There are many positives to the whole world of the internet, but
one of the huge downsides has been how it has made so much that is negative,
and in particular pornography, so much more freely available. There was once a
time when you would have to go to a shop to get hold of pornography, running
the risk of being seen etc, but now if you've got access to a computer then you
can get hold of pornography without anyone else knowing.
Paul writes to the church in
Philippi "Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever
is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable-if
anything is excellent or praiseworthy-think about such things"
(Philippians 4:8). Meanwhile Jesus sets the bar incredibly high when it comes
to Christ followers, setting a grace standard which takes us way beyond the law
when He says "I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has
already committed adultery with her in his heart" (Matthew 5:28).
I know this is an
issue which can affect both men and women, but I particularly want to speak to
the guys in Kerith in getting us to set the bar high in what we look at on the
internet or on TV. For the married men let's choose to delight in our wives, to
honour them and cherish them in all that we look at. And let's have a
generation of single guys who take purity seriously, and choose not to conform
to the standards of those around them but are preparing themselves one day to
be outstanding husbands. Sometimes this will take an active choice. I've said
before that I've struggled in the past with what I watch on TV when I've been
away from home staying in hotels, so I now make the decision that when I'm away
in a hotel to put the remote control in a drawer and make the decision just not
to watch it. I also hold myself accountable to the elders for what I watch and
look at, and from time to time will ask the other elders how they are doing on
this issue. You need to be in some similar accountability relationships, and if
you're in a place where you're struggling right now you need to find a safe
person you can share it with.
There are other ways the internet can pull us down. Simply wasting
hours going from one YouTube clip to another isn't a productive use of our
precious time. Similarly if you want to you can find huge amounts of negative
stuff about pretty much any well known Christian figure you'd like to name.
Don't rely on what some anonymous nutter has to say about Mark Driscoll, Bill
Hybels, Billy Graham or anyone else out there - it's just a waste of time and
will leave you discouraged.
So what is the alternative. Well make sure that you listen to and
watch things on the internet which will build you up. Get the YouVersion app on your smartphone and
sign up for a daily Bible reading plan, getting God's word into you every day.
Listen to Podcasts, read Blogs and sign up for Tweets from some of the
Christian leaders out there, and instead of reading what some nutter thinks about
them make your own mind up. I recommend anything by Tim Keller, Rick Warren, Bill Hybels, Andy
Stanley, John Piper and Craig
Groeschel, but there are loads of other people out there putting out great
stuff. I particularly enjoyed this
Q&A session between John Piper and Rick Warren - outstanding. Even
some dead people like CS Lewis
have Twitter feeds dedicated to them which are full of daily inspiration. And
more locally you can follow my wife,
our Act For Justice group, our
CAP centre, Serenje developments, Ken and Ann Bothamley, Michael and Esther Ross-Watson
and many of our staff on Twitter. Why not add some comments about who you've
found it helpful to follow.
Tomorrow we'll get
on to some stuff on how we actually use social media in terms of what we
create, but before we can do that we need to be sure that we're taking the
right stuff in. Hopefully this will have helped you to do that.
Simon.
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