WARNING: This episode may trigger you…and you may even get mad at me. But if you hang with me till the end, I promise you’ll love where it takes you…even if it does get a little uncomfortable (and personal) in the middle.
Do you know that I love you? I really do. And so I want you to hear what God has laid on my heart to share today with love. And know that He’s doing this hard work on my heart too.
Is anyone still listening? Oh good- you’re here. Just gonna say that says something about you…cuz those who don’t don’t really wanna grow already clicked on to the next podcast that will tickle their ears with what they want to hear….
Paul describes these people in 2 Timothy 4:3-4…
“For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths.”
How did he know that’s exactly what people would be doing over 2,000 years later? Because that’s human nature starting way back in the garden.
I mention The Daily Grace Co resources often on the podcast because not only do I use them, but because they point us towards truth. A really impactful resource is their Redeeming Your Phone-Time Bible Study Companion (sound familiar? It should cuz that’s what inspired the REDEEM Her Phone-Time Challenge Series we’re in). Let me read this section from Day 5 that will set up our conversation for today….
From the beginning of God’s redemptive plan with His chosen people, human beings have tried to make gods out of things that do not deserve their worship. They have also tried to set themselves up as gods. We often do both of these things when we spend too much time with our phones. We idolize our devices and look to them to fulfill a need only the Lord can satisfy. And we sometimes attempt having people worship us through the use of different social media platforms, where we set up our profiles as highlight reels of our lives to show others how great we are.
Perhaps you suspect the message here is that we should just throw our phones away and forget about them, but that is not the message. Phones are not inherently evil. They are not the problem. The problem resides in the heart of the user.
Yes and AMEN. This is exactly what we’ve been talking about since back on Episode 105 up till now. Our phones don’t push buttons, download apps, share, like and post on their own…we do. And as Jesus taught in Matthew 12:34, “Out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks.” And, I might add, the mind thinks and the fingers click. It’s about the condition of the heart.
That’s why it’s possible for some women to use their phone to glorify God while others use it to glorify others…or themselves.
Ok, so far this has felt pretty comfortable, like we’re just having a casual conversation over a cup of coffee…but here’s were we’re gonna dig in and I’m gonna poke some holes to see what truly flows out of you. Are you ready? Let’s start with an important question-
Are YOU a hypocrite?
Crickets. Still here???
Let me lighten things up with a fun Sunday School song I remember from when I was a kid….
I don’t’ wanna be a hypocrite. I don’t wanna be a hypocrite.
Cuz they’re not hip with it. I don’t wanna be a hypocrite.
The song had a few other verses too…
I don’t wanna be a Sadducee. I don’t wanna be a Sadducee.
Cuz they’re so sad you see. I don’t wanna be a Sadducee.
And
I don’t wanna be a Pharisee. I don’t wanna be a Pharisee.
Cuz they’re not fair you see. I don’t wanna be a Pharisee.
Funny, but not. The chorus brings us back to where we do wanna be…
I just wanna be a sheep- baa, baa. I just wanna be a sheep- baa, baa.
Pray the Lord my soul to keep. I just wanna be a sheep- baa, baa.
Funny how these things never leave you…and the truths still apply!
God was not afraid to call out the Isrealites (who were supposed to be His people) and Jesus was not afraid to call out the Pharisees and Sadducees (who were supposed to be the righteous).
HYPOCRITES.
Let God’s word test your heart so if you do fall into this category, you can do the 3 steps I’m gonna share with you today.
First let’s look at the Old Testament. God had quite a few words to say to His people through the prophets. If you remember, He was the one who called the Isrealites out of bondage and called them His people (not because they deserved it for sure). And because they were His people, He called them to be holy- not meaning they sat in church all day, but that they lived different than the nations around them who went after other gods (little g).
Sometimes they blatantly disregarded God’s commands…but other times they thought they were being obedient, but God saw through to their hearts.
Isaiah was one of those prophets God used to speak to His people. Listen to what Jesus quotes from Isaiah 29:13…
You hypocrites! Well did Isaiah prophesy of you, when he said:
“‘This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me;
in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’”
Notice it’s possible to be doing all the right things on the outside, but still have our hearts far from God.
Later in Isaiah 58: 3-7 the people cry out…
Why have we fasted, and you see it not?
Why have we humbled ourselves, and you take no knowledge of it?’
I mean, they were fasting like He said, right? But here’s God’s response…
Behold, in the day of your fast you seek your own pleasure,
and oppress all your workers. Behold, you fast only to quarrel and to fight
and to hit with a wicked fist. Fasting like yours this day will not make your voice to be heard on high.
In other words, they were HYPOCRITES. Does that hit a little close to home too?
By the time we get to the Pharisees in Jesus’ day (remember, they are only Isrealites and God’s chosen people) who were regarded as the super-religious because they studied the Torah (the first 5 books of the Bible) inside and out and could even quote it from memory…they were up to 613 laws to obey! I don’t know about you, but I’d throw up my hands in surrender before we even got started, knowing there’s no way I could keep all those. I mean, let’s be honest, the 10 Commandments have given every human ever a standard we cannot keep (except for Jesus of course). But the Pharisees didn’t admit their guilt in breaking the law. Instead, they not only defended their innocence, but flanted it acting like they were better than everyone else.
But Jesus called them hypocrites- white-washed tombs! And in front of EVERYONE. And He was right cuz their hearts weren’t right. They were…
Say it with me- HYPOCRITES! And while you’re finger pointing at those Pharisees, did you know that when you point one finger at another, you’re pointing 3 back at yourself? It’s true.
Now I’m not putting myself anywhere close to God who gave us the 10 Commandments and other commands in His word, but so far in this series I have given you…let me do the math….2 + 3 + 4 + 5 + 3 +5 +3 + 5…30 practical things you can do to redeem your phone time as a Christian woman living in this distracting digital world. Be honest, how many of them have you actually done…and kept doing? No worries, I got 3 fingers pointing back at me right now too!
So let’s apply this to our phones. There’s not THOU SHALT NOTs that are followed by the words “when you use your phone”, but as God’s children, we are still called to obey the 10 Commandments from the heart (Jesus took those a step further when He taught us about what God really wants from our hearts and why the Pharisees were not as righteous as they thought.) And we are still called to be set apart- to look and act differently than the world around us that’s chasing after other gods.
So does the way you use your phone look different than the way your neighbor who does not know God uses theirs?
Does the way you use your phone reflect that you are God’s daughter and that you’re here to build His Kingdom?
Does the way you use your phone help you love and obey God more and more and love your neighbor as yourself even more too?
I’m guilty too. Cuz it SHOULD look different.
1 John 3:9-10 reminds us…
No one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God’s seed abides in him and he cannot keep on sinning because he has been born of God. By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the Devil. Anyone who does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother.
Sinning? With my phone? Yep- they’re all over our screen-time. Greed, envy, gluttony, pride, laziness, selfishness, adultery, addiction, profanity, idolatry, hatred, gossip…
And what about those more respectable sins that we tolerate? Ungodliness, Anxiety, Discontentment, Unthankfulness, Impatience, Judgmentalism, Worldliness…(thank you Jerry Bridges for pointing out what we often excuse)
I’m not here to dish out a bunch of doom-and-gloom, but to open your eyes to the reality of your heart. And how it’s reflected in the use of your phone. Mine included.
So what’s a girl to do who knows she’s redeemed but is battling the sinful nature that wants to misuse her phone? I’m so glad you asked. Here are the 3 steps I promised…
- RECOGNIZE.
- REPENT.
- REDEEM.
- RECOGNIZE. The first step is to see it- to admit you’re a hypocrite. I know that doesn’t sound fun, but the alternative is to just remain like the Pharisees who couldn’t or wouldn’t see it in themselves….but interestingly, they had no problem pointing out the speck in someone else’s eye, all the while having a log in their own!
And James 2:10 helps put things in perspective if you think you’re pretty close to perfection …
Whoever keeps the whole law, but fails in one point has become guilty of all of it.
All of it? Yep. All of it. In other words, the Pharisees or the Isrealites or us could do all that God commands in His Word (with our phones or any other area of life) and when we fail in just 1 part (wouldn’t that technically null and void the keep the whole law part?) we are guilty of all of it.
We are no longer clean (although none of us really was anyway, right?).
And if you remember a Holy God cannot dwell with sin, which is why we need step #2…
- REPENT. Tell God about it. Admit your sin. It’s really not as hard as it sounds, in fact it’s freeing. I’ll go first. I do not always use my phone in a way that honors God. I sin with my phone.
And the good news is that when we repent, God does not leave us in it.
1 John 1:9 tells us, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” Amen. It’s not about me trying to keep a perfect standard and failing not just at 1 point, but all of it!
And here’s the warning to those who do not recognize and repent in the next verse…”If we say we have not sinned, we make Him a liar and the truth is not in us.”
I’ll happily be a confessing-hypocrite in that case!
- REDEEM. We throw the word redeem around a lot around here, but let’s go back and remind ourselves of what it truly means…according to the dictionary on my phone (yep, I’m using it as a tool) redeem is a verb which means to regain possession of something in exchange for payment. Jesus paid for our sins which redeems our hearts and lives so that we can live for Him and with Him. As my friend Megan calls it, that’s the Beautiful Exchange.
And once our hearts are redeemed, then everything our mind thinks, our mouth says, our eyes see, our ears hear, our hands touch can be redeemed too…aka used for His glory!
But we have to keep using these 3 steps….cuz here’s the thing, this is not a one-and-done…guaranteed you’ll go back to some of your sinful patterns with your phone. But the good news is that Jesus gives us access to God so we can recognize our hearts, repent of our sin and redeem our time (and phone-time) for Him!
No more being a hypocrite…cuz they’re not hip with it…right?
I feel like this episode lent itself to a lot of needing-to-talk-to-God time, so may I pray with you?
Dear God,
You alone are holy. Sometimes it boggles my mind that you would choose to invite sinful people like us to be your people. Thank you for initiating this WITH-God relationship because it’s something we never could have done on our own because of our sin. We do not want to be hypocrites like the Pharisees in any area of our lives, including our phone-time. We confess that our hearts are sinful and so our phones in our hands can lead us to sinful thoughts and actions- both the obvious and the respectable. We know that even just 1 wrong thought or action makes us guilty of all of it and that there’s nothing we can do to fix it or keep ourselves clean. And so we repent by bringing it to You and letting the sacrifice of Your Son make us clean again so that we can redeem our phones and lives for your glory. Thank you for not leaving us alone in our sin, but for providing a way that we can be restored into a right relationship with you. Open our hearts to see what we often cannot see on our own and be quick to recognize and repent when we fall short. You are so good and we love you. In Jesus’s name, Amen.
Hallelujah and Amen. I promised you we’d end up in a good place, right?
I trust you’re encouraged…and challenged. There’s no chapter and verse about how to use your phone, but I challenge you that as you read and hear His word, you ask Him how it applies not only to how you use your time, but to how you use your phone-time too…. And what you do instead that’s probably even better.
In a few days I’ll be back with some practical tips about how to intentionally use your phone to love God more and more….
But until then, I want you to sit with the truths we’ve pulled out from God’s Word- what is He saying to you? What is He calling you to do (or not do)?
But don’t keep it to yourself-come join us in the REDEEM Her Time Community where we’re having real, honest conversations about where we are and where God wants us to be…and doing our part to trust and obey!
Visit redeemhertime.com and click the community tab to join us.
Thanks for joining me for this episode and until next time, remember…
You DO have ALL the time you need to do ALL He has called you to.
Be available to who + what matters most in this season and in light of eternity…
Cuz you are here for Such a Time as This.
Binge the REDEEM Her Phone-Time Challenge Series
Ep 105 No Time? The #1 Tip to Find 1-4 Hours in your Day for Better Time Management
Ep 106 Distracted by Your Phone? 2 Key Steps for Christian Women to Overcome Digital Distraction
Ep 107 Wish You Could Break-up with Your Phone? 3 Steps to Start Setting Healthy Screen-Time Boundaries
Ep 108 Don’t Live on Good Intentions. 4 Steps to Create a Personalized Phone-Time Plan to Prioritize What Matters
Ep 109 Wish your Phone wasn’t so Distracting? 5 Tips to Dumb-down your Smartphone to get more Time in your Day
Ep 110 3 Steps to Build the Kingdom of God with your Phone-Time as a Busy Christian Woman
Ep 111 Put it down. 5 NO Phone Zones for Better Time Management
Ep 112 Is your Phone Shaping You? 3 Questions to Ask to Be Transformed by God Instead
Ep 113 5 Speed Bumps to Make your Phone Less Accessible and Better Manage your Time
Visit the REDEEM Her Time Website https://redeemhertime.com
> Join the REDEEM Her Time Community (did I mention it’s FREE?!)
> Get the REDEEM Her Phone-Time Guide + Screensaver
> Schedule a free 15 Min Strategy Session
>>> or DO ALL-THE-ABOVE!
P.S. And don’t forget to leave a review on Apple Podcasts to get your name in the drawing for $100 OFF the REDEEM Her Time Coaching Program…coming soon!
