A Social Media Warning from the Psalms

by Edwin Crozier

I am not trying to establish a legalistic rule here. Rather, I want to caution you to think a little more deeply and thoroughly before you post.

"If I had said, 'I will speak thus,' I would have betrayed the generation of your children"
-Asaph, Psalm 73:15.

Asaph recognizes the dangers of publicly airing out his doubts and struggles with faith while he is still struggling through them. In an age where we pride ourselves on authenticity and realness, we often air out every doubt and struggle we face (and we all face many) in the most public of forums: Social Media. I think Asaph would have balked at that.

Yes, be authentic and real in your authentic and real relationships. With the people whose eyes you actually look into, on whose shoulders you actually cry, on whose arms you actually lean. Get those struggles and doubts out with them.

But, please, recognize that airing out every doubt and faith struggle you have on social media may not be helping as many people as you think. It may actually be betraying a generation of God's children. They hear the doubts and struggles. Those doubts and struggles lodge in their hearts and minds. Then they miss how you overcame them later and just linger in the doubts and struggles themselves. Or worse, they fall completely prey to them and abandon the Lord.

Please, take care.

That being said, Asaph does expose the doubts and struggles he once had publicly in this psalm. A helpful exposé of doubts and struggles in such a public way is after you've walked through them and overcome them. This does display a helpful level of authenticity and realness. I have had real doubts and struggles, but I've also had real help from God to overcome. Let me share both with you.