To be distracted is to be led astray. Do you spend hours glued to a screen that endlessly feeds you the kind of material that interests you most? It might not be bad or false content. But if it distracts you from what is most important then it is leading you astray. We live in an ‘attention economy’. Your attention is now a commodity. The algorithms behind your media feeds are working hard to keep your attention so they can sell it to advertisers. One of the most common problems now for Christians is the plethora of media that draws us into sensationalist theological bandwagons. It’s easy to tire of the central and vital elements of our faith, and to get drawn into marginal theories and speculations that titillate our curiosity. The book of Revelation is a favourite source for sensationalist teachers who claim to have all the answers to all the mysteries of this book. They draw Christians into world-watching and speculating about whether certain events signal the end-times. This ironically is the very thing that Jesus told us not to do. He told us that there would be wars, famines and earthquakes but that we should not get distracted by this (Matthew 24:6-7). Instead, we should remain diligent to the very particular task that Jesus gave us: taking the gospel to all people (Matthew 24:14,46). Dig deeply into the central things of the faith; focus on the mission of Jesus; don’t get distracted by curiosities and speculations.
Ask God to show you what you are being distracted by.
Read 1 Timothy 1:3-7.
