The Battle For The Mind

In the world today it is becoming increasingly difficult to control the things going on inside your head. Today we have access to incredible amounts of information in the palms of our hands. Our smartphones make it so easy to be constantly connected with the news, sports, and of course social media. Being constantly plugged in like this really creates a burn out in our minds and can lead to stress. We are on social media 24/7 reading news articles, getting into arguments with people we don’t even know on Facebook or Twitter, and scrolling through Instagram or TikTok wishing we were as attractive and happy as the people on our feed appear to be.

All of this leads to people feeling angry, scared, insecure, among many other negative emotions. I mean haven’t you ever been scrolling through Twitter before bed and gotten into some petty political argument with someone living across the country who you’ve never met? You spend an hour yelling back and forth at each other about something the president did or said that day. With no chance of changing any minds on Twitter, you turn your phone off and lay down angry and thinking about how stupid and irrational the person you were arguing with is because of their political beliefs. You lay there unable to get to sleep because your adrenaline has risen due to how upset you were fighting with this person. Because of this meaningless exchange on Twitter you go to bed with anger in your heart and wake up tired and unprepared for the day because you didn’t get a proper night's sleep.

Or have you ever woken up in the morning feeling good, like it’s going to be a great day? You go to the kitchen and make yourself a bowl of cereal and sit down at the table to eat. You flip out your phone and start scrolling through Instagram as you’re eating your cereal. As you scroll through you might see some pictures of your friends, but you’re likely seeing many more pictures of models or celebrities.

You’re looking at these pictures and thinking to yourself how perfect their lives appear. Or how the girls on the screen don’t seem to have a stretch mark or a pimple on them. And every guy has six pack abs and bulging biceps. In every picture you see, people seem so perfect and happy.

Then you start to think about all the ways your life is imperfect. Thoughts creep into your mind about how disappointing your life is compared to theirs, how you’ll never look like any of these people. You think about how you can’t possibly live up to the lives presented on the screen.

By the time you’ve finished your breakfast, your feeling insecure and depressed. You woke up excited and ready for a great day, and before the day even began it was ruined.

So many people around the world have moments like these every day. Social media has caused us to become increasingly self-conscious. We think we need to be perfect to be liked by others. We think men are looking for women with perfect bodies and unblemished faces, and women are only looking for men with swimmers' bodies.

The fact of the matter is people really don’t care, or at least they shouldn’t. God certainly doesn’t expect us to be perfect. In fact, Romans 3:23 tells us, “all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.” God knows we aren’t perfect and that’s okay because immediately following that statement we are told that we have been “justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.”

Let’s pick the second half of that verse apart a little, because it is so important to understand. First of all, what does it mean to be justified? Justification means complete and total forgiveness. My grandparents put it like this, justification means ‘just as if you’ve never sinned.’ Here’s a little illustration. Imagine there is a white board with all your sins written on it in marker. When you decide to accept Jesus as your savior, all those sins on the white board get erased. Isn’t that amazing? Because you have been justified through Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross, all of your past sins have been forgiven, totally!

But that’s not all, it gets even better! Because not only are your past sins erased from the white board, but the entire white board is thrown away so no sin can be written on it again. That is the love and forgiveness that our Father provides us through Jesus! That is justification.

Now you might be thinking how can it get any better than that? Well I’ve got good news for you because it does. Some might be thinking well this justification thing sounds great, but what do I have to do to get it? The one and only thing you need to do is accept Jesus into your heart. Justification is a free gift of grace for doing so. It’s like a door prize from God when we enter His kingdom. What an amazing gift!

As children of God, He looks at us through the lens of Grace. When He sees us, He sees Jesus. So, remember that the next time you’re scrolling through your phone and feeling insecure or depressed. God loves you unconditionally and sees you as perfect in every way, so accept His love and have a blessed day!