Much of what we know of the lives of others and of the world is curated. The view we are given, by whatever source is giving it, has carefully selected, organized, and presented the view for us. Our news sources carefully craft the images and messages they present to garner our attention. They don’t show you everything. They select and organize the bits and pieces and present them to you to give you the view they want you to have. Social media is much the same. Individuals choose and organize what they want you to see. Some take great pains to make sure only the best images of themselves are shown. We all do it to some extent. We all present our lives to the world as a “curated” presentation, carefully selecting, organizing and presenting what gets seen and what doesn’t. We do it every day, all day, picking and choosing what is seen and what is not. As we build this facade, the curation of our lives can actually deepen. We must become even more careful to present the right “face” in public. We must be even more careful to maintain the appearance that everything in our lives is going so well – because it certainly appears to us that everyone else’s lives are. The cycle grows. We become more guarded, more closed, or worse we start to believe our own curated story.
This isn’t just a problem externally. We curate our spiritual lives as well. We often only let the best parts show to others. Sometimes we even deceive ourselves into thinking that our spiritual lives are what we are attempting to project. James dealt with this in his letter to the early church when he states “Prove yourself doers of the word and not merely hearers who delude themselves” (James 1:22). We can delude ourselves into thinking that our spiritual lives are in good standing with God simply because we are willing to hear what He has to say from time to time. “I attend worship without fail. I go to Bible classes regularly. I read my Bible every day.” These are good things, but they can represent only a curated view of our spiritual lives. Are we actually living out, day to day, what we hear? Are we proving ourselves to be doers or just hearers? James uses the illustration of a man that sees his “natural face” in the mirror (1:23-25). In his example, Scripture is the mirror, and when we look at ourselves in it we see ourselves with all of the facade striped away (Hebrews 4:13). Now, equipped with the real view of our life that Scripture provides, the question becomes are we going to correct the things that need correcting? The man in James, walks away forgetting what he saw. He simply returns to the old curated view of his life. That delusion will cost him his soul.
No one is suggesting that we need to expose the raw details of our lives to the world through social media. What we are suggesting is that we must all understand that there is a curated view of our life and there is the real, unfiltered view of our life that God shows us through His word. We need to look into that mirror and seek to make the changes that are needed. We need to implant His word in our life and DO IT. If we do, it has the power to save our soul.
Michael Hite
“The one who desires life, to love and see good days, must keep his tongue from evil and his lips from speaking deceit. He must turn away from evil and do good; He must seek peace and pursue it” (I Peter 3:10-11)
