MY BLOG POSTS

Normally, this blog is for teens. But, occasionally, I feel the need to talk to the parents. This is one of those occasions…

Forgive me if I offend you with this, but Facebook is not evil. Neither is Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, or whatever else is new and up-coming in the social media world. They are not, in my opinion, the harbinger of end times or the destruction of society as we know it.

You’d think my generation would be used to new things. Come on, guys! From the time we started Kindergarten until we graduated college, we saw the introduction of cable TV, the CD, the DVD, cell phones, the personal computer, and the internet – to name a few. We know change. We’ve lived it, appreciated it, enjoyed it. Sure, there are precautions that come with new technology, evils that can be introduced through them. But there is also great good, hope, and endless possibility.

Using social media is like driving a car. It doesn’t guide us, we guide it. Like anything else in life, we should approach social media with wisdom and self-control. I wouldn’t get behind the wheel and drive 100 miles an hour or ignore the signs posted on the road. I know that, used in the wrong way, a car can be lethal. But that doesn’t mean I don’t drive! No, it just means I am cautious when I drive. I teach my daughter to be cautious, as she is learning to handle a car. I am making sure she gets enough practice on the road, with me to guide her, before she is permitted to drive on her own.

I try to do the same with social media – I check my kids’ sites, and I have other adults in their lives who check, too. They have some degree of autonomy, but if I sense they are taking advantage of that, they lose the privilege of using it. I am , in short, a parent! It’s a job that isn’t easy and one in which I fail as often as I succeed, but helping my kids learn to navigate their world in a healthy, God-honoring way is supremely important.

Social media is not going away – it will be part of our kids’ lives, just like cable and the internet is part of ours. So help them know how to use it wisely and cautiously. Teach them to “drive” on what can often be a dangerous highway. Don’t avoid what is new – learn to use it wisely and well so you can teach your kids to do the same.

More songs, poems, books, and movies have been written about love than any other subject. We love love. We long for it, hunger for it, diet for it, scheme for it.

To yearn for love is not only natural, it is Divine. God has given each of us a hunger for true love. But too many of us look to satisfy that hunger in the wrong way, with the wrong people. And we end up unhappy, hurt, and broken. That kind of love fails us, again and again.

The Apostle John is known for his themes of love. In his gospel, he refers to himself as “the disciple whom Jesus loved.” In his letters, he tells us that God’s love is so great, our response should be to share that love with others. In his Revelation, John longs for the day when we will be able to spend eternity loving Jesus in spirit and in truth. John fully embraced the love God lavished on him, and he responded with humility and wholehearted commitment.

We will never be fully satisfied until we accept the love God has for us – unfailing, perfect love. When we look to other people to fill that God-sized hole inside us, we will always be disappointed. But when we live in the light of God’s love, we are free to love others without limits, without unrealistic expectations. We can be full of joy, even in difficult circumstances, because we know that God will never leave us or forsake us, that his love is eternal.

God has been working on me about that particular question, lately.

I know the right answer: “To glorify God.”

But do I live it out?

Really?

I start out my day with Bible reading and prayer, but then what? Does the Word of God change me? Does my time with the Creator of the Universe permeate my thoughts as I go throughout my day?

I know the answer should be “Yes. Of course!” I want that to be the answer. But the reality is that it isn’t always the answer. I can get to the end of a day and realize I have “handled” everything since my morning devos entirely on my own.

But if I really believe that I am here on this earth to glorify God, then everything I do should reflect that. Rather than thinking about what I want and what I need, I should be seeking to know how God wants to use me – not just at the start of the day, but every moment of it.

Rather than handling the events of the day – my thoughts, my family, my students – on my own, I should release them to God, ask how He wants me to think, to love, to teach.

As much as I believe and preach that the Christian life is a 24/7 prospect, I am convicted that I treat it more like a check-up – “Hey, God. We good? Got anything for me today….? Oh, that’s nice. I like it!….Okay, then. Thanks. Talk to you tomorrow.”

I am here to glorify God.

I am HERE to glorify God.

I am here to GLORIFY God.

I am here to glorify GOD.

“He must increase, but I must decrease.” John 3:30

Good Friday – the day Christians remember Christ’s work on the cross.

But what, exactly, is that cross? What does it mean? And is it really important?

I see the cross everywhere – in earrings, on necklaces, in children’s craft projects, even as decorations on flip flops and magnets on cars. None of that is bad, necessarily, but I fear that we are so accustomed to  seeing the cross that we have forgotten what it actually represents, what it means. It has become merely a symbol of our faith. But it is so much more than that.

On Good Friday, Jesus was led to his execution. He was sentenced to a death so horrendous that it was reserved only for non-citizens of the Roman Empire. Not even the worst Roman citizen would have to endure this. And he was sentenced for one reason:

Because he claimed to be God.

He wasn’t killed for being a good person, for being a wise teacher, for hanging out with tax collectors and prostitutes. He was killed because the Jewish leaders of his day found his claims to deity to be blasphemous. They did not believe he was the promised Messiah. And they understood – rightly – that that is exactly who he was saying he was.

But Jesus was the Messiah. He was God in the flesh, come to earth. He lived a sinless life, qualifying him to be the only one who could pay the penalty for our sins.

Sins separate us from God. But God loves us, and he doesn’t want us separated from him. And so he sent his son to die the death that we deserve so we can have eternal life with him.

And that is what Jesus did on the cross. He didn’t just suffer excruciating physical pain, he also bore on his body the sins of the world. I can’t even begin to comprehend that.

And he did that for us. Because he loved us so much.

Today is the day we remember that death, that price that our Savior paid for us – for all who believe on him.

So while cross necklaces and magnets and decorations are highly visible this time of year, I want to be careful that I’m not forgetting what it represents, the magnitude of the work done there. The cross is more than a symbol. Because Jesus chose to go to the cross, you and I  have the opportunity to choose Him, to choose eternity with Christ, to choose a life with Christ here on earth.

If you haven’t made that choice, yet, make it right now. Make this a truly Good Friday.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amxE80Zj1Ys

Listen to the words of this wonderful old hymn….so rich, so true. May it be our prayer this Resurrection Weekend.