Does it
ever feel like the internet is getting scary? I was looking up information
about motorcycle parts the other day. Now every time I go to a site with any
banner ads, guess what ads I’m getting? You got it – ads for motorcycle parts.
Everything
you do online might as well be printed in the Observer. I remember back in the
mid 90’s (1990’s, that is) when our company began giving everyone e-mail
addresses. They told us to not send anything via e-mail that we wouldn’t want
published on the front page of the next day’s newspaper. It was sound advice.
Five years
ago in China our friends cautioned us in sending e-mail back to the States that
everything we did would probably be monitored. Of course there, even the snail
mail we sent was likely to be opened before it ever left the Chinese post
office.
It baffles
me to read some of the posts and comments I come across on Facebook. Do these
“friends” not know that any potential employer or college admissions officer or
future spouse will likely be reading anything and everything they print?
And what’s
with all the surveillance cameras everywhere you go? Makes you think George
Orwell knew something long before his time. Even a deer can’t walk through the
woods in the middle of the night without being captured on a trail camera.
What I’m
saying is not breaking news. We’re living in an age of transparency. Every word
you speak, every keystroke you make, every thing you do and perhaps even every
thought you think could wind up on tonight’s newscast. Or go viral on the
internet.
Makes you
want to be pretty careful about the way you live, doesn’t it? Shouldn’t it? But
let me offer you an even greater motivation to live a clean and unashamed
life. Ultimately you will not answer to your
friends, to your boss, to your government or to the public. It would be bad
enough if they all knew and judged everything about you.
But the
Bible says that we all will one day answer to Almighty God, the Perfect and
Righteous Judge. Hear the word of Lord from Hebrews 4:12-13: “For the word of
God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates
even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and
attitudes of the heart. Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight.
Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must
give account.”
What that
means is exactly what it says. Read it again. God is the One to whom we must
give account. His word sets the standard by which we live, and by which the
very thoughts and attitudes of our hearts are measured. You can’t hide anything
from God. No careless word ever spoken has He missed. No deed done in secret
has escaped His vision. No impure thought or harmful intent has ever gone
unnoticed by the Judge.
Don’t know
about you, but that’s pretty scary to me. In fact, if that were the end of the
story, who among us would be able to stand before Him at all? But, praise God,
the One enthroned as Judge is also the One exalted as Savior! We’d all be
doomed to everlasting death in hell because of our sin, but Jesus took the
Judge’s sentence for our crimes upon Himself! And He rose from the grave in
dramatic victory over sin and death!
Friend, that victory can be yours today.
Receive His salvation by repenting of your sinfulness and believing that Jesus
died on the cross for the forgiveness of your sins. Believe that He rose from
the dead to bring eternal life, and yield your life to Him by following Jesus
in joyful obedience as Savior and Lord.
Then on the Day of Judgment you need
not be ashamed nor fear eternal condemnation. Instead, you’ll be singing with
the saints:
Jesus paid it all
All to Him I owe
Sin had left a crimson
stain
He washed it white as snow
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