I Don't Usually Get Angry at Advertisements

 

I have been trying advertising on social media and it is an interesting exercise. It is an advert for a Christian conference about cults and new religious movements in September. You can find out more here if you're really interested. Someone helpfully pointed out I might like to think about my strategy given the hostile emojis and unhelpful comments I have received.

Of course, I rely on Facebook to choose my audience according to the declared purpose of my page and its regular content. Perhaps they're not doing such a good job, maybe there is something I can do to manage that, but...

It's a Christian ministry page and my personal FB account carries a fair amount of Christian/religious content, as you might imagine. That being the case, I get all kinds of 'suggested' post, emails to my ministry email account, things I regard as not interesting, or not 'appropriate.' From ads for success-building advertising funnels to invitations to New Age conferences, past regression therapy, even a ride on a spaceship to meet my forefathers from another galaxy.

I pass on without comment, I delete as I see necessary. I don't throw a hissyfit, or hurl insults at those people posting, because I don't usually get angry at an advertisement. When I get leaflets, adverts, menus, etc. through my door they all go in the recycling. I don't call up every organisation and complain, 'What are these leaflets doing coming through my door?! I am offended! Where is my safe space?'

It seems, however, there is a population on social media that is determined to take offence where none is offered, and I find that curiously interesting.

Is this a mental health problem? Have we raised a whole generation convinced they have a right to not be offended, to not see or hear anything that might bruise their tender little hearts? Is the current generation imprisoned in a continuous state of peripubescence, of teen angst, capable of expressing itself only in terms of shallow petulance, and spite?

Is this a specific expression of neo-atheism? I know Richard Dawkins has, for many years, encouraged his acolytes to mock religion at every opportunity. Can we do anything to help these poor people who seem incapable of seeing something they don't like, are not interested in engaging, and just walking on?

I can't help but think about the sleepless nights they must endure as they turn over in their minds 'what has offended me today?' Indeed, it seems amazing to me they manage to fulfil their work and family commitments given their demanding commitment to complaining. Do they laugh as they point mockingly at someone on the street that has caught their attention?

Are there regular, real world gatherings outside the homes and businesses of folk unfortunate enough to unwittingly look, think, or speak in a way that has offended the mob? Or is that too much reality for them?

Actually, this behaviour has spilled over into the real world. From Christian bakers to street preachers, from those holding traditional family values to those regarding human life as sacred, from farmers and their traditional practices to meat eaters and their personal tastes, all have provoked the ire of the determinedly offended, always ready to put the rest of us right. How did we ever manage to live before they came along?

What is social media making of us? It has brought together people who would otherwise have never known each other, who have gone on to create a complaining critical mass of the traditionally isolated, historically localised, Marxist ‘we know best’ brigade.

It’s a jungle out there, predation the every day experience of anyone with a faith, an opinion, strong convictions, or a ham sandwich. Time was you simply walked away and got on with things. We have to find a new way of dealing with the know-it-alls in this wacky new world where your next word or thought might find you socially mugged.

The mob is the mother of tyrants - Diogenes

Where is Your God?

 

William Wordsworth wrote:

The world is too much with us; late and soon,

Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;—

Little we see in Nature that is ours;

We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!

Wordsworth is lamenting the fast withering connection between people and nature because of the all-embracing industrial society of his time, a great theme of his day. I find people are often aware they are somehow disconnected from something bigger than themselves. I sense their longing for they don’t know what, their frustration at an inexplicable sense of fragmentation.

Believers can experience this frustration, when ‘the world is too much with us, late and soon, getting and spending.’ That sense we have laid waste our powers, given our hearts away while distracted by the demands of life. Like Esau, we can feel we have traded our new-birth-right ‘for a mess of pottage.’ Genesis 25:29-33 ‘The world is too much with us, late and soon,’ and little we see in spiritual things that should be ours but are not.

As I read psalm 42 last evening I discovered David experienced this longing for connection, as he found himself far from Jerusalem in, ‘the land of Jordan and Hermon, from Mount Mizar,’ Psalm 42:6. Although he knows God is never far from him, David feels physically far from God (42:9), the world is too much with him, and it taunts him, ‘where is your God?’ So David cries:

‘As the deer pants for flowing streams,

so pants my soul for you, O God.

My soul thirsts for God,

for the living God.

When will I come and appear before God?

My tears have been my food

day and night

while they say to me all the day long,

‘Where is your God?’’

Psalms 42 and 43 stand together as one song and are a great comfort to those who feel as David did, surrounded by, ‘ungodly people...unjust man.’ (43:1) I find myself in this psalm as David cries, ‘Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me?’

David prays fervently for vindication and deliverance (43:1) for leading and guidance (43:3). In all this David is open and honest with his God, sharing his thoughts, speaking of his sense of abandonment (42:8,9)

At the same time he is determined to prove faithful to his God. David answers his own plight with two comforting words of encouragement. In the first he remembers those days when he was in communion with God and his people:

‘These things I remember,

as I pour out my soul:

How I would go with the throng

and I lead them in procession to the house of God

with glad shouts and songs of praise;

a multitude keeping a festival.’ (42:4)

Remembering is a gift and a comfort to the saints. In those times when I feel the world is too much with me I go to his Word, remind myself of his mercies, and recall those countless times of blessing in fellowship. God has been good to this man and I remember his goodness.

David’s second word is encouragement to hope in God. Our present circumstances do not, finally, determine our future, or our eternal place among the saints of God. We have every reason to hope in him, to praise him. He is our salvation, our God. When the world is too much with us, late and soon, we may encourage ourselves with David’s encouragement:

‘Why are you cast down, O my soul,

and why are you in turmoil within me?

Hope in God; for I shall praise him,

my salvation, and my God.’ (43:5)

My God is Enough

 

This morning I walked the dog, spoke to a few neighbours, and tidied up a little more of my study, a task that seems to have no end. I still seem to be caught up with the idea I am not enough and somehow can’t get away from it. So, I am reflecting on a prayer of David I read last night and asking myself how thankful I am, and ow to be as thankful as David.

He is at the end of his life, there are rivals for his throne staking their claim, enemies at court that his son Solomon wisely gets rid of later, and he speaks to his assembled officials. David has dedicated a fortune in gold, silver, bronze, and other materials for the temple Solomon would build and invited Israel’s leaders to make a similar freewill offering to the project. There is a lot going on for a man on his deathbed. Then he prays:

“Blessed are you, O Lord, the God of Israel our father, forever and ever. Yours, O Lord, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the victory and the majesty, for all that is in the heavens and in the earth is yours. Yours is the kingdom, O Lord, and you are exalted as head above all. Both riches and honour come from you, and you rule over all. In your hand are power and might, and in your hand it is to make great and to give strength to all. And now we thank you, our God, and praise your glorious name.

“But who am I, and what is my people, that we should be able thus to offer willingly? For all things come from you, and of your own have we given you. For we are strangers before you and sojourners, as all our fathers were. Our days on the earth are like a shadow, and there is no abiding. O Lord our God, all this abundance that we have provided for building you a house for your holy name comes from your hand and is all your own. I know, my God, that you test the heart and have pleasure in uprightness. In the uprightness of my heart I have freely offered all these things, and now I have seen your people, who are present here, offering freely and joyously to you. O Lord, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, our fathers, keep forever such purposes and thoughts in the hearts of your people, and direct their hearts toward you. Grant to Solomon my son a whole heart that he may keep your commandments, your testimonies, and your statutes, performing all, and that he may build the palace for which I have made provision.” 1 Chronicles 29:10-20

Who am I? What a great question! David was the greatest king in Israel’s history, achieving so much despite his failings (did he ever feel he wasn’t enough?), despite setbacks (did he ever think this was all too much for a shepherd boy?). What kept him going in spite of everything? He knew God, and he knew who he was before a holy God.

“Who am I, and what is my people, that we should be able thus to offer willingly? For all things come from you, and of your own have we given you.’

Who am I? I am a man who knows God and my God is enough.