A facebook forward

Facebook Makes Us Miserable
by Tim Challies
03/14/11

The ending: Facebook makes me believe, even stronger, in the value of the local church, in the value of true, deep fellowship, or genuine community. The fact is, we want to love real people and we want to be loved by real people. Facebook is fiction. Local church is fact—the most real community we can experience this side of eternity.


The whole thing:

Just about everyone has joined Facebook. And just about everyone has since considered giving it up. There are all kinds of studies today telling us how much time Facebook is sucking—700 billion minutes between the lot of us every month. That’s a lot of time. But when you divide it 500 million ways it doesn’t seem quite so bad. That’s not why most of us have considered giving it up. There are studies telling us how Facebook is invading our privacy and selling our personal details to advertisers. That’s annoying, but not reason enough to quit.

The reason so many of us have considered giving up on Facebook is that it makes us miserable. A recent paper in Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin looks at a series of studies involving how people evaluate moods—their own and those of others. The study itself is not as interesting as the implications. What the study found is that people tend to underestimate how dejected other people feel and that this in turn increases a person’s own sense of unhappiness. Put otherwise, we all believe that others have better lives than we do and this makes us feel bad about ourselves. That’s strangely significant.

Where do we find this phenomenon in clearest form? On Facebook, of course. We log on to Facebook, look through the photographs and status messages our friends post, and believe that everyone is happier and more successful than we are. And when I have spoken to friends and family members who have considered giving up Facebook, this is exactly the reasoning they have given. They look at other people and feel miserable in comparison.

What an interesting phenomenon. It seems clear that Facebook is exposing something, some ugly little corner of the human heart. Facebook is all about making life seem joyful—we “like” one another’s happy status updates, not the sad ones; we post photos of our parties, not our funerals; we use it to celebrate births and marriages and new relationships, not to mourn deaths or remember break-ups. Facebook is meant to be a happy place for happy people. But it doesn’t seem to work out so well. We all think everyone else is happy, but we don’t feel the joy.

And it strikes both ways—when we portray ourselves through social media we do so on our own terms. And of course this means that we present ourselves in the way we want to be perceived, whether or not this is an accurate portrayal. So even while we put only our best foot forward, we look at others and assume that their portrayal is more accurate than our own; we believe that we are the only pretenders, the only ones stretching and exaggerating, trying to keep up. We resent another person for being happy—“She has an amazing life and I don’t!” Or we resent her for being falsely happy—“I know her and I know that her life isn’t all that!”

Either way, we all end up miserable. We all end up trying to be something we are not and believing that everyone else has a better life. Libby Copeland spoke to the author of this paper and he quoted Montesquieu saying: “If we only wanted to be happy it would be easy; but we want to be happier than other people, which is almost always difficult, since we think them happier than they are.” We do not want to be happy—we want to be happier. It becomes a competition, a point of comparison. But we can never be happier because we constantly drag ourselves down by believing that we are the only ones who are miserable.

What a ridiculous lot we are. What a sad, jealous, envious, idolatrous lot.

Facebook makes me believe, even stronger, in the value of the local church, in the value of true, deep fellowship, or genuine community. This is just one more reason that we need to live in community—in real community with real people. When I mediate my life by Facebook, I am the one who controls it all. I curate it by tagging the photos I like, by offering up the statuses I like, by making myself who I want to be rather than who I am. But when I live before others, when I live a real life in the real world, well, that is where people see who I really am. And they love me on that basis. In fact, they love me more on that basis.

The fact is, we want to love real people and we want to be loved by real people. Facebook is fiction. Local church is fact—the most real community we can experience this side of eternity.

A Prayer for Japan

A Prayer for Japan
March 12, 2011

by John Piper

The scenes of the tsunami in Japan are apocalyptic.

The power of moving water is greater than most of us can imagine. Nothing stands before it. We are driven to our knees:

"Father in heaven, you are the absolute Sovereign over the shaking of the earth, the rising of the sea, and the raging of the waves. We tremble at your power and bow before your unsearchable judgments and inscrutable ways. We cover our faces and kiss your omnipotent hand. We fall helpless to the floor in prayer and feel how fragile the very ground is beneath our knees.

O God, we humble ourselves under your holy majesty and repent. In a moment—in the twinkling of an eye—we too could be swept away. We are not more deserving of firm ground than our fellowmen in Japan. We too are flesh. We have bodies and homes and cars and family and precious places. We know that if we were treated according to our sins, who could stand?

All of it would be gone in a moment. So in this dark hour we turn against our sins, not against you.

And we cry for mercy for Japan. Mercy, Father. Not for what they or we deserve. But mercy.

Have you not encouraged us in this? Have we not heard a hundred times in your Word the riches of your kindness, forbearance, and patience? Do you not a thousand times withhold your judgments, leading your rebellious world toward repentance? Yes, Lord. For your ways are not our ways, and your thoughts are not our thoughts.

Grant, O God, that the wicked will forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts. Grant us, your sinful creatures, to return to you, that you may have compassion. For surely you will abundantly pardon. Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord Jesus, your beloved Son, will be saved.

May every heart-breaking loss—millions upon millions of losses—be healed by the wounded hands of the risen Christ. You are not unacquainted with your creatures' pain. You did not spare your own Son, but gave him up for us all.

In Jesus you tasted loss. In Jesus you shared the overwhelming flood of our sorrows and suffering. In Jesus you are a sympathetic Priest in the midst of our pain.

Deal tenderly now, Father, with this fragile people. Woo them. Win them. Save them.

And may the floods they so much dread make blessings break upon their head.

O let them not judge you with feeble sense, but trust you for your grace. And so behind this providence, soon find a smiling face.

In Jesus’ merciful name, Amen."

It's been awhile....

Ten months. That's how long since I last posted to this blog. What happened? Life.

Since May of 2010, much has happened. Most of the family photos and events have been maintained on the Hubert Family Blog. But somehow this blog got neglected.

Instead of trying to work backward, especially with the sermon posts, here's the recap of the last 10 months.

I set this blog up with four initial categories, but realized two of them overlapped, so it is now at three. I will do my best to summarize what's happened in the past ten months in each of these.



1. What I have learned from my pastor (and other things at church) - We are still in Revelation! It's been a very thorough study and we have finally reached the final chapter. Pastor Jack will finish up in the next month or so and my goal is to be MUCH more consistent in summarizing his sermons as we move forward.


Our Sunday School class has worked through two RC Sproul studies: The Holiness of God and The Names of God. We begin John Piper's, Don't Waste Your Life on March 20. I am very excited to start this study and will be posting as we go through it.


Since May 2010, the women's Bible study groups have gone well. We worked through Nancy Leigh DeMoss, Choosing Gratitude, this summer. It was great to see over 60 women attending this study offered at 3 different times.


The fall and spring study has been on the book of Proverbs. Ancient Wisdom in a Postmodern World, by Sue Edwards has been challenging, convicting and encouraging as I have dug into a very practical book in God's Word. There really isn't a topic that the book of Proverbs doesn't cover!


I am currently working with the Women's Ministry Team at our church to select studies for summer and next year. We have many great options and I look forward to posting insights from these in the future.



2. What I have learned from the books I have read - Unfortunately, I have not read many entire books. It seems that most of my reading is textbooks and lesson plans :).


I used to read Christian fiction as I had time, but the last 10 months I may have read one fiction book. And honestly, I don't miss it. The last couple books I have read are The Ever Loving Truth by Voddie Baucham and UnPlanned by Abby Johnson. These were both excellent and I plan on doing an entire post on each of these soon.


Phil and I are going through Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace study on Sunday nights at our church. This has been a great tool for us and exciting as well to see these principles work!!


We host a small group on Friday nights led by Phil and Pastor Paul. This is a new group of people, mostly made up of young married couples. We began the school year with Tim Keller's The Gospel in Life study. We have an amazing group of hungry, humble, and hilarious people that makes Friday nights extra special for Phil and I. We just kicked off a new study, also by Tim Keller, The Reason for God. This video is a format unlike anything I have ever viewed. Tim Keller sits down in a round-table-sort of discussion with "seekers" and "scoffers". We have used this opportunity to invite friends and relatives that may feel more comfortable in this setting. The example of Dr. Keller's dialogue with others has also been a great training tool to show us as Christians how to engage the culture in a meaningful, spiritual dialogue.

An added benefit from this new study was Phil and I finding a mature couple in our church to provide mentorship to us. We both feed into other people yet we know we need the specific accountability and wisdom that comes from an older and more mature couple. Bob and Ellie Bruhn started coming with their daughter and her husband before God moved them away. Thankfully, the Bruhn's wanted to stay with our small group and after praying about who to ask to provide mentorship to us, Phil and I both felt led to ask the Bruhn's. We look forward to this growing relationship.

3. What I have learned as a Home School Mom - LOTS!! This is the primary reason this blog has sat dormant for 10 months. In September we started home school all 3 girls (and actually Timothy has jumped right in as well). I believe we have settled into a routine and are actually ahead of schedule to finish up for the year. But I am BUSY, all of the time trying to keep on on planning, teaching, and grading. But already, we have seen great results and have been encouraged in this new venture.

The older girls are going to go on an exciting trip with Grammy and Grandpa to Washington D.C. in June. This has been a great motivation to stay focused and finish in May!

We attended a super home school conference in June of last year and have made plans to go again this year. Lord willing, I can post some of my notes from these conferences as time allows.


Thanks for not giving up on this blog. I am excited to get more regular with my posts. Feel free to comment at any time.