The Violin Gospel Podcast
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The Violin Gospel Podcast
Navigating the Digital World: Embracing Faith and Simplicity - Episode 2
Have you ever wondered if your social media habits are pulling you away from your spiritual journey? Join me, Michael Sanchez, as I unravel my personal experiences with social media's dual nature—both as a bridge for connection and a potential barrier to hearing God's voice. With a soothing violin rendition of "Amazing Grace," we'll set the stage for exploring how to maintain simplicity amidst the noise. I'll share insights on filtering out the digital clutter and guarding our hearts from the allure of wealth, power, and comparison. Together, we'll uncover practical strategies to build a thoughtful online presence that nurtures rather than hinders our spiritual growth.
In another segment, I'll open up about a transformative period in my life when losing everything shifted my focus towards faith and purpose. Drawing from scriptures like Romans 12:2 and Ephesians 5:15-16, we'll discuss the profound realization that earthly successes pale in comparison to eternal values. My journey of using God-given talents, such as playing the violin, to uplift others serves as a reminder of the importance of kingdom work. We will also confront the pervasive fear of missing out, especially relevant in our hyper-connected world, and emphasize the liberating power of disconnecting to deepen our relationship with God.
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Hey guys, Michael Sanchez here. Hope you guys are having a great day. I'm going to start this podcast by just playing a song that most of you guys probably know. I hope it just brings a little light to your day. Here's Amazing Grace on the violin © transcript Emily Beynon All right.
Speaker 1:I hope you enjoyed that song Obviously a really famous tune. And today's topic for the podcast I'm excited about this particular topic as I've been really passionate about it lately is the concept of how we should manage social media. So yeah, for those of you guys that didn't know this, I'm actually a marketing consultant, so I actually have clients that are constantly needing help with social media, because social media is a great tool to be able to connect with people all over the world. It's likely how you guys actually found my podcast. So there is actually good when it comes to social media and I do believe that if you manage it properly, it can be ultimately a great tool. But there's definitely just like anything else in life, if it's not managed properly, it can also become something that's almost an idol, a distraction, and ultimately takes you from your purpose and your ability to connect with God. So I have some great points today to make with you guys, some concepts, quite a few verses, because I really want to help you guys see the importance of this, the overall concept and the vision. But I really do believe that if you guys are able to manage this part of your life, it really will help for you guys to quiet things down and ultimately hear God's voice. Because, yeah, if we can hear God's voice in our lives, it's going to really help us to know where we should be going. He promises to give us the joy and the ability to live a stronger, more spiritual life when we have that connection with him and just be more happy as we go through the pains of life. We're able to go through it with him at our side. So I want to start with the first concept, which is the call to simplicity and quietness. I kind of just brought that up, but basically I started with this verse, which is Be still and know that I am God. That's in Psalms 46, verse 10.
Speaker 1:And I just want to point this out as related to social media, because if you're constantly on social media, in those moments in between let's say, your work or your dinner, really just any part of your day you're kind of lured towards getting on your phone and just seeing what's on Facebook. Those sort of times are really opportunities to really reflect and really understand where you're at with your day, with your week, with your month, with your life. You know, to be able to talk to God and ask him. You know what are things that you want me to do, lord. You know what are things that you say in your word that I should be focused on right now. And if we're constantly on social media, we're going to have a really hard time hearing God's voice. And I found that when I shut it off completely, which you know is sort of an extreme. But you know, when I'm not even on Facebook at all other than just for my clients you know my marketing job I'm just seeing a tremendous ability to connect with God and have that joy in my heart. So that's one thing I just want to mention is that when we manage social media, we're able to get to those moments of quietness with God.
Speaker 1:The second point I want to make is guarding your heart and mind are some of the most important things to do in your life. So the problem let's just go into the problem of social media. So social media, if you're browsing, let's say, reels, and you're just going from video to video, I actually understand this quite clearly from a marketing perspective that they really understand what your triggers are and the things that interest you the most. And if you really analyze it, if you really dig down deep, you're going to be able to find that they're basically targeting the same things, which is wealth creation. You're ultimately, you know, if you do this next big thing, you're going to be able to make more money, have more success. The other one can be sex success. The other one can be sex. Ultimately, it's all over the place, right? Basically trying to make you lured with lust, with images, anything that's appealing, attractive. Ultimately, that's a really bad thing to put into your mind. That's going to distract you from the word of God. And the last one is just you know understanding that you know power is also all over social media. So that's just you know the lure of you becoming this bigger person or being better than everybody else. It's really all over the place.
Speaker 1:So it's so important that you understand that as you're browsing social media, these are the things that you're letting go through your mind. And if you're just like browsing random's much different, in my opinion, than if you're just seeing people's profiles and kind of what's going on in people's lives as far as their family. But unfortunately, when you're browsing, facebook always plugs in those random videos that are going to be sort of diluting you know your experience of, even if you go there for the intention of seeing what's going on with family members. You can easily get distracted by all the other stuff, so that's why it's so important to manage it. My recommendation would be to, when you see an ad or you see something you don't like, I would suggest and if it has something to do with one of those three things I mentioned, you know, just say that you want to see less of this sort of ad. I think that's a good practice.
Speaker 1:A key verse I want to mention above all else guard your heart for everything you do flows from it. That's in Proverbs 4, verse 23. Great. The next concept I want to talk about is the danger of comparison. So, yeah, when you're on social media, you know you're, you're seeing other people sort of brag, boast, show off like what they're doing, you know, and that can be. That can really become an idol, because you see other people, what they're doing, and it sort of makes you want to have that same thing. Or you know you want to be better than that person you know. Oh, they're to be better than that person you know. Oh, they're doing this, I should be doing that, you know. Key verse says you know, for we do not dare to classify or compare ourselves with some who commend themselves. When they measure themselves by themselves and compare themselves with themselves, they are not wise. That's in 2nd Corinthians 10, verse 12. So I want to encourage you guys just to see what's going on there with comparison and not fall into that trap, because that can really dilute your mind and ultimately, your relationship with God.
Speaker 1:I would say, the more you're just not on social media, right? So like if you just check it once in a while, once a week, that's way better than if you're on it every day or every minute of the day. I mean, if you just go different places, you see people are on their phones constantly. You know to where. I think there's studies that say that people are on social media like four or five hours a day. You know, like if, if that's the case, like you are literally putting garbage into your mind and just free flowing like a highway, all these other thoughts like how are we, how we expect to connect with God when we have that mentality? So I just really encourage you guys out there to manage social media, to only go in there once in a while or maybe just cut it out completely out of your life and there's definitely benefit to that.
Speaker 1:All right, let's go into the next point. I wrote down the biblical principle of rest, taking a digital Sabbath. So this is one thing that I would say that I struggle with. You know cause I? I'm an entrepreneur, like I'm always wanting to. You know, do things online and create businesses. You know that's always been my personality since I was young, so you always. You know you can easily look at that extra day as like a way to like catch up on your work or to do more things, but God really says in his word that we need to take that day off. You know, at least one day a week spirit, all right.
Speaker 1:So the next point I want to make is living in the world but not conforming to it. So a key verse says do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, and that's in Romans 12, verse two. This is such an important verse, I believe, because the world around us is constantly trying to transform us into what the world says, which is that we need to make money, we need to have success, we need to have fame. You know we need all these things that the world is trying to get us to do. Ultimately, all those things are of the world of Satan. If you really do transform and conform to not what the world says but what God says, it's going to totally change your daily walk, like the things that you value, you know.
Speaker 1:For me, I would say, you know, before being transformed, probably the most important thing was making money, having success, building a big business and, as a lot of you guys know that I mentioned on the last podcast, I lost literally everything. So I had a big business, I had a multimillion dollar business, I had a big house and I lost all of it. You know, at the time all those things seem like. You know, I was at the at the peak I was, I was living the American dream, but then losing all of that really opened up my eyes and really helped me hit rock bottom to a point of understanding that, hey, I haven't been living life the right way, and it really made me change, to see things differently. And it's been a journey. You know it's been an up and down journey of, you know, going one direction and seeing that it's a dead end. You know that God doesn't want me in that direction and, as I told you guys, with the violin I really put the violin sort of buried. The violin I put it in, you know, buried it in the ground. To where, when I'm not on social media, to where, when I'm focusing on God, when I'm focusing on the word, he really shows us in his word that we should be using the gifts that he's given us to help others. So that for me, is the violin and other things. So when you start to really focus on what God is telling you, it's going to change and transform the way you want to live your life. So that verse is so important. I want to just read it to you guys again Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.
Speaker 1:Romans 12, verse 2. So I encourage you guys to write that verse down, go to the Bible and read that verse over and over, because it's so important. It's basically like the roadmap, it's like the fork in the road, like are we going to decide to live God's way or are we going to decide to live the way the world tells us to live? And where does the world tell us to live? All over the place, social media, tv commercials that you need this, you need that to be happy. It's all a lie, guys. It really is. So it's the choice we have to make. So I encourage you guys to write that one down. It's a really good verse.
Speaker 1:All right, next point I want to make is filling our time with kingdom work. A key verse says be very careful then how you live, not as unwise, but as wise, making the most out of every opportunity, because the days are evil. Ephesians 5, 15 and 16. So that's so true, guys. I mean, we're here on this world, on this earth, temporarily.
Speaker 1:So it's so important that we understand that there are so many incorrect roads to take that god does not want us to take. There's so many idols, whether it be that you're living for the approval of others, whether you're trying to make a bunch, a bunch of money, whether you're living only for your family. There are so many traps, addictions, drugs, pornography. So whatever one of those you guys relate to, it's just so important to understand that we're here on a temporary assignment and it's so important to manage those challenges in our life. So for me you know like I went through a terrible divorce it took a lot of going through pain for me to understand this, but basically, managing those challenges in our life is everything in this world.
Speaker 1:Once we're able to really get to a point of understanding that now we're able to grow in Christ and live our purpose because we understand who we are as men, who we are in Christ, that he's ultimately we're valuable because of who we are in him and he wants to live a certain way. So if we live a certain way now, we're actually able to fulfill our purpose in life and follow our kingdom work. So I want to read that verse again Be very careful, then, how you live, not as unwise, but as wise, making the most out of every opportunity, because the days are evil. We're only here on this earth for 80 years sometimes less, guys 60 years. If we get lucky, 100 years. That is such a small amount of time compared to the trillions and trillions and trillions of years that we're going to have in eternity. So it's so important that we live life a certain way to where God is the center of our lives, because that's where we're going. You know we have a. We're either going to be in one of two places, either in hell or in heaven. So we have to make those choices and social media is just a place of of destruction. I mean, it's a place where, if you continually watch and listen to social media like it's going to lead you off track, it's going to allow Satan to get into your mind and use the things that you're seeing to get away from God's word. You know that's ultimately what Satan wants. He hates you. Satan hates anybody that God loves. So it's so important that we manage these things in our lives.
Speaker 1:Number eight I wrote down is overcoming the fear of missing out FOMO in relation to social media. So a key verse I wrote down is the Lord is my shepherd. I lack nothing. So I think with social media it's it's really easy to get into the mindset that we need to check it all the time because otherwise we're going to miss out. We're going to miss out on something, or it can even be just checking the news all the time, like I would say I'm a culprit of that. I like to know what's going on in the world, but if we do that all the time, it really does cause a disconnect from God if we do it constantly. So I encourage you guys to understand that fear of missing out is of the devil. He wants us to feel like we're missing out if we don't go on social media. So like delete Facebook for a day or two or, you know, maybe only check Facebook on your desktop and not on your phone, like there's ways to sort of manage it. But we have to understand that with the Lord, with God, we lack nothing. We don't need to always know what's going on in the world. That fear of missing out, you know it's such an important concept to understand.
Speaker 1:But my next point I want to make too, is building deeper relationships in real life. So, although you would think like social media brings everybody together and everybody knows what's going on in each other's lives, there's been studies that say that it actually makes people loneliest as ever because there's no, there's not those really deep relationships in real life as much as, let's say, 50 years ago or 100 years ago. So I just think it's so important to understand that by you going on social media all the time, you're missing out on those genuine, potentially deep relationships that you're going to not have on social media. You're going to only have those in real life. So me, I would say I'm more of an introvert, but by me being intentional and not getting on social media. I would say it just naturally makes me more interested and more available, you know, to to reach out to that person, that friend, that person that's you know maybe needing my help with something you know, and building those relationships. My wife is really good at this, maya. She's amazing with building, cultivating deep, real relationships outside of social media. But yeah, I encourage you guys to do that and see it that way to where the more we get off social media, the more time we have to spend with other people.
Speaker 1:My next point the role of social media in evangelism. Should we use it or avoid it? Evangelism Should we use it or avoid it? So I do really believe that there is good media. I've grown tremendously in Christ through Rick Warren sermons and I mentioned that in the last podcast. I highly encourage you guys to go to YouTube type in Rick Warren sermons. You're going to learn a lot. There's quite a few different sermons. I mentioned last podcast Rick Warren on self-destruction. Rick Warren on the mind. Rick Warren marriage. Rick Warren dating. He points to a lot of truths in the Bible. He's got amazing messages. I can't tell you, like how much I've grown from listening to good media.
Speaker 1:So there's obviously media that's just pointless and even People trying to make you do this or buy this or build this big new thing. Use this strategy. Those type of things aren't necessarily helping your life, but if you listen to the word of God through media that can be through YouTube, videos that can be through, potentially, if you consider this podcast, you know something that you can grow from. There's good media out there. So if you choose and be selective of different media platforms and messages, that can actually benefit your life and actually point you to the word of God.
Speaker 1:I would say that, for me, has been huge, you know, focusing on going, for example, to YouTube and typing in Billy Graham sermons. I mean there's amazing sermons that are still out there, even though Billy Graham died several years ago. I encourage you guys to check out some of his sermons on YouTube. I mean just amazing knowledge and passionate preaching and amazing content, you know. So I really believe that there is good media out there. You're not going to find it on commercials. You're not going to find it browsing reels. Most likely, even if they know that you're a Christian, you'll see a few here and there that are about God. The majority of them probably are not, so it's not really a great place to see the random stuff, but being intentional and going to a specific place or podcast or YouTube channel or something like that, I think that's good.
Speaker 1:So I do see that there's a, there can be good in media and eventually like an AI. I've started to learn a lot more about AI and although AI can can be bad in some ways, it can also be very good. It can help us to to do things a lot faster and to create good content faster. Technically, this podcast I created this outline initially using AI for me to get ideas, verses of bullet points. So there's a lot of good that comes out of media as well as AI, different places that you can ultimately get good nuggets from Very good. So I hope you guys enjoyed this discussion, this podcast.
Speaker 1:I just really wanted you guys to know that, wherever you're at, it's all about the journey of getting closer to God and I really do believe that if you manage social media more in your life, god and I really do believe that if you manage social media more in your life, there's going to be an ability to connect more with God and to build that relationship that he wants us to have Guys. It's not about building wealth. It's not about becoming rich or being a millionaire. It's about going down to your roots and knowing who you are. You're the most valuable person to God. He loves you, he wants to connect with you and he promises us, if we are on that journey of getting to know him and building that relationship with him, we're going to be as happy as we've ever been. You know, we may be going through trials and tribulations and struggles, but even in those times we can find joy in the Lord.
Speaker 1:So if you're going through a hard time right now, I encourage you to give God a chance. You know, let's just do a prayer. Anybody out there, guys, that doesn't know the Lord. I just want to pray for you right now, lord, whoever is listening to this podcast. I just pray for everybody out there that doesn't know you as well as they ultimately can know you. Lord, you know we're all there. We're at a point where we're not fully there yet, but I encourage anybody out there listening to grow closer to you. And for those out there that don't know you deeply and haven't made that decision yet, lord, I just I pray that they'll make that decision, that they're wanting to follow you, because that's really what brings happiness and joy in this world.
Speaker 1:Lord, we just pray for everybody out there that's going through troubles and tribulations. For me it was that divorce, lord. It was that difficult time. Maybe other people out there are going through difficult times. I just pray for their situation, their specific problem that they're going through. We all go through it, lord. I just pray that they'll be able to take that challenge, turn it to you and build a relationship with you so that they can ultimately get through that challenge and that difficulty. Lord, we love you so much. We just pray in your name. Amen, lord, we love you so much. We just pray in your name. Amen. Thanks so much, guys. I'll end the podcast with a little song, a little outro. Have a blessed day, guys.