Let’s talk honestly for a minute about the growing prevalence of “Facebook Christianity”—you know, those 101 ways we equate burying ourselves in social media with interacting with God. Just one example: those posts that claim that a Like = Amen, or that a Comment = a prayer—or, better yet, a Share = a hundred prayers.

It appears that all we have to do is bang on our keyboards for 30 seconds each morning to be transformed into prayer warriors. But please understand: liking a FB page does not equal prayer. There’s nothing even remotely similar about giving a thumbs-up to a social media post and communicating with our Creator. When the disciples asked Jesus, “Teach us to pray,” He responded with a beautiful lesson in how to talk to the Father. He didn’t say, “Click a button or two, and we’ll call it even.”

Seriously, are we that lazy? Are we so pressed for time that we’ve replaced our morning God-time with the click of a Like button? Or is it that we’ve convinced ourselves that we can spend time with God without having to rip ourselves away from our devices?

And how about those click-bait posts that test your “faith” according to whether or not you Like or Share? Every time I see a post like that, I’m stunned that any Christian would actually believe that Liking a post was somehow connected to their devotion for Jesus—or that scrolling past it would make them a child of Satan—and yet it happens. A lot.

And while we’re on this subject: sharing a post that promises money in return for an Amen or a Share (even when adding the disclaimer “just in case lol”) is no different than consulting a Ouija board to discover the future “just in case” a board game might know more than God. We either trust the God of the Bible or we don’t. We look to Him for provision, or we look to Mark Zuckerberg. We are Christians who live by faith, or we are superstitious twits. End of story.

Faith and superstition don’t mix. We can’t have it both ways. So please, if you care anything about lending credibility to what you believe, stop this ridiculous hocus-pocus. Let’s put an end to Facebook Christianity and repent that it ever got to this point in the first place.

Here’s to the new year—a brand new opportunity to experience the joy and contentment that come from genuine communication with the Father.

1 Tim. 4:1, Voice: “The Spirit very clearly tells us that in the last times some will abandon the true faith because of their devotion to spirits sent to deceive and sabotage, and mistakenly they will end up following the doctrine of demons.”