1 Kings 20:39-40 KJV
“And as the king passed by, he cried unto the king: and he said, Thy servant went out into the midst of the battle; and, behold, a man turned aside, and brought a man unto me, and said, Keep this man: if by any means he be missing, then shall thy life be for his life, or else thou shalt pay a talent of silver. And as thy servant was busy here and there, he was gone. And the king of Israel said unto him, So shall thy judgment be; thyself hast decided it “.
You would agree with me that this generation has far more distractions to deal with than any other generation known to man. Back in the days when I was a little boy, there were very few and minimal distractions. The only real distraction was the television, but the tv stations only operated from 4pm when people returned from work, up to 11:15 pm after the news cap. Sometimes they would continue a movie after the news cap. And that would be on weekends. Such movies would last till 12midnight at the most.
But we are in a generation where there is not just tv, there is cable tv that plays 24/7. Most of these satellite TVs have up to 30 to 60 channels to watch. We also have GSM phones now; what many call cell phones or handsets. The phones further graduated to smart phones with internet connections in them. Such that virtually anything can be done with the smart phones. The effect of these new forms of distractions are enormous. On the platform of google, YouTube, WhatsApp, 2go, Facebook, Twitter, instagram, Snapchat, LinkedIn and millions of apps and many other social media platforms; distractions of believers have reached an epic level, and here are the consequences:
-People have lost their Prayer lives.
-Spiritual gifts have been lost due to prayerlessness.
-People no longer read the Bible anymore the way we used to.
-Night praying has turned to night browsing or chatting.
-Projects have suffered due to the amount of time people have sunk into social media; valuable time that would have helped completed the entire projects.
-On the other side of things, many have lost academic focus, lost admissions, and even lost jobs/contracts.
-Many lives have been lost due to distracted drivers and pedestrians who fiddle with their phones while driving and walking respectively.
In this new year of 2018, receive grace from the Lord to overcome distractions in Jesus Name.
Action Points
-Make a comprehensive list of all the distractions of your life in 2017 to this day, and lay them before God in prayer.
-Be sincere and truthful to yourself about those distractions that are already addictions.
-Seek help over those ones that have become addictions already. Our addiction recovery unit could be of a help to you in this regard.
-Don’t miss this ongoing 21 day fast, and endeavor to take weekly fast of personal consecration.
Prayer
Ask for grace to do the action Points.
Nugget
A lot has suffered due to the amount of time people have sunk into social media and other distractions; have you dealt with yours?
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