the totality of what’s being communicated.

Yet these days I see a lot of heads constantly buried in smart phones and other devices. Even those sitting across from each other literally within touching distance will choose to communicate via text.

The upcoming generations are probably more advanced when it comes to texting and posting yet almost completely inadequate when it comes to actual social interaction. That’s sad.

I am most certainly not against social media or smart phones. I have both. I am against them when they entirely replace the old-fashioned conversation.

As a pastor that I greatly admire once said, God didn’t see our dire need of salvation and send a text. He didn’t look at our predicament and tag us in a social media post. He sent a person. He took on flesh and blood and moved into the neighborhood and met our greatest needs face to face. Because that and that only is where healing and forgiveness and restoration can take place.

It’s ironic that in the present age where we are more connected than ever that so many feel cut off and neglected. So many feel ignored and unwanted. As Mother Teresa once said, the greatest poverty is that of not feeling wanted by anyone.

The cure isn’t more connectivity but community. It’s not in having more Facebook friends but in cultivating the few real ones you have. It isn’t tagging more people in your posts but being more intentional about including them in your schedule for those face-to-face conversations.

That’s still what we need most.

 

Palm Sunday

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“A man who was completely innocent, offered himself as a sacrifice for the good of others, including his enemies, and became the ransom of the world. It was a perfect act” (Mahatma Gandhi).

“Do not abandon yourselves to despair. We are the Easter people and hallelujah is our song” (Pope John Paul II).

“The gifts of the Master are these: freedom, life, hope, new direction, transformation, and intimacy with God. If the cross was the end of the story, we would have no hope. But the cross isn’t the end. Jesus didn’t escape from death; he conquered it and opened the way to heaven for all who will dare to believe. The truth of this moment, if we let it sweep over us, is stunning. It means Jesus really is who he claimed to be, we are really as lost as he said we are, and he really is the only way for us to intimately and spiritually connect with God again” (Steven James, Story).

So we have reached Palm Sunday, one week before Easter.

That means that in eight days, I can resume my social media activities.

More importantly, it reminds me that Easter and what it represents are never very far away.

Easter is more than bunnies and candy.

Easter is even more than wearing my Sunday best to attend church on Sundays as a kid.

Easter means that even though death doesn’t have the final say. It means that although there is a battle raging around us, it has already been won.

Easter means that there is no such thing as too late, too far gone, or hopeless.

If God could raise Jesus from the dead, there is nothing dead in your life that Jesus can’t resurrect.

Easter means there are no final goodbyes for those who are in Christ.

Easter means that Jesus wasn’t just a good man or a great example to follow but God in the flesh, Immanuel who came near to us who were far away so that we who were dead might live again.

That’s Easter.

 

Blog #2,062 Or Day 29 of Lent

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I’ve loved my break from social media. I suddenly find I have all this free time and I’m actually engaging in the world around me.

Unfortunately, I also feel out of the loop on current events. I don’t know what’s going on in the lives of my friends.

When I’m Facebooking or Instagramming, I at least feel somewhat connected to what’s going on around me. I’m able to keep up with all my friends’ activities, what they’re eating, who they’re dating, who’s engaged, etc.

Now I have no clue.

Still, it’s a small price to pay for giving up social media. I highly recommend everyone who reads this to fast from social media (if you’re not one of those who already abstains from it). It’s extremely refreshing.

I always have Netflix to get me through. I’m up to season four of The Wonder Years (and loving every minute of it). I got to the part where Winnie cried when she broke up with Kevin. It almost made me cry.

Think of the time that The Wonder Years is set in. There was no social media, no cell phones, no computers (at least not personal ones), and only the basic channels on TV. Yet they somehow managed to survive.

There are days when I think society as a whole would be better off without so much reliance on social media and technology. Just don’t ask me to give it up for very long.

Also, I have my blogging outlet to get me through the absence of social media. I can still share what’s going on in my world. Sometimes, that can be very therapeutic.

Most of all, I am being reminded yet again that God is enough. He more than fills any absence of Facebook or Twitter or Instagram. He more than makes up for the lack of a wife or kids. He alone is sufficient for every day of the year, no matter what the season.

 

More Lessons from Lent

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It’s been a week since I gave up social media for Lent and so far, I’ve managed to stay away. I’m also trying not to be super-legalistic about it, but I’ve done well so far.

I do miss seeing what everyone’s up to and what their kids and pets are doing. I do feel quite a bit out of the loop when I’m away from social media. I also feel like I’m actually participating in my own life again.

I got to see a good friend of mine in what looks to me like the beginning stages of a dating relationship. I’m to the point now where I can be completely happy and supportive of both of them.

I also was blessed to celebrate the transition of Kairos  leadership from Mike Glenn to Chris Brooks. Even though I’m not the biggest fan of change (as I may have mentioned in passing in a few other blogs), I know that better things are in store for Kairos.

Maybe I’ll actually get back to that novel I started back in December but haven’t been able to get around to in 2016. Imagine that. Reading actual books. It boggles the mind.

I still hope to have more face-to-face conversations and do more of that real life stuff that I’ve been hearing so much about. From what little I’ve seen, I really think I’m going to like it.

In three days, my teenaged geriatric cat turns 16. I almost feel like a parent, wondering where the time has gone from when she was a wee little kitten barely bigger than my hand.

I think at some point in the future, I’d like to take a week or so where I go off the grid completely. No electronics, no phones, TV. Just me getting back to nature and (hopefully) getting my internal clock reset.

I also want to get back to living out of a sense of wonderment. I want to enjoy the moments and give thanks to the Creator not only of the grand universe but also of the smallest details.

There will be more updates as Lent progresses. If you’re pining away without me on social media, you can always reach me at gmendel72@icloud.com (because I get so few actual emails from actual people these days).

 

My Lent Plans for 2016

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Here I am, typing this on my laptop in Starbucks and already thinking about Lent. If I’m not mistaken, Lent starts on Ash Wednesday, the day after Fat Tuesday, which occurs during Mardi Gras.

My plan as always is to fast from social media during this time. As much as I’d like to use the extra time to be all productive and stuff, my main goal during this season is to reboot my brain and get my head right again.

Not that I’m in a bad place. I just think that it’s easy to let social media affect how you perceive yourself and others, and stepping away from it all can be a good way to remind yourself that life is more than status updates, Instagram posts, and how many likes and/or comments you get.

I will still be writing these blogs, so fret not. They will still show up on all my social media outlets, as usual.

Ideally, I can spend way less time with my head buried in my phone. I can look up and see blue skies and sunsets and other people (most likely with their heads buried in their phones and tablets).

Life is what happens when you’re busy making plans. It’s also what happens when you’re checking your Facebook feed or updating your Twitter account. I doubt very seriously that you’ll get to the end of your life and regret all those hilarious memes you didn’t share or all the clever status updates you didn’t write.

You will regret not spending more actual real time with real people in face-to-face conversations about real-life situations.

You will regret not looking up from your social media to see all that life that’s passing you by.

So all that to say that starting Ash Wednesday, I will be (mostly) off the grid until after Easter Sunday. See you all then.