Forgive me, but I’m about to go all Southern on y’all and I might even rant a minute.
Try to keep up.
...but I’m just tired of heading over to facebook, Instagram, youtube and my inbox to see if I’m famous yet. If I’m accepted. If anybody sees me. If I’m getting it right.
I know I’m not the only one. Does this make me feel better? NO! It makes me incredibly sad. Why would I feel better if that means that someone is battling something that has robbed SO much out of my life. That’s not something to celebrate.
And by the way, this kind of thing started way before social media was a thing.
I’m just over trying to be like anybody else.
I can’t do it.
Shoot. I have a hard enough time just trying to be myself, much less anybody else!
Don’t get me wrong. I’m not shy. I actually love Instagram.
But seriously! It’s designed to trip you up, trap you in and take you down in the sense that they make sure you are not satisfied with who you are, you are not moving fast enough and you are certainly not wearing the right thing. It is designed to be addictive. It’s called marketing. Otherwise, why would the top execs of these social media creators send their kids to private schools that don’t allow cell phones? Answer me that!
It should maybe come with a warning like they have on cigarettes. “WARNING: You know the rest.”
What has spurred on this rant?
Yesterday, I posted a reel. (For those of you who are not at home on Instagram, that’s a short video that you can add captions, music and filters to.) I was so proud of my ever so much older than twenty year old self for figuring out how to do it.
We were headed to the airport and there’s this spot where you can see the space needle over the water from underneath a bridge. The trestles, or whatever you call them, were making a pattern that I love. It feels like when I used to lie down in the backseat of our car before shoulder straps were a thing for seatbelts. I’d put my head on the armrest and look up and the telephone poles as the wires would dip and rise to a rhythm that matched the percussion of the tires over an old highway. Only I could hear it because I was the only one taking it in.
But headed toward the airport, I admit I was feeling a little melancholy. Another goodbye. Someone I love getting on the plane and me stuck on the ground again in so many ways.
ANYway, that bridge does the same thing for me as those telephone poles. And I love it. So I videoed it, wrote my clever heartfelt caption and looked for some music that made me feel like I was about to get on the plane myself and go someplace. I only listened to the first few lines. Liked it. Attached it. Posted. BIG MISTAKE.
I wondered why I got over 2K views and ALL these followers and “loves” from people who are totally foreign to my world view. They are the kind of guys who post a fake profile with numbers behind their fake names looking for some new victim to fill the same ancient void that was planted in the heart of man when we ate from the tree that said, “You get to be your own god now. Have fun with that.”
They make me mad.
In fact, the whole thing makes me so angry. And in an effort to provide something guilt free on IG, I got had.
My awesome kids, who know me, know my heart, have my back. They both texted, “Hey, Mama. That song you attached is not one you want to be associated with.”
It was a song by a well known artist. It was new. I’ve watched this artist try to pivot his life toward purity, but apparently the pivot didn’t drill deep into this particular song. I haven’t listened to it. I won’t. But do I judge this modern day poet? No. Sheesh. How can I?
How can I judge someone who gets so much “love” for something that isn’t love and expect him not to be confused? He’s new to this walk. He’s new to adulthood, for pete’s sake. Why would I put a double standard on him when he’s just walked into grace? NOT the, “oh you’re fine, Jesus love you, you can do anything you want even if you destroy your own life and the lives of others” definition of grace. PEOPLE! We are redefining the miracle right out of grace!
(I told you I was going to rant. But there’s a time to be angry and apparently this is my time.)
BACK TO THE REEL.
I tried to take it down and our “high speed” wifi wouldn’t even let me do it! (Gotta love em… insert habitual “aarrrgh” here. I once asked our neighbor if they had the same problems or was it just our house. He said, “Oh, I’m not allowed to call them anymore.” But that’s another rant for another day that’s not worth writing about.)
I FINALLY was able repost the reel with an apology and a new music attachment by Lauren Daigle about how Jesus takes our shame. Why that song? Because my stupid mistake covered me in shame. And I had a choice.
Wallow in it. Or learn from it and let it be a perfect example of forgiveness.
And every one of my friends in their teens and 20’s who got really confused by it and were maybe asking, “Why would Mrs C post that song? And if she thinks it’s ok then I guess I’m ok filling my mind with it…”
AAAARGH! I’m SO sorry!!!! I am not beating myself up, but I AM saying to myself and all of us who are honest thinkers, WAKE UP!!!!!
Words matter.
Words wrapped in music, no matter how good the beat, matter.
And right now, someone is saying, “You’re overreacting.” Welcome to the slow boiling pot. As for me? I’m climbing out before I have tartar sauce on my head.
As I reposted that same video footage, my heart broke for all those “Johns” who thought I was there to be exploited. Come here, dear lost “fakename1966” and I will tell you what love is. And it’s not what you’re selling and buying.
I have been super shy to talk about Jesus on IG because I don’t want to be one the “those” people that get censored and made fun of.
BUT LISTEN!!! My son and absolutely all men who go on social media are faced with a constant battle with a highly sophisticated plan that clicks them into addiction and uses their algorithm to bathe them in the temptation with every click My son is leading others into freedom. It is hard to watch. It is beautiful to witness. And I hear my bleeding, risen, all powerful Jesus say, “It is finished.”
He’s the same son who texted this morning to say, “hey, momma! Love you! Haha i think you put a song on your reel that you dont want there. Haha. I would suggest taking it down.”
My daughter had already gently said the same, but I literally fell asleep in the car and forgot.
Sometimes we need repeated love to deliver us from “stupid” and “lazy” and “it’s no big deal” and “no one watches what I do anyway.”
Well apparently, 2K are watching me.
What’s really sad? IG will not let that reel be seen by the same 2K. So I’m asking Holy Spirit for something miraculous that will fly in the face of the enemy and lead to the direct salvation of every single lost and hurting addict that saw my post.
YOU are loved by the ONLY one who can fill that craving pit in your gut. But it will cost you something. It will cost you your shame. It will cost you your guilt. It will cost you the loss of the rejection you hide behind as if that wall can really protect you.
But for that dirty rag or that tottering wall you turn in, you’ll get freedom in exchange - and the key to your identity.
Trade in your reel for your real.
Jesus sees you. And He loves you. Really.
love,
©2021 Lydia Davis Crouch