wasting time?

God has been putting something on my heart for awhile, and just recently he started repeating himself because, well, I was ignoring him.  That hurts to type, but it is true.

I spend waste too much time on the computer.

I am not saying that technology is bad.  But, I am saying that I have not been managing my time well when I am  online.  Specifically, I have found that I have a hard time not wasting time when I check my facebook account and when I catch up on the blogs I follow through Google Reader.  Well, God has brought that fact back to my attention in two different ways over the past few days:

• My first big bump little nudge was, coincidentally, when I was reading a blog I follow.  This is a blog that I have not kept up with regularly (i.e., I see her updates in my reader, but I rarely click on them), but, for some reason (God's nudging?), I read her recent post on "Guarding Against Technology Time-Wasters".  It is just posts like this that show me that there is very useful information available online, but we must use the internet wisely.  I am so grateful that she wrote this post and provided some useful tips and tools.

• My second encouragement was a new bible study I started attending last night. My friend, Barb, is facilitating a study by Kelly Minter called No Other Gods on Sunday evenings at the Mulder Church.  Barb and I heard Kelly Minter last month when we attended the Deeper Still Conference in Birmingham.  Kelly had such spunk and a heart for the Lord, we both were quickly interested in looking into her bible studies.  I am so grateful that Barb was led to facilitate this particular one.  During our first introductory lesson last night, so many in attendance brought up how much time we have wasted on the internet and how it has truly become a god in our lives.  I hope that this great group of women will be able to hold me accountable in this area as we study more to fight our 'personal pharoahs'.

God is so good.  He knows what I need when I fail by trying to meet those needs my own way.  I thank him right now for these tools he has provided me.  In fact, one of the comments on the "Guarding against technologies" blog post I mentioned above shared a wonderful tool, a Google Chrome extension called StayFocusd. This is a "productivity" extension that restricts the amount of time you can spend browsing websites.  Once your allotted time for the day has been used up, the sites you have blocked will be inaccessible for the rest of the day.  I downloaded it last night and have set a limit on the time I can stay on Facebook each day: 20 minutes.  I just needed something to remind me, and this little tool is just the thing for me.  I am still deciding if I need to set restrictions for other websites (blogs, etc).

When reviewing my Google Reader account, I realized I had over 100 subscriptions!!  I have my reader set up to show on my iGoogle home page, so I have the opportunity temptation to read all...those...blogs. Lindsay at Passionate Homemaking (the blog I referenced above) suggests limiting yourself to 5 blogs.  I started reviewing my subscriptions and did get it down to 61.  That really doesn't sound like very much of a decrease, though, does it?  I need to cull a little more, I guess.  But, it is a start!

I also am committing not to open up the laptop until I have completed (1) my daily bible reading (click HERE for my 52-week plan), and (2) my daily bible studies (No Other Gods and a new Tuesday morning study I start tomorrow).

E-mails, social media sites, or blogs are not going to be my modern-day idols.

"This disaster came upon the nation of Israel because the people worshiped other gods, sinning against the Lord their God, who had brought them safely out of their slavery in Egypt."  2 Kings 17:7 (NLT)