The Fear of Man in The Age of Facebook
There are some things in our world that are very telling of the culture we live in. The Facebook “Like” button has to be one of them.
If you’re anything like me, the moment you log onto Facebook your eye is drawn to the little red notifications symbol in the top left-hand corner. Most of the notifications we regard as useless information: 22 people commented on the same wall post as you, your second-cousin’s niece’s brother wants to be your friend, you’ve been tagged in a photo that has your shoulder is in it, and so on. They’re useless to us because what we’re really looking for are the ones that tell us how popular and adored and liked we are. “Joe Bloggs likes your status.” “Joe Bloggs likes your photo album.” “Jane Smith likes your profile picture” – not only that but “Jane Smith commented on your profile picture” and, oh yes, she said “You are sooo HOT!!”. Let’s hope that shows up in the News Feed for the whole world to see…
We’ve become obsessed with what people think of us: do people like us? Do they value our opinions? Do they think we’re beautiful/attractive – or at least look beautiful/attractive in the photos we put online? But why do we care so much? I’m not just talking about social media here – I’m talking about why we are all too prone to find our happiness and identity in what people think of us and how much we are liked. We may live in a self-centred, narcissistic culture, but the fact is that the real problem lies in our fleshly hearts – and it’s called the fear of man.
The fear of man is to reverence or prize what other people think of us – doing anything we can to look good in their eyes – and allowing our happiness and our identity to be dictated by that. We know this is wrong though; so how do we break out of it? Many well-meaning people might tell us that we just need to feel better about ourselves and learn to love ourselves more – to get more “self-esteem”. This, however, will only further the underlying problem.
Not meaning to sound insensitive here, but our real problem is not that we have a “low self-esteem” issue – it is because we have a worship issue. Ultimately, we want other people to worship us and give us praise, instead of giving ourselves to worship God, because we sinfully believe that this will give us true life (as with any kind of idolatry). According to Proverbs 29:25, ‘The fear of man lays a snare’ – but the way to get out of this trap is not to worship ourselves even more. The verse goes onto reveal the answer: ‘whoever trusts in the LORD is safe’.
Thanks be to God who, through the finished work of the cross, has set us free from all kinds of idolatry – including the self-worship at the core of the fear of man – so that we can worship only Him, trusting that He is what fulfils us. We no longer have to be enslaved by the need for praise from other people because we are caught up in living for the praise of the only One who deserves it, and the only One who can truly satisfy us in doing so. And with this mindset, social media ceases to be used as a channel for serving our own self-idolatry, and instead becomes a tool for glorifying Jesus, loving other people and furthering His mission.
(For more, see the article ‘Justification by Twitter’ on TheResurgence.com.)
Comments
By Adam James on 14/03/2011 at 11:35
I think I will Like this article
By Simon Davy on 14/03/2011 at 18:19
The link to the referenced article.
http://theresurgence.com/2010/06/30/justification-by-twitter
Be nice if the hyperlink had been inlcuded. This being the web and all :)
By Lois May-Miller on 15/03/2011 at 00:01
So true.
By Neil Davidson on 16/03/2011 at 16:03
A great post and well-made point.
I recently deleted my Facebook account after a lot of thought about how it controlled me, in fact “ensnared” would be more accurate. Not only that but my self-worship-through-low-self-esteem narcissism was time consuming, very time consuming, to the point I didn’t have time to think about God!
By Richard Brown on 21/04/2011 at 16:05
Thanks Emily. Excellent challenge to us all. I have for a time been contemplating idle and idol worship and how we condemn idol worship whilst ourselves being idle in our worship.
By Andrew on 13/03/2012 at 15:15
Indeed - great thoughts about self worth/worship. I guess that is a problem for some/many users of FB and society in general - a point well made. Fb itself does not produces narcissism, more likely the lack of clear teaching on how much we worth to God, that we are not condemned, that we are precious, loved, that we no longer have a sinful nature because of that love. I know that some don’t approve of me but I know God does - end of problem. No, that’s not arrogance, that is the bible truth. However, social media is here now and we must learn to use it for good…and it is a learning process. I have made mistakes with it and unintentionally offended others by my posts. Also, others need to be a little less sensitive perhaps when reading what should be assumed to be well intentioned posts - let’s give each other the benefit of the doubt. It is, to be frank both a poor way to communicate and also a great way to stay in touch. Pretty useful for provocation too…..