12 Ways Your Phone Is Changing You

by Tony Reinke

“Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven” (Matt. 6:1). Consider one example. Imagine setting aside a few weeks of your summer vacation to travel on dirt roads and bump around in loud jeeps, winding deep into remote jungle villages in Central America. You risk fevers, diseases, and heatstroke, all in order to help build an orphanage for twenty destitute kids. At the end of the month, you step back, take a selfie with your handiwork in the background, and post it with pride on Facebook. Poof!—the reward is gone. Think about it. In one humble-brag selfie, the trade is made—eternal reward from God is sold for the porridge of maybe eighty likes and twelve comments of praise. (Context is not the point; we do this same sort of thing with pictures of an open Bible in a coffee shop.)