“Repent, says the Lord; the Kingdom of heaven is at hand.” Mt. 4:17

I am not going to lie, being out of the social media circles is hard. I never realized how much time I actually spent “staying on top” of everything going on. For me, I would spend the empty spots between meetings, or on my break times just trolling the Facebook or Twitter feeds. All in total, about two hours of my day, and even more at night. Wasted time that I will never get back. It was actually difficult, but, today, it has not been so bad.

So, what did I do with all that time……. amazingly, productive things. Last night, I spent time in Church, listening to a wonderful homily, and getting my spiritual self fed. I spent extra time with the kids and my wife last night. It was unfiltered time, and it actually meant something. There was no distractions in those moments. I can not explain to you how good that made me feel. I never knew how distracted I really was by other things outside of my own family, to actually spend time with them. I think this is why I know this is what I was supposed to be doing this Lent.

So, with all that said, today’s Gospel is from Luke Chapter 9, Verses 22-25. I put this out there for you to look up on your own, but I will tell you what hit me the most about this passage today was the message on choices. We all have the choice of what we do on daily basis. I can wrap this back to my social media addiction (an addiction I didn’t realize I had by the way). I had a choice of what to do with my time, but it wasn’t an effective use that actually enriched my life. Please don’t get me wrong, I love all the people that I interact with on my Facebook page, but to be quite honest, I think it has made me lose the personal touch that should come with any relationship. I actually like face to face conversations better than ones through a computer, but the ease of sending a text, or a message made that seem so much like work. It’s not really work, it just makes it seem that way. Again, we have the choice. Just as with anything else, we have options. I kind of like not having the distraction.

Lord, thank you for giving me the free will to choose in my life. More importantly, thank you for being there to show me the better choice to make. Amen.