Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.
Romans 12:2
A simple blackberry bush, overflowing with ripe, luscious beautiful berries is what God indented a blackberry to be. In all of its simple glory, a blackberry represents the world the way God created it to be. You grow a blackberry bush, you physically go out and pick the berries. It’s hard work, but you do it anyway, because after hard work, you get the reward. The reward is sweet beautiful berries. After you eat a few of them, you can make pie, jam or any other wonderful dish you can come up with. This is normal. This is what God sees as normal. Hard work, taking time to make a wonderful treat, enjoying the fruits of your labor.
The world is constantly trying to deceive us; it tricks us in to believing that a different way of life is normal. The world tries to flip our “normal” upside down. It says: You don’t have to work hard, you should have what you want “right now”. The world wants us to believe that every want and every desire should be acted upon immediately. This type of thinking is not of God. The world has tricked us!
Immediate gratification, immediate communication: God did not intend our lives to work this way. The world makes sin look normal and righteousness seem strange. The world displaces God from His truth and from our decision making. The devil finds great pleasure in the human race thinking immediate gratification and communication is normal.
Taking the time to think about your thoughts, taking the time plan and save for something you want, taking the time to pick blackberries, taking the time to make jam: This is how God designed the world to work.
Lord, please help me to see Your truth in my every day life. Help me to concentrate on Your word and question the conventional wisdom.
Crackberry
What sorrow for those who get up early in the morning looking for a drink of alcohol and spend long evenings drinking wine to make themselves flaming drunk …… but they never think about the Lord or notice what he is doing.
Isaiah 5:11-12
In an age when it seems as if some people can’t get enough of their handheld devices the phenomenon of the crackberry has emerged. The definition for crackberry is all about obsession. Persons who are so enamored of using their Blackberry handheld devices that they seem to always have them in hand have been nicknamed crackberries. While acknowledging how addictive Blackberry use can be for many people, the true crackberry is an individual who chooses to never be without their trusty Blackberry. A true sign of the obsessive Blackberry addict is that upon rising in the morning, the user reaches for the Blackberry before doing anything else. All of life revolves around the Blackberry, to the extent that friends will send text messages and emails in order to communicate with their loved one, since verbal communication is apt to be a dead end. For those that see the Blackberry phenomenon as a full-blown epidemic, there is not much difference between a crackberry and anyone that suffers from substance abuse or Internet addiction. While many see the term crackberry as a way at poking fun at the latest technology, others see the obsession with Blackberry services as one more example of how physical social interaction is eroding in our society. (from www.wisegeek)
While using our handheld devices can be harmless, we have to watch ourselves. Do we really want our children growing up thinking its normal to text one another while sitting in the same room? This is how evil gets in and turns our world upside down. Little by little, it (evil) changes your thinking in to believing its “normal” and ok to communicate in this manner, but guess what? It’s not. Sadly, real face to face communication IS eroding in our society.
Lord, help me to pull myself away from all of these alternative means of communication. I want to concentrate on talking to others face to face.
Isaiah 5:11-12
In an age when it seems as if some people can’t get enough of their handheld devices the phenomenon of the crackberry has emerged. The definition for crackberry is all about obsession. Persons who are so enamored of using their Blackberry handheld devices that they seem to always have them in hand have been nicknamed crackberries. While acknowledging how addictive Blackberry use can be for many people, the true crackberry is an individual who chooses to never be without their trusty Blackberry. A true sign of the obsessive Blackberry addict is that upon rising in the morning, the user reaches for the Blackberry before doing anything else. All of life revolves around the Blackberry, to the extent that friends will send text messages and emails in order to communicate with their loved one, since verbal communication is apt to be a dead end. For those that see the Blackberry phenomenon as a full-blown epidemic, there is not much difference between a crackberry and anyone that suffers from substance abuse or Internet addiction. While many see the term crackberry as a way at poking fun at the latest technology, others see the obsession with Blackberry services as one more example of how physical social interaction is eroding in our society. (from www.wisegeek)
While using our handheld devices can be harmless, we have to watch ourselves. Do we really want our children growing up thinking its normal to text one another while sitting in the same room? This is how evil gets in and turns our world upside down. Little by little, it (evil) changes your thinking in to believing its “normal” and ok to communicate in this manner, but guess what? It’s not. Sadly, real face to face communication IS eroding in our society.
Lord, help me to pull myself away from all of these alternative means of communication. I want to concentrate on talking to others face to face.
Texting While Talking
Those who control their tongue will have a long life; opening your mouth can ruin everything.
Proverbs 13:3
Imagine this: You are having a conversation with a good friend and all of the sudden, right in the middle of your sentence; your friend just turns around. She walks two steps away from you and strikes up a conversation with someone else. After 60 seconds, she walks back over, looks you in the eye and begins to carry on the conversation as if nothing happened. This is not normal and you would never put up with it. You would call your friend on it right away. However, when people are texting someone else, while talking to you, they seem to think it is ok, and sometimes you do as well.
Another example: You are in a room full of people and none of them are looking and talking with each other, but all of them are looking down, staring at their phone, and pounding them repetitively. However, several of them are “talking (texting)” to each other. NOT NORMAL!!
The world wants us to believe it is ok to live this way. It’s not. It’s ok if you have a thought and do NOT express it right away. There is a reason we were NOT built with the ability to telecommunicate with other humans. God wants us to process our thoughts, mull them over before rolling them out in the world. Our words are one of the most evil methods the devil uses to ruin relationships and lives. The devil loves it that we now have zero filters on our thoughts and words.
Dear Lord, I want to concentrate fully on who ever I am with, who ever I am talking to. Please, help make me be aware of any situations where I am not doing this.
Proverbs 13:3
Imagine this: You are having a conversation with a good friend and all of the sudden, right in the middle of your sentence; your friend just turns around. She walks two steps away from you and strikes up a conversation with someone else. After 60 seconds, she walks back over, looks you in the eye and begins to carry on the conversation as if nothing happened. This is not normal and you would never put up with it. You would call your friend on it right away. However, when people are texting someone else, while talking to you, they seem to think it is ok, and sometimes you do as well.
Another example: You are in a room full of people and none of them are looking and talking with each other, but all of them are looking down, staring at their phone, and pounding them repetitively. However, several of them are “talking (texting)” to each other. NOT NORMAL!!
The world wants us to believe it is ok to live this way. It’s not. It’s ok if you have a thought and do NOT express it right away. There is a reason we were NOT built with the ability to telecommunicate with other humans. God wants us to process our thoughts, mull them over before rolling them out in the world. Our words are one of the most evil methods the devil uses to ruin relationships and lives. The devil loves it that we now have zero filters on our thoughts and words.
Dear Lord, I want to concentrate fully on who ever I am with, who ever I am talking to. Please, help make me be aware of any situations where I am not doing this.
There is more hope for a fool than for someone who speaks without thinking.
Proverbs 29:20
Pretend you are given a microphone and are told to record your most private thoughts about yourself and people that you know. You are told to share your feelings when you are down, when you are happy and when you are mad. Additionally, every once a while, you are given a piece of paper with information on it about people you know. At that point, you are instructed to tell your thoughts about that person as well. What you were not told was that you are in a room full of 250 people. When you talk into the microphone, each and everyone of them can hear you. You share your thoughts, you share your emotions and pour your heart out.
This is what it’s like when you at your computer, alone, typing away on Facebook. EVERYONE is “listening”. Just remember, God did not intend us to communicate this way. Spending time on Facebook is not evil, but living our lives through it can be harmful. Face to face time is what God wants us to have. It is the healthiest way to talk to our loved ones.
Trust me; I can only say this because I could easily be addicted to this stuff, but work very hard to keep balance. Balance is the key to so many things in our lives.
I have a friend that does not use Facebook: Many people try to convince her that she is WRONG by NOT using it. This is evil trying to convince her that the world way is the right way. She is wise to be cautious.
The “world” wants us to believe that Facebooking is normal; the world is working overtime to lead us to believe that talking to everyone at once is a new normal that we should adhere to. Be cautious to keep the real Godly normal, YOUR normal.
Dear God, I need to concentrate more on You and Your word than I do on technology. Please, help me to focus in this area.
Proverbs 29:20
Pretend you are given a microphone and are told to record your most private thoughts about yourself and people that you know. You are told to share your feelings when you are down, when you are happy and when you are mad. Additionally, every once a while, you are given a piece of paper with information on it about people you know. At that point, you are instructed to tell your thoughts about that person as well. What you were not told was that you are in a room full of 250 people. When you talk into the microphone, each and everyone of them can hear you. You share your thoughts, you share your emotions and pour your heart out.
This is what it’s like when you at your computer, alone, typing away on Facebook. EVERYONE is “listening”. Just remember, God did not intend us to communicate this way. Spending time on Facebook is not evil, but living our lives through it can be harmful. Face to face time is what God wants us to have. It is the healthiest way to talk to our loved ones.
Trust me; I can only say this because I could easily be addicted to this stuff, but work very hard to keep balance. Balance is the key to so many things in our lives.
I have a friend that does not use Facebook: Many people try to convince her that she is WRONG by NOT using it. This is evil trying to convince her that the world way is the right way. She is wise to be cautious.
The “world” wants us to believe that Facebooking is normal; the world is working overtime to lead us to believe that talking to everyone at once is a new normal that we should adhere to. Be cautious to keep the real Godly normal, YOUR normal.
Dear God, I need to concentrate more on You and Your word than I do on technology. Please, help me to focus in this area.
But Jesus said, “Peter, let me tell you something. Before the rooster crows tomorrow morning, you will deny three times that you even know me.”
Luke 22:34
(Godly twitter: Jesus announces what will happen BEFORE it happens)
Imagine you are in an office space, typical cubical scenario. But at this office, every time you move to another task, you must stand up and yell the change. “Working on daily report” you hear frequently. “Eating my lunch”. “Talking to a client”, Henry yells frequently, “Rebooting my PC”, and so on.
Sound silly huh? That is exactly what we are doing when we are constantly updating ourselves via Twitter and Facebook. Don’t get me wrong, this stuff is fun and can actually do some good. But you must keep your focus on what is really “normal”. Don’t fall too far in to the cavern of deception. The world wants and needs us to believe these things are appropriate. They are ok just like coca-cola is ok, all in moderation.
Spending your time reading God’s word is a much better way to spend your down time. Twitter and Facebook will ultimately drain you more than it will build you up. There is no way, NO WAY the word of God will drain you. His word breathes life in to us.
The key to all of this new way of life in the world is to keep a handle on it. Have fun with the world wide web, but do not let it consume you and your way of life. Turn your computer off one day each week. Don’t hit the screen until night time. Something, anything to force you to communicate the old fashion way: actual talking, or hey, what about a hand written letter?
Lord, help me communicate more in the way you intended us to. I want more time with You instead of technology.
Luke 22:34
(Godly twitter: Jesus announces what will happen BEFORE it happens)
Imagine you are in an office space, typical cubical scenario. But at this office, every time you move to another task, you must stand up and yell the change. “Working on daily report” you hear frequently. “Eating my lunch”. “Talking to a client”, Henry yells frequently, “Rebooting my PC”, and so on.
Sound silly huh? That is exactly what we are doing when we are constantly updating ourselves via Twitter and Facebook. Don’t get me wrong, this stuff is fun and can actually do some good. But you must keep your focus on what is really “normal”. Don’t fall too far in to the cavern of deception. The world wants and needs us to believe these things are appropriate. They are ok just like coca-cola is ok, all in moderation.
Spending your time reading God’s word is a much better way to spend your down time. Twitter and Facebook will ultimately drain you more than it will build you up. There is no way, NO WAY the word of God will drain you. His word breathes life in to us.
The key to all of this new way of life in the world is to keep a handle on it. Have fun with the world wide web, but do not let it consume you and your way of life. Turn your computer off one day each week. Don’t hit the screen until night time. Something, anything to force you to communicate the old fashion way: actual talking, or hey, what about a hand written letter?
Lord, help me communicate more in the way you intended us to. I want more time with You instead of technology.
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