grab a hymnal turn your songbooks to song number two glory to his name song
number two glory to his name song number two glory to his name on the first down
at the cross where my Savior died down where for cleansing from sin I cried
there to my heart was the blood so sweet today something a word of
prayer amen all right let's go to song 187 Jesus loves me and all the kids
should know this one so belt it out 187 Jesus loves me 187 Jesus loves me on the
first Jesus loves me this I know for the me so singing this time we'll go through
our bulletins and on the front page there we have our verse of the week
Romans 8 7 because the carnal mind is enmity against God for it is not subject
to the law of God neither indeed can be and on the inside on the left page we
have our service times every Sunday morning 10 30 a.m. Sunday evenings at 5
30 p.m. and Thursdays 7 p.m. our Bible study will take a pause through the book
of Acts tonight pastor Shelley is at a camping trip with Stronghold Baptist
Church in Georgia and so we hope him and his family have a great time they much
deserve time of fun and rest and they do a lot of hard work so we're very happy
for them to have that time and then on we have our soul winning times Sunday at
2 p.m. Thursday 515 Saturday 10 a.m. and all those meet at the church we have a
couple regional regional times as well below we have our soul winning salvation
and baptism totals there and let's go ahead and get a count for this week I
already counted one from one of you on Monday besides Monday is there anything
else for this week okay all right sounds good I know brother
Samson I did some soul warning today so that's sometimes how it goes you have
weeks like that but we've got to keep with it and as always make sure that
we're continuing in prayer for our expectant mothers at the church some
upcoming events it's not in the bulletin but May 16th pastor Joe Jones is gonna
be preaching at steadfast Baptist Church he's from shield of faith Baptist
Church in Boise Idaho sent out by pastor Jimenez he's a great preacher and
friends we're looking forward to having him if you want a little weekend getaway
it's May 16th would be a good time to come up and visit us up in the Dallas
Fort Worth area after that a few days later May 20th through the 22nd we're
to have our men's conference which I know many of you have signed up for as well. So we're looking
forward to that. During that conference Pastor Anderson will be preaching for us that Friday,
so that's a great reason just in and of itself to make it to that conference. We're looking forward
to that. And also, you know, any prayer requests throughout the week make sure to send that into
the email and we will get that added to the list. And with that we'll go to our third song. Go to
song number 100 day by day song 100 day by day song 100 day by day on the first day by day
with each passing moment strength I find to meet my trials here singing as wise bestow strength shall
be at this time brother Samson will come read Ephesians chapter 5 Ephesians chapter 5 Ephesians
chapter number five I'll turn there and follow along with me as we read this chapter together
be therefore followers of God as your children and walk in love as Christ also had loved us
and has given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet smelling savior
but fornication and all uncleanness or covetousness that did not be once named among you has become
its saints neither filthiness nor foolish talking nor jesting which are not convenient but rather
giving of thanks for this you know that no whoremonger or unclean person nor covetous
man who is an adulterer has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God let no man
deceive you with vain words for because of these things come at the wrath of God upon the children
of disobedience be not you therefore partakers with them or you are sometimes darkness now are
you lighting the Lord walk as children of light fruit of the spirit is an all goodness and
righteousness and truth proving what is acceptable until the Lord and have no fellowship with the
unfruitful works of darkness but rather reprove them for it is a shame even to speak of those
things which are done of them in secret but all things that are approved are made manifest by the
light for whatsoever doesn't make manifest is light wherefore he said awake it thou that sleep
it and arise from the dead and Christ shall give thee light see then that you walk circumspectly
not as fools but as wise redeeming the time because the days are evil wherefore be you not
unwise but understanding what the will of the lord is be not drunk with wine wherein is excess
but be filled with the spirit speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs singing
and making melody in your heart to the lord giving thanks always for all things and to god the father
and in the name of our lord jesus christ submitting yourselves one to another in the fear of god
wives submit yourselves unto your own husbands as unto the lord for the husband is the head
of the wife even as christ is the head of the church and he is the savior of the body therefore
as the church is subject unto christ so let the wise be to their own husbands in everything
husbands love your wives even as christ also loved the church and gave himself for it that he might
sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word that he might present it to himself
a glorious church not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing but that it should be holy and
without blemish so ought men to love their wives as their own bodies he that loved his wife loved
himself for no man ever yet hated his own flesh but nourished and cherished even as the lord the
church we are members of his body of his flesh and of his bones for this cause shall a man leave
his father and mother and shall be joined into his wife and they too shall be one flesh this is a
great mystery but i speak concerning christ and the church nevertheless let every one of you
in particular so love his wife even as himself and the wives see that she reverence her husband
by ahead for a quick word of prayer father will come for you father we always pray and ask this
thing in Jesus Christ's name amen amen all right well thank you all for coming tonight and thank
you pastor Shelley's always for giving the opportunity to preach for you guys i always
look forward to it and enjoy it and we are here in ephesians chapter five but before we get into
this chapter the title of my sermon tonight is snares of social media snares of social media
and before we get into this passage or into the sermon i just want to make it very clear that
social media is not something that is inherently sinful i'm not going to preach to you tonight that
you shouldn't have a social media account that we shouldn't be on any type of social media i mean
our church is on social media our church has a facebook account we're on youtube right now
we're on facebook right now we use all these alternative sites there's nothing inherently
wrong with social media and i have to say that because i i've heard people say and teach that
there is stuff inherently wrong with social media that it is of itself a sin and that is not true
it's not what i'm going to be preaching tonight but this sermon need is for everyone every single
person needs this sermon myself included because probably all of us are on social media and social
media is not going away anytime soon in my opinion social media will probably be here until the day
the lord returns it's just something that is integrated into our society and i don't think
that it's ever going away and because of that we have to be careful as christians because there are
some snares with social media that can cause you to sin it's not sinful in and of itself but there
are some traps some snares that this new thing that's been brought into our lives can cause for us
that can cause us to sin and so we need to be careful with that and so point number one tonight
a snare of social media is social media wastes a lot of time social media wastes a lot of time
according to broadband search dot net it says that the average time spent daily on social media
in north america is two hours and six minutes a day keep in mind that's not including television
that's not including video games this is only what the average north american that includes mexico
and canada and the united states over two hours a day your average person is spending over two hours
a day on social media that is a lot of time now here's the thing you say oh who cares about two
hours a day well you know us as christians we have way less time to waste than the world does
because the world really lives for one thing and that's themselves the world really lives just to
make more money to have more free time to spend on entertainment and just fulfilling the lust of
the flesh fulfilling the lust of whatever they want to fulfill but you know what their time is
not spent doing reading the bible homeschooling kids going soul winning going to church three
times a week you know praying memorizing scripture we have way more to accomplish in this life than
just making money so therefore we have way less time that we can waste on social media than the
world does so a christian spending two hours a day on social media is going to be extremely
detrimental to your christian life look in ephesians chapter 5 look at verse number 15 it says see then
that ye walk circumspectly not as fools but as wise now the word circumspect means watchful
discrete discrete careful well thought out so bible is saying make sure you're walking make
sure you're living in a way that's well thought out that's careful that's not foolish look at verse
16 redeeming the time because the days are evil so when you're walking circumspectly you're
realizing that you have few time few days on this earth we don't have a lot of time on this earth
whereas the fool is not walking circumspectly and he's not counting the days he's just living his
life however he wants we need to be wise and realize that we don't have much time verse 17
wherefore be ye not unwise but understanding what the will of the lord is so someone who's wise
someone who's walking circumspectly what they're going to do is they're going to find out what the
will of the lord is and they're going to do that now the will of the lord for us as christians is a
lot of those things that i was talking about how about going to church is that something that is
god's will for our life absolutely hebrews chapter 10 tells us not to forsake the assembling of
ourselves together as the manner of some is that's something that should be a priority in our life
and guess what that takes a lot of time does it not i mean most of you guys live really far
away from the church building i'm really blessed i live literally two or three minutes away from
steadfast but you also have to make that extremely long commute then you come to church then we sing
the songs then we have the hour-long sermon or whatever it is then you got the hour hour plus
drive home that takes a lot of time and many of you do this three times a week that's a lot of
hours throughout your week that the world doesn't have to spend not only that i mean hopefully
everyone in here has a goal of reading the bible at least one time cover to cover per year that's
going to take at least 15 minutes a day of your time right there you know the bible commands us
to pray you know you know we're supposed to pray in the morning lift up our voice to god
in the morning we're supposed to pray without ceasing that's going to take some time in your
life we're supposed to memorize scripture that takes a lot of time that takes a lot of diligence
that takes you walking circumspectly meaning thinking about how you're spending your time
being wise about how you spend your time and thinking about what is the will of god for my
life when you think about that you're going to spend your time your time a lot differently look
at verse 18 and be not drunk with wine wherein is excess but be filled with the spirit so
contrasting these two things again the circumspect person who's the wise person and the person who's
not redeeming the time what do they do well they get drunk with wine and they're filled with excess
right and what what is more excess than having nothing to do than just scrolling on your phone
i mean that you have excess if it's like there's no work you could be doing right now there's no
bible you could be doing right now there's no memorization you can be doing there's no
soul winning you can be doing it's just like you have two plus hours a day to just scroll aimlessly
it wastes tons of time and you know for a lot of people they think well i'll just look at it for
five minutes and then an hour passes by and you went deep into that rabbit hole you went to the
discover page and you're finding stuff that you never thought you would ever see and you're just
getting dragged into who knows what you didn't plan on going into why because hey there's a
snare with social media that can just suck all your time from you and if you're wise if you're
circumspect you're going to think about that and use social media as a tool and not let it just use
you not let social media just control your life where it's the first thing you do when you wake
up the morning is you open the facebook app and you just start scrolling and the next thing you
know two hours of your day have passed by and you know there was a time where i used to spend a lot
of time on social media and then i got one of those phones that tells you that has like an app
timer that tells you how much time you're spending on it and i'm like good night how did i spend that
much time and so like i said this sermon is for everyone we all need to be aware of of these
traps because the devil wants to attack all of us right and so i'm looking at this i'm like good
night that's a lot of time and so that'd be one good way if you want to avoid this snare is set
up that app timer on your phone and it'll tell you how much time you've been spending on social
media and it might shock you you might think oh no i spent 15 minutes a day and you're like whoa
an hour and 15 minutes a day and that's not working that's not walking circumspectly i
guarantee you you have more important things to do in your life than spending an hour plus
two plus hours a day on social media there's a lot better things you can be doing with your time so
is social media sin no but it could be if you're wasting all your time if it's causing you to waste
time that god has given you to steward god has put you on this earth to do his will to walk
circumspectly to understand what the will of the lord is and then to do that not to be drunk with
wine not to be filled with excess but to be filled with the spirit that's what god wants us to do
to understand what the will of god is and choose to be filled with the spirit choose to do things
that will that will fill us with the with the spirit spending our time doing things that will
fill us with the spirit i'll read for you psalm 90 verse 12 it says so teach us to number our days
that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom and so it's a wise thing to to stop every once in a while
and realize that we don't have much time left on this earth and i don't care if you're 13 years old
or if you're 73 years old you know the bible says that our life is a vapor it just vanishes
away like that you know you could blink your eyes and think about your first day of kindergarten and
boom here we are in 2021 right i don't care how old you are life goes by fast and we don't have
just endless amount of time to be working for god we have to teach ourselves to number our days and
to walk circumspectly and to be wise with the time that we have go to exodus chapter number 20
exodus chapter number 20 exodus 20 look at verse 9 one of the 10 commandments or one of the
commandments of god in verse number 9 it says six days shalt thou labor and do all thy work now we
live in a very blessed country where most americans they don't work six days a week most americans they
only want that 40 hour work week there's places in the world like i believe france has even less
than a 30 or a 40 hour work week and it's like our human nature is we don't want to work but god
knows that we need to work we cannot just be idle we cannot just be wasting our time and i don't
care what country you're at i don't care who you are if you have two spare hours a day that you're
spending on social media it's because you're not working enough period whether that's working on
things in your spiritual life or working carnally to support your family or working in your home as
a mother or anything like that we're going to get to those things soon but you know god wants us to
work six days shout thou labor hey if god's blessed you with a job where you get saturday and sunday
off saturday is a good soul winning day isn't it there you go six days shout thou labor if you come
soul winning on a saturday and you work five days at your second secular job hey you're working six
days like god said i think that's what people should strive for is following god's system for
your life not corporate america's system for your life working six days a week leads me to point
number two it's point number one social media wastes a lot of time number two to go to first
Timothy five social media can make you a busy body social media can make you a busy body because
here's the problem when you become lazy when you become idle because of social media you have so
much extra time you're just scrolling it doesn't end at that it's not like you just become lazy and
that's the only problem that affects you no really the laziness is just a springboard for other sin in
your life laziness is where other sin begins at your life because you're not working the bible
talks about this in first timothy chapter number five look at verse number 13 it says and with all
they learn to be idle wandering about from house to house and not only idle but tattlers also
in busy bodies speaking things which they ought not now the bible describes a common issue with
women specifically this is talking about an unmarried woman who doesn't have kids to take
care of doesn't have a husband take care of doesn't have a house take care of what is she
she's wandering about house to house she's idle she's not working and what else is she doing
she's a busy body and she's speaking things which she ought not is her only issue that she's lazy
that she has all this excess time no it's that her excess time is causing her to lead her into
other sin her excess time is now causing her to be a busy body her excess time is now causing her
to run her mouth and say things that she should not say and can we just be honest in church
that the ladies struggle a little more with the social media than the guys do it's just a fact
you look up the statistics on social media use women use it more than guys do and it's just in
their nature to struggle with this a little bit more than the guys do that's why god describes
a single woman who's unmarried in this way now of course men can fall into this trap as well
and many people do but this is especially something you should take heed to if you're a woman
you know don't just allow yourself to get so uh have so much extra time where you're becoming
a busy body or you're speaking things which you shouldn't on social media just because you have
all this excess time it's it's not just the wasting time that's the problem is that when
you're not filling your time with anything good it's leading you into all this other garbage
this woman now is going house to house becoming a busy body and this is what you see on facebook
this is what you see on social media people being busy bodies people getting into other people's
business and not minding their own business not living their own life they want to get involved
in every single contention and fight and drama that they could possibly find on facebook why
because they're not working that's why because they have let all their free time they've let all
that excess time get to them and now it's not only causing them to be lazy it's causing them
to be a busy body go to proverbs keep your place there and go to proverbs chapter 26 proverbs
chapter 26 look at verse number 17 proverbs 26 it says he that passeth by and medalleth with strife
belonging not to him is like one that taketh the dog by the ears now us the soul winners in this
room we have a lot of experience with dogs don't we you know i used to really love dogs until i
became a soul winner and now i can't stand them because they hinder the gospel so bad and i mean
obviously i have dogs back home in idaho that are good dogs they don't bark when someone knocks on
the door but how annoying is it when you knock on the door and that just demonic dog is coming up
trying to stop the gospel it's horrible right but you know what it's funny think about all the dogs
that we've seen out so many imagine if you just went up to one of the dogs and just grabbed both
of its ears by your hands you know what happened to you blood would be drawn that's what would
happen to you you'd get destroyed and you'd look like an idiot for doing something so stupid like
who would go up to a dog and grab it by both of its ears you look like an idiot well that's
what you look like when you go get involved with strike that has nothing to do with you
and sometimes it's so funny on facebook you'll see people arguing living on opposite sides of
the country barely even know each other one person's rebuking the other has no authority
over the other person has no has nothing to do with this person's life and just rebuking them
getting in their business and it's like man you look so stupid right now why are you getting so
worked up over this why are you letting this uh control your day why are you spending your life
involved in contention that does not belong to you now here's the thing i'm not anti-contention
the bible says to earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered under the saints and if
you've ever been in a church like pure words baptist church for any length of time we are not
shy of contention we have no problem with contention but you know what's stupid is
contention not belonging to us no we actually want to contend for the things that the bible talks
about contend for things in your personal life it makes no sense to just be so contentious with
everyone and everything but the bible describes this woman in first Timothy five who she's she's
lazy she doesn't have time she goes house to house she's a busybody speaking things which she ought
not and you know what we need to learn this for our own sake this is good for us to learn because
we're the ones that are going to look stupid when we get involved with contention that doesn't
belong to us it's not like the other person is getting hurt by you being a jerk and getting
involved in contention no you're just making yourself look stupid you're making yourself
look as stupid in fact as someone that grabs a dog by both of its ears and expects nothing to
happen to you you look like a fool you look immature and it looks like you're lazy it looks
like you got nothing else better to do in your life than spend your time on facebook arguing with
random people it makes you look stupid and some people you know would be offended by this and
and not like this type of preaching but it's really for their own good because i don't want
you to look stupid god doesn't want you to look stupid and he wants you to be spending your time
doing things that are profitable look at verse 18 says as a mad man who casteth firebrands arrows
in death so is the man that deceiveth his neighbor and saith am not i in sport where no wood is
there the fire go without and where there is no tail bearer the strife ceaseeth what's funny is
the strife you think oh it already existed and then the tail bearer you know just makes things
worse it's like no where the tail bearer is gone there's no longer any strife and it's funny
throughout life you'll notice the same people in your life whether it's a family member or a friend
that you have on facebook or something like this and you will always see their name attached to
strife whether that's with your you know family reunions it's always that one same family member
that's getting into fights or it's on facebook you have that one facebook friend who comments
on every post and gets in a fight on every post and you know that if there's contention
that tail bearer will be there you'll see that name in that comment thread you know why because
that person's a tail bearer because that person is a busy body because that person is speaking
things which they ought not because they have too much time on their hands and it makes them look
foolish the bible says look at this verse again verse 20 where no wood is there the fire go without
and where there is no tail bearer the strife cease it verse 21 as coals are to burning coals
and wood to fire so is a contentious man to kindle strife i mean these people are just
drawn to strife they're just drawn to that dog and they just have to grab it by both ears
but when that person is gone when that tail bearer is gone you'll notice something
peace quiet not a bunch of stupid arguing and contention over nothing why because the tail
bearer is the one causing that strife the tail bearer is just creating strife out of their own
heart and why is it it's because they have too much time on their hand go to proverbs chapter 10
proverbs chapter 10 and look at verse 19 proverbs 10 19 it says in the multitude of words
there wanteth not sin but he that refraineth his lips is wise and this is such a fitting verse
for social media is it not you see a post and it's just a thread this long of someone just
letting them have it just getting everything off their chest well when there wanteth not words
or when sorry let me not misquote that in the multitude of words there wanteth not sin but he
that refraineth his lips is wise the wise thing a lot a lot of times to do in our lives whether
it's on social media or honestly in many many areas of our life the best thing that we can do is
learn to just close our mouth is learn to just shut our lips we save ourselves a lot of trouble
when we shut our lips you think about some of the most embarrassing things you've done in your
in your life i bet you have something to do with something you said it is for me it is for me
some some stupid thing that i said and embarrassed myself or said something dumb
and just made myself look foolish you know we all do that and it'd be a lot wiser just to shut our
mouths sometimes and so when you see the big contention that you have nothing to do with when
you see this on social media a lot of times it's the best thing to do is just to stay quiet and
just not comment on that on that dumpster fire or whatever type of of you know contention is going
on sometimes it's best just to not get involved with it and stay quiet so how do how do we fix
this how do we prevent ourselves from this temptation go back to first timothy five
first timothy five first timothy five look at verse number 14 says i will therefore that the
younger women marry bare children guide the house give none occasion to the adversary to speak
reproachfully for some are already turned aside after satan so the good news is that god has a
solution for this problem this this problem of ours our temptation to get involved with other
people's matters being a busy body our temptation with speaking things which we ought not god gives
us a way to where we can overcome this and what is it it's by working it's by working god gives him
give this list to the young lady of what he wants her to do to get married to bear children to guide
the house to give none occasion to the adversary to speak reproachfully and so you know you know
in this type of church a lot of ladies are working hard being homeschooling moms raising kids and
let me tell you something a mother that is doing her job as a mom a mother that is homeschooling
her kids correctly a mother that is raising her children in the nurture and admonition
of the lord teaching them the bible giving them the correction they need taking care of her husband
cleaning the house she is not going to have two plus hours a day to spare on facebook i can promise
you that i'm not saying that any woman that ever goes on social media oh it's because she's not
working hard enough she's not that's not what i'm saying i'm saying if you have two hours to spend
on social media it's because you're not working hard enough you know i okay you got two hours
can guests come over to your house at any time how's your house look right now you know if you
got two hours to spend on social media have you cleaned your house uh have you made nutritious
meals for your family are you reading your children the bible are you giving them the
discipline they need well if the answer is no maybe you shouldn't be spending two hours on
social media god gave ladies this workload to solve this problem of being a busy body
but it seems like when you go online you know you could identify their problem pretty easily when
you see them on every single post it's well they must not be taking care of the things that god
commanded them to do rather they're sacrificing that to spend time on facebook and that's why
there's the stereotypical you know mom watching soap operas all day that was the 1990s well welcome
to 2021 now it's facebook all day it's not soap operas all day and it is a true stereotype for
many women and god forbid that that would be true of the ladies in our church though
it doesn't have to be true of the of the ladies that go to pure words baptist church or steadfast
baptist church but you know it is a true thing for a lot of people but it's a shame and we should
not be like that mothers should not be acting that way and guess what neither should the men
god gave us a lot of work to do as men as well you know god gave us the role of spiritually leading
our families teaching them the word of god making sure that our families are going in
the right direction and providing for their physical needs in a world where it's getting
harder and harder and harder to provide off one income you know if a man has two plus hours to
spend on social media a day it's because he's not working hard enough it's the same answer you don't
see it quite as often i don't believe but it's the same answer and it's the same problem a lack of
work and hey if you tell me brother dylan i read my bible an hour today i prayed i went soul winning
i obeyed my parents i did all my school work or mother said i cleaned the house
i did all the meals i took care of my husband i did all these things and i still have two plus
hours to spend well you just go ahead and call pastor shelly and ask him what he needs done
because i'm sure he could find something for you to do then if you have two hours plus if still you
have two hours you're the perfect mom you take care of the kids just like you're supposed to and
you have two hours okay i'm sure pastor shelly will find you some more productive ways to use
that two hours than spending on facebook because there's a lot better work that we can be doing
than wasting our time on social media you say is social media a sin well if it causes you to
waste a bunch of time it can be is social media a sin well if it causes you to become a busy body
if it causes you not to be able to ever mind your own business if it causes you to always have to
open your mouth at every time you see something you disagree with open your mouth every time
you want to get into a fight well then it could be a sin absolutely the answer is getting back to
work focusing on the things that god wants us to focus on being circum circumspect being wise
caring about what the will of the lord is the will of the lord is working hard the will of
the lord is bearing children guiding the house giving none occasion to the adversary to speak
reproachfully the will of the lord is not you spending all your time on instagram becoming
a uh an influencer you're a sensi influencer uh essential oils influencer that's not god's will
god's will is for you to raise your kids number three another snare go to second corinthians 10
another snare that social media can cause is social media can cause you to compare yourselves
to others social media can cause you to compare yourselves to others you say what's the danger
of that look at look at uh first corinthians oh i'm sorry second corinthians chapter number 10
look at verse number 12 the bible says for we dare not make ourselves of the number or compare
ourselves with some that commend themselves but they measuring themselves by themselves
and comparing themselves among themselves are not wise so the apostle paul here in this chapter he's
doing a lot of correction and he's saying that it's not wise to compare yourself among yourself
and really what you see is you see two types of people when they compare themselves to other people
you either see them compare themselves and think that they're so much better than everyone else
or you see them compare themselves and think wow everyone else is so much better than me
and i'm nothing and both of these are harmful both of these are bad for you and both of these like
the bible says is unwise so the first person which is what you see more often on social media
is the person that compares themselves to everyone else and thinks that they are better that they're
filled with pride they get filled with pride because they compare themselves to other people's
life and a lot of social media is people just telling you how great they are telling you how
great of a house they have telling you how great of a life they have telling you how great of a
spouse they have telling you what what a great job they have it's just you see the pictures they
post you see the things they talk about and a lot of it is just vomiting here's how great i am in
comparison to you to all of their followers all the people that they follow i'll read for you
proverbs seven verse two it says let another man praise thee and not thine own mouth a stranger
and not thine own lips so we got to be careful not only of course of not praising ourselves with our
mouths we have to make sure that we're not with our actions with the things we post make it look
like we're just praising ourselves look at how big and bad i am look at how great of a person i am
because what do people do they compare followers oh i have a thousand followers on instagram how
many do you have 200 wow i'm certified i have a checklist next to my name you know people
especially in the world they actually care about this kind of stuff and this is like
so prestigious high school kids they care a lot about followers which is one of the reasons why
why apps like tiktok is so dangerous by the way because they're wanting to do more and more
provocative things to get followers and to get views and it attracts some wrong eyes we'll get
to that later you know this is a dangerous thing this is a dangerous thing to compare your others
yourself to others and think that you're better than them just because of some other area of
their life that they're not doing as well in and what's funny is people that compare themselves
they're usually only comparing one or two aspects of their life to a specific aspect of another
person's life like we'll talk about money or something i'd be like oh i make three hundred
thousand dollars a year and brother jeffrey only makes two hundred thousand dollars i'm so much
better than he is or they'll say you know oh you know i have a boat but brother so-and-so he
doesn't have any of this stuff but it's like yeah you know you're comparing financial things
and maybe you're in a financially better spot than them but it's like your wife is committing
adultery on you bro and his wife isn't who really has it better who really has a better life well
you know what people like to do is they just like focus on one thing but you know what it's not
impressive to find one area of your life that you're better at than other people anyone can
do that there's always going to be someone who's more of a loser than you are okay and if that's
really the game you want to play you really want to play the compare game where you want to see how
great you are yeah okay they'll always be someone who's a bigger loser than you are but that doesn't
mean that you're not still a loser and that doesn't mean that if you compare yourself to the word of
god that you're anywhere near the mark no you just want to pick that one aspect of your life
that you perceive as better meanwhile what you can't see is the hand of god working on someone's
life you know i bet you anything a poor person who lives in a rundown house who drives a beat-up
old car but who loves god who goes soul-winning i bet you have a way better life than these rich
people that have all that they want but they're not saved they're going to go straight to hell
it's a stupid comparison you don't want to compare yourselves other and think you're better than them
just because of some aspects of your life and on the flip side you don't want to compare yourself
to others and think that you're so much worse than them because of one aspect of your life you could
use that same example it's like you look at so-and-so and they have a lot more money than you
and you have way less money but oh yeah their wife is committing adultery on them who has it worse
you know what i mean there's always something that you have better than someone else and there's
always something that someone else has worse than you that's why paul said it's unwise to compare
ourselves because we all have problems we all have issues and no matter who you think in your life
it is is living up to the best life they could possibly live i guarantee you that they still have
problems second Corinthians 10 17 second Corinthians 10 i'm sorry i might have gone to the one wrong one
here but he that glorieth yeah verse 17 but he that glorieth let him glory in the lord for not
he that commended himself is approved but whom the lord commended and see that actually takes
fate when you live a life that's saying i don't care what man thinks about me i'm not going to
try to post all over the internet about how great i am how spiritual i am how much money i have what
a great house i have all these things why because it's not who man approves that's commended it's
who the lord approves but that actually takes faith but when we humble ourselves and realize
that man doesn't matter only god's approval of us matters we're going to be less likely to compare
ourselves to other people we're going to be less likely to want to put every aspect of our life
out there on display when all we care about is what god thinks about us anyways that's the type
of life that we should be living go back to first timothy chapter 5 first timothy chapter 5 you know
another thing is why it's unwise to compare yourself to someone else is because let's say
you're comparing to someone and you think that they have everything you know settled in their
life and they're living a great life it could be fake for all you know especially on social media
i mean you think people post the worst aspects of their life on social media no their profile picture
is the best picture that they could find of themselves okay they airbrush they put it on
photoshop they airbrushed it they put a filter over it the ladies stood at just the perfect
angle so they looked as skinny as possible that's what people do on social media they present their
best image when they take pictures of their kids and i understand because i try to take pictures
of bethany and it takes you know 20 of her screaming to get one of her smiling okay let's
apply that to your house when people take pictures of their house it's like you wouldn't have wanted
to see the 20 other takes you apply that to the dinners that people take pictures of and their
vacations and everything you don't even know if it's real on social media especially with people
you don't even know their life i mean it's foolish to compare yourself to people you don't even know
you don't even know if it's real and then people get all upset that their life isn't better and
it's like you have no idea what their problems are you have no idea if it's even real look at
first timothy 5 first timothy 5 look at verse 24 it says some men's sins are open beforehand
going before to judgment and some men they follow after this is saying you know some men we can just
see they're an open sin right and we we can see that they're a wicked person but some people it
follows after you may not know i mean you think about pastor donnie romero who was exposed as
being an adulterer for being a gambler for smoking marijuana i'm sure there's many people
that compare their lives to his and be like man i wish i was like donnie romero i wish i was as
good of a guy as donnie romero i wish i was as spiritual as donnie romero but it's like uh no
you don't want to compare yourself to donnie romero why because it was fake that's why because
it was a show and you never know what people are really like only themselves and god do so don't
compare yourself to them compare yourself to who you were yesterday maybe that's fine or compare
yourself to the word of god those are really the two only comparisons you should make especially
on social media look at verse 25 likewise also the good works of some are manifest beforehand
and they that are otherwise cannot be hid in the same way you know you can tell sometimes when
someone's a great person you can see the great works that they're doing and it's open it's open
for everyone to see but some people you know they do the hidden works some people don't do everything
on display you know you might see the guy preaching but you don't necessarily see the
people cleaning the building you don't necessarily see the people running a soul winning time that
one person shows up to that two people show up to a lot of times these hidden works you don't see
and you might never think oh i should be looking up to that person you're thinking no i gotta look
up to the person who's doing everything in the spotlight and obviously if the work that they're
doing is good amen follow them right but i'm what i'm just saying is that especially on social
media it's hard to discern what's real it's hard to discern what is real and the person that you
look up to that seems so great may be fake and the person that you should be looking up to
that's real that's doing great you might even know it not know their name you might not even
know their name you might not know how wise they are because they're not running their mouth on
every comment on every post you might not know that this person is someone who should be sought
for for guidance and for counsel on this situation because they're not commenting on anything they're
keeping their mouth shut and so it's dangerous to get your role models and to get your your role
models or to compare yourself to people online and you know what this is why i have a problem
and you do whatever you want the men are the pastors of their own home they could lead their
wives their own however they want i do not like the the housewife vlog movement where it's like
here's a video of me changing my kid's diaper here's a video of me doing the laundry here's
a video of me cooking dinner here's a picture of what my bedroom looks like here's a picture of
what you know whatever type of projects i'm doing look that is not a wise thing to be doing because
here's the thing women are going to compare themselves to these ladies online and they're
going to say wow how is her home always so perfect how is everything always so perfect in her life
how is she reading the bible how is she praying how is she raising all these godly children and
makes these perfect meals and has the perfect family and it's like it may not be perfect
it may be fake is what it is you have no idea some men's sins are open beforehand you have no
idea if it's even real and then people want to compare themselves and come up with these
ridiculous expectations for their life that they need to be the next internet superstar they need
to be in the next female housewife influencer know what you need to do is have a meek and quiet
spirit you know i like that my home is a sanctuary it is a holy place i like that no one knows what
my wife looks like doing laundry then me no one knows what my wife looks like cooking a meal then
me no one knows all the things that my wife does around the house no one needs to know no one cares
no one cares listen listen when men go to work how weird to be here's me starting my work truck
here's me picking up the asphalt from the plant oh here's me shoveling a hole here's me riding a
sermon here's me praying here's me answering a phone call here's me leading a sony time it's
weird you know what it is it's pride it's puffing yourself up wanting everyone to see what your life
is like and like i said it's not like you know you can do whatever you want it's you can do
whatever you want i just don't want my wife doing that and i think that it's unseemly i think that
it causes people to compare themselves to other women and then think worse of themselves because
they're not hitting that fake imaginary mark that people put online that you can just have your
house perfect at all times and be a spiritual superstar and be the best wife ever and always
look perfect or whatever you know it's fake it's completely fake and i don't want my wife i don't
want my wife looking up to women that are influential online because the bible says
that a woman of a meek and quiet spirit is of great price and so i want my wife to compare herself
to women that she knows in real life that are the real deal people like miss carry pastor shelly's
wife people like her mother sherry tomson sherry tomson pastor tomson's wife people that she
actually knows in her life actually have raised godly children actually are the real deal in
their christian walk they're not fake they're not just trying to get a following on the internet
they're not just wanting to flaunt themselves all over the internet for everyone to see that's not
a good role model for women go to titus chapter number two titus chapter number two what does the
bible say in verse three the aged women likewise that they be in behavior remember that word
behavior as becomeeth holiness not false accusers not given to much wine teachers of good things
you say oh see look the bible says that women should be teaching that means that they should
go on the internet and have a vlog and post every day about how to be the perfect wife
no the bible says that they should be in behavior they should be teaching other women through their
behavior through their example we're not going to sit down and have a class or anything like that
led by the ladies look at verse four that they may teach the young women to be sober to love
their husbands to love their children to be and notice this word discrete discrete knowing what
is appropriate and what is not appropriate being able to withhold things that are private information
you know it is not discrete when i've never been to someone's home but i know what every square
inch of it looks like because their wife posts videos of themselves in it every single day or
i know every single thing about this woman and how she lives her life why because she's broadcasted
it to the whole world that is not teaching women to be discrete it's not if you have a problem with
it take it up with titus chapter 2 the bible says that the elder women should be teaching younger
women to be discrete not to get a name for themselves not to get a following for themselves
no rather the godly woman is actually lifting up her husband not lifting up herself not trying to
draw all the eyes to herself it's not good to be discrete chased keepers at home you know how are
you going to get seen by the world when you're staying at when you're keeping at home the time
when the bible is written you know you didn't have tiktok you didn't have instagram you didn't have
all these things if you're keeping at home you're not going to get a following for yourself so if
you have a following for yourself there's something wrong as a woman good obedience to their own
husbands that the word of god be not blasphemed we'll talk about that that last phrase there on
sunday we're talking about blasphemy but the bottom line is you know make sure on social media that
you're not allowing yourself to get all these example uh people or to look up to people that
you shouldn't be looking up to that's what i'm trying to say whether men or women men don't look
up to guys on social media that dress like a fag that have that wear skinny jeans that are prideful
that are covetous they don't take care of their family don't look up to someone like that and
ladies don't look up to someone that is the antithesis of a meek and quiet spirit i mean
what's the opposite of quiet how about talking i mean hello and it's like all these women just
want to make videos themselves talking and talking giving advice here's how you do this here's how
you do this here's me doing my whole life look don't look up to people like that that is not
the real deal that's the person that's fake that's the person that's putting on an image
that's putting on a show don't let your daughters or your wives look up to people
like that it's not a good thing lastly here go to genesis chapter number 34 genesis 34 the last
snare with social media is that social media can compromise your safety and your purity social media
can compromise your safety and your purity you know unfettered just unsupervised access to the
internet is a great way for fornicators and adulterers to commit sin and unfettered
unsupervised unsupervised access to the internet and to social media is a great way for predators
to commit crimes it is like it is heaven for these fornicators and adulterers and predators
on all the tools that social media gives them to commit these sins and crimes you know the social
media outlets can be a good tool but let me tell you they can also be very very dangerous tools as
well i want to read for you an article and you know what for every for every article like this
i read i've seen a hundred of these in my life and i'm sure you guys have too the title is
the hidden problem social media's role in human trafficking and sexual exploitation in the midst
of a national debate about social media company's obligation to monitor and remove volatile posts on
their platforms many believe the easy access to child exploitation content is largely overlooked
it's easy to get rid of trump off twitter but they can't get child pornography off of twitter and
snapchat said lycoming county detective william weber the county's chief investigator of child
abuse crimes so this detective this police officer he's a detective he's saying look these platforms
they can't rid themselves of all the child pornography and all the filth and all the smut
on these websites and i can't tell you how many times i've seen a law enforcement press conference
when they're like okay parents be aware of these apps instagram snapchat tiktok you know law
enforcement is warning people about this the u.s military banned tiktok for a while for security
reasons which is a separate issue but it's like even some people in the world understand
how dangerous some of these apps can be and yet some christian parents are so foolish as to give
their children complete unfettered access to social media and to the internet and it's craziness
because of the stuff that is out there and your little johnny is not so pure as to never do some
of this on purpose first of all and even if he is well who's to say he's not to run into it on
accident it absolutely can happen let's keep reading this it says initially weber said that
it looked like it could have been a sex trafficking case but soon he realized i might have skipped
something here oh yeah for weber the majority of exploitation cases involved dating apps or websites
like snapchat facebook or twitter he recalled a case involving a 15 year old girl who used a
dating app to solicit let's just say relations from two adult males initially weber said it looked
like it could have been a sex trafficking case but soon he realized that the young girl was trafficking
herself a 15 year old girl got on some of these websites and was trafficking her self and i bet
you the parents would say i would have never thought i would have never thought that my daughter
would do something like that but you know foolishness is bound in the heart of the child
and you cannot just leave this kind of stuff to chance the parents are never going to get that
one back that they messed up big time and of course the young girl is who's really responsible
for her sin but as his parents we have to protect our children and protect our spouses as well
because all of this stuff is just as vulnerable to our spouses the the article says relations was
never really normalized for her what's right what's wrong detective weber said 20 years ago
you didn't have the internet and it was harder to find now you can sit at home on your bed and it's
all there a 2020 study by the tech transfer transparency project showed that between january
of 2013 and december of 2019 over 300 cases of child exploitation went unnoticed by facebook
just children that are either being trafficked by wicked people or just pictures of them being
exploited by wicked reprobates over 300 cases just facebook didn't do anything about and
facebook is one of the most well funded well established imagine what some of these other
sites are like if if it's getting past facebook i guarantee you it's getting past tiktok i guarantee
you it's getting past instagram and and social media companies like this despite claiming to
have strict policies on distributing exploitative content the social media mammoth only identified
a small percentage of the cases to the u.s department of justice the other 366 cases were
reported to the doj by individual users on other data gathering methods and remember these social
media companies they're only trying to censor what's illegal they're not trying to censor what's
immoral they're only trying trying to censor the child pornography they're not trying to censor
the adultery websites they're not trying to censor dating apps where you can just go meet a random
stranger and be unfaithful to your spouse they're not trying to censor those you think that you
think that that stuff is not a danger absolutely it is they're not even trying to censor it it's
just there the report goes on to show that the child exploitation cases include disturbing images
of sexual abuse recruiting children and sex trafficking for amber morningstar program director
at the ywca's wise operations in williamsport the biggest problem for young adults is snapchat a
social media app that allows users to send each other photos with the app which the app then
soon deletes afterwards i wonder if teenagers would use that for anything bad sending pictures
to each other where the picture just disappears you know that sounds like a great idea i'm sure
whoever invented that had really pure motives stupidity we find a lot that a girl thinks she
is in a relationship and can trust the person and shares a picture of herself and it is
screenshotted it's a great way for your child to ruin their life to do something stupid and
it's not like this child is a reverberate for doing something like that look we're all centers
here and kids do stupid stuff but it's like that's a great way to ruin your kid's life for them to
have some screen-shotted image of your daughter how would you like that to happen it'd be horrible
i wouldn't want that on anyone these images spread like wildfire she said and can turn into a form of
human trafficking while the line between sexual exploitation and human trafficking through social
media can be hard to distinguish morningstar said trafficking is anytime someone exerts
power over another person for their own personal gain it could be something as local as just the
high school kids sharing pictures or something larger where you have a truck stop where victims
would be picked up so it's like not only is it just the traditional human trafficking where it's
like you get kidnapped and taken to a horrible place it's like no you can just be blackmailed
for the pictures that these teenagers have been sending to each other and the high school bullies
can go around and hang this picture that they have of some girl over her head and force her
to do a bunch of bad stuff and it's like the point of showing you all that is to show you
that social media has a big snare of compromising your safety and your purity and we should take
this and we should apply this to every single person don't just think that because you're an
adult that something horrible isn't going to pop up on your screen and drag you away too no we need
to all make sure that we're taking heed to ourselves you're in genesis 34 and i was thinking of a verse
to to match this point look at verse 34 verse 1 it says and dina the daughter of leah which she
bear unto jacob went out to see the daughters of the land so you have this woman dina the daughter
of leah and she's just going out to see the daughters of the land dad's not with her husband's
not with her brother's not with her she's just on her own you could say that she's just unsupervised
she has unfettered access to the daughters of the land she's going to go out on her own
and see how that works out for her verse two and when she come the son of hamore the hivite prince
of the country saw her he took her and lay with her and defiled her now you think diana you think
she would have been defiled if her dad was with her absolutely not you think she would have been
defiled if her brother was with her if she was married if her husband was with her no but because
she was alone because she was by herself she had just no supervision whatsoever she went out to see
the daughters of the land she wasn't looking to go out and get defiled but what happened anyways to
her she got defiled and these social media apps you know predators use this all the time the
private message the links that they can send all the horrible things that people can do on social
media and you know what to get into it in detail would be shameful to speak of those things which
are done of them in secret we're not going to get into the details of it but let me warn you if you
don't want your daughter or your son to be like this where they become defiled you cannot or your
spouse or your spouse you cannot just let them have unfettered just supervised access to social
media not only because it may cause them to be lazy not only because it may cause them to be a
busybody and say stupid things and be someone that just blows their mouth off not only because
it may cause them to compare themselves to other people to lose their joy by comparing people that
they think is better than them or not only because it might make them prideful because they're
comparing themselves and thinking they're so much better but also because it could rob them of their
purity it can rob them of their safety and if that happens to someone you love you will never
forgive yourself you will never be able to take that back if if something happened to my daughters
because of my negligence man i couldn't imagine how hard that would be and how how much pain i
would feel because of that and so let's just all take a warning tonight not not to get offended
just because oh you have a facebook look i have a facebook too okay and like i said this stuff is
not going away anytime soon i don't believe but we need to make sure that these snares are not
entrapping us and causing us to be sinful and causing us to be a worse christian than if we
were not on them to begin with and maybe your answer i don't think this is for everyone but
maybe your answer is maybe you just can't handle it maybe you just need to get off social media
maybe you cannot take the steps to guard yourself from these things and if that's the case
better to just not have it and not have these snares better to just plug out your eye better
to just chop off your hand you know if you can't deal with it in the last verse i want to read is
proverbs 4 26 it says ponder the path of thy feet and let all thy ways be established every once in
a while it's good to just take inventory of our life and just say is there anything i'm doing
that's that's a hindrance in my walk with god is there anything i'm doing that's causing me to sin
and if any of these points hit home with you tonight which like i said this sermon's for
everyone a lot of these have applied to me in the past and may in the future if i'm not careful
all of us can fall to this we need to ponder the path of our feet think about is this something
that i need to work on and guard ourselves our spouses and our children from the snares of social
media let's have a word of prayer lord thank you for this day and thank you so much for all the
tools that you do give us that we can use to get the gospel out and to get our message of our church
out lord and to stay in contact with friends and family that live far away and to to share our lives
with them even though that we don't live in the same place lord i just pray that you would help
us to be careful for the pitfalls and the snares that social media can prevent for present to our
lives i pray that you protect every family in here give us wisdom and give us grace to be able
to protect our families and ourselves in the jesus name we pray amen all right for our last song
go to song 105 all that thrills my soul song 105 all that thrills my soul song 105 all that thrills
my soul on the first thank you all for coming you are dismissed