off the grid

hello everyone, its been a while since I blogged and I figured it was time to update you all on my life!

First off, I am doing GREAT on funding, thanks to all of you! I have a couple more donations coming that I know of and I am getting really close to my goal. I am so grateful and cannot believe the generosity and kindness I have experienced in the last 10 months!

Second, I am graduating SO SOON! I am so excited and am soaking up as much of my time here as I can since it is rapidly coming to a close! (135 short days until I pack up and head out)

Next up is a pretty big life update and an explanation for the title of this blog. This weekend I officially decided to delete and deactivate all of my social media accounts and go “off the grid” as I like to call it (makes me sound like a spy or cool FBI agent 🙂

This is a crazy choice and you may be thinking “that’s not that big of a deal”, “HOW WILL YOU SURVIVE”, or somewhere in the middle. This was a really hard decision for me but I honestly feel like it is where the Lord was leading me and I wanted to not only give you a heads up incase you try to reach out or message me, but also so I can share a little bit of my story in this area, hopefully encourage you, and ultimately glorify God’s faithfulness in my story!

Since I was in middle school I have had an Instagram account and over the years I have acquired accounts on more and more platforms until I was juggling 8+ social media accounts. I want to first say that I don’t hate or dislike social media, I actually think it is mind-blowing, so helpful and I admire people who use it in such a God-honoring way-however, no matter how it may have seemed, I was not one of those people.

I, like so many others, fell into the trap of feeding a praise addiction with the validation that comes in the form of “likes and comments”. Through some tough talks with the Lord over the past few months, He revealed to me my dependency on the approval and applause of other people. I was subconsciously keeping a mental tab of how many people “liked“ a photo, how many people followed or unfollowed me after each post, and whether my “aesthetic“ was forming the picture of me that I wanted it to. I was identifying more with the portrayal of Bree that my social media created than the real version of myself. My identity lied in an app on my phone and photos that most people spent no more than 3 seconds glancing at.

While this sounds extreme, it didn’t happen over night—it happened over years of seeking praises from other people, while feeling empty inside and wondering why those compliments weren’t enough to fill me.

BUT GOD

My two favorite words ever. He met me in this awful place of selfishness and vanity with His rich mercy and He set me free. He set me free from a life of wondering if people wanted to be my friend after seeing my social media accounts. He set me free from days of searching for one more compliment, one more like, one more follower. He set me free from a seemingly unbreakable cycle of prideful desires that seemed to be ”just how it is” for people in my generation.

One thing that I’ve learned through this experience is that God made us so uniquely different that there is not a black and white answer to our problems. It’s not “social media is great for everyone” or “social media is awful and no one should have it”—its a little bit of both and lots more in the middle.

However, what I do know is that we serve a God who is infinitely proud of us and thinks that we are worthy of everything He has to offer. We don’t have to go searching for the fickle approval of man because we already have the eternal approval of God (and that’s an understatement). 

While this is my solution, it most likely is not your solution and that is totally fine! I’m not an advocate for social media nor am I an angry protester trying to take down the entire platform—I’m simply a daughter of a Father who loves me so much and has yet again set me free, and I am just here to tell the world all about it.

P.S. One concern that myself and others have had is how I will be able to share pictures with family and friends while I am on the World Race. I still want the opportunity to give all of you as much insight into missionary life as I can, so I’m working on the logistics for doing a “photo dump” type email newsletter each month that I’m gone. Stay tuned for more details on that and how to join it!

I love you all so much and I feel so lucky to have a place where I can be open and vulnerable and have a group of people who love me despite all of my mess.  Feeling extra thankful this week that I serve a good God who brings freedom.

His love & mine,

bree