facebook Fast

It's been coming for a while. Truth is, I have been thinking about this for more than a year. I just wouldn't do it. Notice I said "wouldn't," not "couldn't." I knew that there were times when I would get so absorbed in reading what everyone had for their afternoon snack, or what they found under their toenail that I would realize I had just traded an hour of my day for the details of someone else's. When they monkeyed around with the news feed this week, it was just the push I needed to step away from facebook for a few days. 40, to be exact.

That's right. I am taking a 40 day break from all things facebook. I already uninstalled the app from my phone, and am trying to figure out how to stop notifications from coming to my email inbox for that time. Now I don't want you to think that I think facebook is evil, or sinful. I have tried, from time to time, to post spiritual things. Many of you do an excellent job of sharing your faith or messages from the Word through your status updates. But for me, facebook has become a distraction that I can (and need to) do without.

I hate beauty pageants, but I LOATHE the ones for babies. The whole point of those baby shows is to say, "My kid is so much prettier than yours." And we love that approval that comes from judges who agree with our assessment. If someone else's child wins over ours, the judges are blind and just don't appreciate true cuteness. Makes me sick at my stomach. Yet (and these words don't taste very good) I have been guilty of the same thing with facebook. It is one thing to praise my kids; another, entirely, to boast about their accomplishments or behavior. My kid plays sports better, my kid is smarter, my kid is _________ (you fill in the blank). I am not suggesting that all people do this, but I have.

I have boasted about my vehicles, campers, time at the gym...so much time spent saying, "Look at me!" I don't know if it is for validation, or if my human mind just likes the attention. But when I read from God's word about modesty, I hear God telling his people to avoid a "look at me" attitude. When I read about humility, I hear my Father telling me to stop finding my identity in my stuff or in the lives of my kids.

This is hard. It is hard to write, but it is even harder to do. No, not just the facebook part. The humility part. Even now, I wonder if writing about this on a public blog is still an attempt to get people to notice me for something I have done.

Aside from the boasting, I am ashamed of the time I have wasted reading page after page after page of "news." I sometimes found it to be the first thing I would do in the morning when I got to the office. It got even worse when I got a smartphone and had instant access in the palm of my hand. I am guilty of ignoring my wife and children (even when talking about them on facebook). I am guilty of using time that would have been much better spent in the Word to look at vacation photos and read about birthday parties. I am guilty of running behind for appointments because I would be commenting on someone's announcement of unimportant information. In other words, facebook became a real time-stealer for me.

As a man recovering from the battle with pornography (five+ years clean), facebook can become a very troubling place, with so many females so freely showing their bodies at every turn. We won't argue about who is at fault in lustful situations, but I just can't keep giving my eyes that kind of temptation to ogle women. It's not healthy for me spiritually, so I will probably begin (after the fast) to thin my friends list to remove that aspect of fleshly warfare from my view. I don't need to see you in your bikini, or with your cleavage hanging out. It doesn't really matter how good you look (or how good you THINK you look), no one who is not married to you needs to see your exposed or accented body. Period. I know some fathers and husbands who need to step up and do something about what their daughters and wives are letting the world see, and who need to be leading their sons away from the slaughter that always follows lust (think Samson here). Wake up, people!!!

Now, from the soapbox back to the blog. I don't know if I will go back to facebook after this 40 days, but I suspect I will. I like keeping up with those I love. I like sharing photos and videos with the grandparents. I may even continue to use the little button on here that lets me share my blog posts with my facebook friends. (Is that cheating?) But my aim is to retrain myself in time management. I want to disconnect from the computer a little more so that I can reconnect with real people. I want to be less distracted from what is really important. That's what fasting was about in the Bible; drawing nearer to God, spending time in prayer, preparing hearts for God's service. So it is with this fast.