So...I deleted my Facebook account on Wednesday afternoon. Actually, I just deactivated it. I can log back in, activate it again and it will be like I never left. But I have no plans to do that.
I have felt a calling, a gentle nudge, from the Lord to get rid of Facebook for a while now. Like a long, loooooong time. But Facebook is fun, so I ignored Him. Not proud of that. I would take a week long break here and there. I'd try the "I won't stay logged in so every time I have to enter my password and it will be annoying so I won't do it" trick to cut back on how much time I spent on there. I would only log in every other day. All of these worked for a short time, but old habits die hard and I'd eventually find myself back in my daily habit of wasting time. I never fully gave it up to God. I never fully left Facebook as He was calling me to do so every time, my efforts failed.
Is Facebook inherently bad? No, not by any means. It, like many things of the world, is what you make it. For me it had become an idol; Something I put more time and thought into than God himself. I checked it first thing in the morning and last thing at night. I checked right before I left home and first thing when I got back. I "jumped on real quick" when I was bored. I logged in to Facebook more than I opened my Bible.
And on top of that, I don't like what Facebook has become. I had a few friends who truly use it as a means of communication. I had a few friends that posted the most wonderful scriptures and used it as a platform for collecting prayer requests and I had friends who genuinely wanted people to know what was happening with their families and in their lives. But then there were the rest. They were like sharks in the water just waiting to attack when someone posted something they didn't like. They complained about their bad day, their ungrateful boss, their insensitive husbands and their disobedient children. They tried to "one-up" others by telling a story of how their kid did it at a younger age or their husband fixed it faster. They needed to compete for the best of the best and the worst of the worst. My newsfeed was full of complaints, negativity, conflict and pride. These are not things of God. These are not things that His children feed themselves with on a regular basis.
It is my hope and prayer that by stepping back I will start actually connecting with people. Like in real life. Face to face. Reading status updates and knowing what happened to someone is not the same as having a friend and being involved in their life. I want to play with my kids more. I want to dig - really dig - into God's word.
If you need me, friends, please email, call or text. Just because I'm not in your newsfeed, doesn't mean I'm not still here.
