Do you feel it? The throbbing blue-light headache from your mobile devices that starts in the back of your neck that wraps all the way up to the frontal lobe of your forehead? Can you feel it? The intense urge to check something, anything, to see who is cyber hugging you? Facebook, Texts, Emails, Instagram, Periscope, Twitter, etc. I can’t escape it. It is this incessant need to check my cellphone every 2 minutes. It is now said that the urge to check your cell phone is as strong, if not stronger than that of a heroin or cocaine addict. It has such a strong pull; that of social acceptance. How many likes did I get, how many comments, how many hearts, how many friends? We are fishing for acknowledgment. We cast out the line full of bait in the form of witty remarks and quips and cute photos and selfies just to get a scant few responses. Could it be that our lack of real social involvement has lead to this insatiable need for artificial social media grubbing? In hopes of our artificial social hierarchy we climb the ever so present yet imaginary cyber ladder. And to what end? Our own destruction. Pride. Arrogance. And worst of all SLOTH.

We think of sloth as laziness but did you know that the actual understanding of the word in Biblical times also meant laziness toward God? Our destruction is great when we do not do the things God has asked of us. The ramifications are HUGE. Satan’s best attempt at gripping the hearts of humans is through distraction. Today’s distraction, I am convinced, is through the almighty, never-leave-my-side cell phone. I go to read my Bible app and before I know it my phone tells me I have to respond to an urgent text or some other pressing item. Honestly, it will only get worse. Is it realistic to tell you, or to tell myself to throw our phones out? Mark 9:47-48 ESV says figuratively, “And if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into hell, ‘where their worm does not die and the fire is not quenched.'”

Yikes, those are some pretty intense words. It is like money. Money is a tool, but be super careful not to make it your idol. I fear most of us have made an idol out of our cell phone. I resolve to leave my phone in my office when I am with my family. I resolve to leave my phone in the car when I am out with friends. I resolve to leave my phone downstairs in the charger when I am in my bedroom at night and in the morning. Can you do this with me? Can you make a resolution to make a positive change for your Maker? Stop the checking cycle and give to God what is rightfully his: your time and your attention.