(Disclaimer: This transcript is auto-generated and may contain mistakes.)

you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you grab a hymnal turn your song books 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 applied glory to his name glory to his name glory to his name there to my heart was the blood applied glory to his name I am so wondrously saved from sin Jesus so sweetly abides within there at the cross where he took me in glory to his name glory to his name glory to his name there to my heart was the blood applied glory to his name oh precious fountain that saves from sin I am so glad I have entered in there Jesus saves me and keeps me clean glory to his name glory to his name glory to his name there to my heart was the blood applied glory to his name on the last to this fountain so rich and sweet cast thy poor soul at the Savior's feet plunge into day and be made complete glory to his name glory to his name glory to his name there to my heart was the blood applied glory to his name 187 Jesus loves me 187 Jesus loves me on the first Jesus loves me this I know for the Bible tells me so little ones to him belong they are weak but he is strong yes yes Jesus loves me yes Jesus loves me yes Jesus loves me the Bible tells me so Jesus loves me he who died heavens gate to open wine he will wash away my sin let his little child come in yes Jesus loves me yes Jesus loves me yes Jesus loves me the Bible tells me so Jesus loves me he will stay close beside me all the way thou hast bled and died for me I will henceforth live for thee yes Jesus loves me yes Jesus loves me yes Jesus loves me the Bible tells me so good 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 am Sunday evenings at 5.30 pm and Thursdays 7 pm our Bible study we'll take a pause through the book of Acts tonight Pastor Shelley is at a camping trip with the Old Baptist Church in Georgia and so we hope him and his family have a great time they much deserve this 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 we have our soul winning times Sunday at 2 pm Thursday 5.15 Saturday at 10 am and all those meet at the church and we have a couple 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 on Monday, besides Monday is there anything else for this week? Okay, alright, sounds good I know Brother Sampson and I did some soul warning today so that's sometimes how it goes you have weeks like that, but we just gotta 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 was sent out by Pastor Jimenez he's a great preacher and friend so we're looking forward to having him if you want a little weekend getaway, 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 gonna 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 in to the email and we will get that added to the list and with that we'll go to our third song put a song number 100 day by day song 100 day by day song 100 day by day on the first day by day and with each passing moment strength I find to meet my trials here trusting in my father's wise bestowment I've no cause for worry or for fear he whose heart is kind beyond all measure gives unto each day what he deems best lovingly it's part of pain and pleasure mingling toil with peace and rest every day the Lord himself is near me with a special mercy for each hour all my cares he fain would bear and cheer me he whose name is counselor and power the protection of his child and treasure is a charge that on himself he laid as thy days thy strength shall be in measure this the pledge to me he made help me then every tribulation so to trust thy promises O Lord that I lose not faith sweet consolation offered me within thy holy word help me Lord when toil and trouble meeting ere to take us from a father's hand one by one the days the moment's fleeting till I reach the promised land Good, sing it this time. Brother Sampson will come read Ephesians chapter 5 Ephesians chapter 5 Right, Ephesians chapter number 5 We'll all turn there and follow along with me as we read this chapter together Be ye therefore followers of God as your children and walk in love as Christ also had loved us and hath given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet smelling savior but fornication and all uncleanness or covetousness let it not be once named among you as becometh saints neither filthiness nor foolish talking nor jesting which are not convenient but rather giving of thanks for this ye 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 cometh the wrath of God upon the children of disobedience be ye not ye therefore partake as with them for you are sometimes darkness but now are ye light in the Lord walkest children of light for the fruit of the spirit is in all goodness and righteousness and truth proving what is acceptable unto 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 reproved are made manifest by the light for whatsoever does make manifest is light wherefore he saith awake thou that sleepeth and arise from the dead and Christ shall give thee light see then that ye walk circumspectly not as fools but as wise redeeming the time because the days are evil wherefore be ye 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 unto 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 wives 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 loveth his wife loveth himself for no man ever yet hated his own flesh but nourishes and cherishes it even as the Lord the church for 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 unto his wife and they too shall be one flesh. This is a great mystery but I speak concerning Christ and the church nevertheless that every one of you in particular so love his wife even as himself and the wives see that she reverents her husband bow your heads for a quick word of prayer Heavenly Father we come before you again thanks for joining us to get ahead of our congregation and for blessing us again with young brother Dylan all the coming priest we give you thanks for the soul winning even though more warning than soul winning we give you thanks for the opportunity to do that spend time with each other and fellowship while we do it. Father we always pray and ask your name in Jesus Christ's name Amen. Amen. Alright well thank you all for coming tonight and thank you Pastor Shelley as 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 5 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've heard people say and teach that there is stuff inherently wrong with social media and 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 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 broadbandsearch.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 at Ephesians chapter 5 look at verse number 15 it says see then that you walk circumspectly not as fools but as wise. Now the word circumspect means watchful discrete careful well thought out. So the 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 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 where in his 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 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 could be doing there's no soul winning you could 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 in 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's for everyone we all need to be aware 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 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 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 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 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 shalt thou labor if you come soul winning on a Saturday and you work five days at your 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 social media wastes a lot of time number two to go to 1st Timothy 5 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 1st 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 Tatler's also in busybodies 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 to take care of doesn't have a house to 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 busybody and she's speaking things which she ought not it's 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 busybody 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 have so much extra time where you're becoming a busybody or you're speaking things which you shouldn't on social media just because you have all this excess time 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 busybody and this is what you see on Facebook this is what you see on social media people being busybodies 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 busybody 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 meddleth with strife belonging not to him is like one that taketh the dog by the ears now us as 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 strife 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 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 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 unto 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 1st Timothy 5 who 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 it says 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 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 goeth out and where there is no tail bearer the strife ceaseth 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 life I bet you it has something to do with something you said it is for me it is for me 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 mouth 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 contentions going on sometimes it's best just to not get involved with it and stay quiet so how do we fix this how do we prevent ourselves from this temptation go back to 1 Timothy 5 1 Timothy 5 1 Timothy 5 look at verse number 14 says I will therefore that the younger women marry bear 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 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 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 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 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 today 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 Shelley 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 Shelley 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 social media sin well if it causes you to waste a bunch of time it can be is social media sin well if it causes you to become a busybody 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 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 an influencer a sensi influencer 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 ten 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 first Corinthians oh I'm sorry second Corinthians chapter number ten look at verse number twelve 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 7 verse 2 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 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 like oh I make $300,000 a year and brother Jeffrey only makes $200,000 a year 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 okay there'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 run down 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 safe they're going to go straight to hell it's a stupid comparison you don't want to compare yourselves to others 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 is living up to the best life they could possibly live I guarantee you that they still have problems 2 Corinthians 10 17 2 Corinthians 10 I'm sorry I might have gone to the wrong one here and see that actually takes faith 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 1 Timothy 5 1 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 in 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 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 got to 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 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 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 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 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 however they want I do not like the housewife vlog movement where it's like here's a video of me changing my kids 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 the next female housewife influencer no 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 than me no one knows what my wife looks like cooking a meal than 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 when men go to work how weird are you 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 writing 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 Carey Pastor Shelley's wife people like her mother Sherry Thompson Sherry Thompson Pastor Thompson'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 2 Titus chapter number 2 what does the Bible say in verse 3 the aged women likewise that they be in behavior remember that word behavior as becometh 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 everyday 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 4 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 what 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 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 obedient to their own husbands that the word of god be not blasphemed we'll talk about that last phrase there on Sunday we're going to talk 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 of 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 wear skinny jeans that are prideful that are covetous that 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 of themselves talking and talking and 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 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 beware of these apps Instagram Snapchat TikTok you know law enforcement is warning people about this the US 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 herself 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 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 they messed up big time and of course the young girl is who's really responsible for her sin but us as 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 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 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 it's getting past Facebook I guarantee you it's getting past TikTok I guarantee you it's getting past Instagram 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 US 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 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 morning star program director at the YWCA 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 reprobate for doing something like that look we're all sinners here and kids do stupid stuff but it's like that's a great way to ruin your kids life for them to have some screenshotted 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 morning star 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 Dinah the daughter of Leah which she bear unto Jacob went out to see the daughters of the land so you have this woman Dinah 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 2 and when Shechem the son of Hamor the Hivite prince of the country saw her he took her and lay with her and defiled her now you think Dinah 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 or 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 un 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 busy body 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 something happened to my daughters because of my negligence man I couldn't imagine how hard that would be and how much pain I would feel because of that and so let's just all take a warning tonight 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 just chop off your hand you know if you can't deal with it and 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 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 is 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 share our lives with them even though 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 and in Jesus name we pray amen alright for our last song go to song one hundred and five all that thrills my soul song one hundred and five all that thrills my soul song one oh five all that thrills my soul on the first who can cheer the heart like Jesus by his presence all divine true and tender pure and precious oh how blessed to call him mine all that thrills my soul is Jesus he is more than life to me and the fairest of ten thousand in my blessed Lord I see love of Christ so freely given grace of God beyond degree mercy higher than the heavens deeper than the deepest sea all that thrills my soul is Jesus he is more than life to me and the fairest of ten thousand in my blessed Lord I see on the third what a wonderful redemption never can a mortal know how my sin though red like crimson can be whiter than the snow all that thrills my soul is Jesus he is more than life to me and the fairest of ten thousand in my blessed Lord I see every need his hand supplying every good in him I see on his strength divine relying he is all in all to me all that thrills my soul is Jesus he is more than life to me and the fairest of ten thousand in my blessed Lord I see on the last by the crystal flowing river with the ransomed I will see and forever and forever praise and glorify the king all that thrills my soul is Jesus he is more than life to me and the fairest of ten thousand in my blessed Lord I see God bless. Thank you all for coming. You are dismissed.