With the recent dawning of the pervasive new cultural ethos of lawlessness – coupled with a terrorizing, daily narrative making everyone anxious and fearful about the future, not to mention increasing inflation and decreasing financial and food security for so many – it’s not surprising so many people have now resorted to simply switching their relationships “on and off,” without notice, with personal and private decisions: no explanation or justification necessary: you’ve been ghosted!
Not cool for Christians. Not cool at all!
The genesis of this prevalent new social fad was online dating and hook-up apps on the internet. They created an “ease” and convenience with both starting and ending romantic and sexual relationships, with little shame or guilt, because both parties getting into those kinds of relationships were usually aware of what to expect, and that they were doing it for mostly selfish reasons anyhow.
It wasn’t long, however, as a result of the widespread use of these apps, that this seemingly sophisticated but oh so selfish strategy transformed the people adopting it online, and this behavior transmigrated from the “virtual” internet world of mostly contracts between strangers (although sometimes overlapping in the ‘real’ world with apps like tinder) to the “real” day-to-day lives of people living in society.
It seems that countless people have unwittingly adopted these same ways of thinking and acting to understand and manage not only any romantic or sexual relationships they may enter into, but ALL relationships, including family and friends.
Attempts to justify this practice of ghosting others by saying it was to avoid hurting their feelings is a vacuous argument.
Getting “ghosted” without explanation proves the person doing the ghosting lacks compassion and is selfish: ghosting usually creates far more confusion and protracted uneasiness for the “ghostee” than if the other person had simply stated how he or she felt, and what they had decided.
Again, it takes a bit of courage and at least an ounce of integrity to do the right thing in such circumstances, so anyone ghosting someone else who isn’t simply a stranger they don’t want to get to know is, to put it bluntly, a moral coward.
Ghosting may have started with internet dating apps, but has since clearly become a much-broader cultural phenomena: so count yourself really, really lucky if you haven’t been “ghosted” at least once by someone you believed to be an important person in your life during the past year. The stories I could tell you from what others have shared with me!
How prevalent is ghosting now? Hard to say, but it gets my vote for the 2023 trend setting “Word of the Year” !
Christians should intuitively know ghosting is very wrong, but it’s necessary to recall this and bring it into our consciousness for us to come to the morally-transforming and dynamic realization of the true moral and spiritual significance and importance of NOT ghosting, especially at this time in our culture.
It is a key component in this end times spiritual warfare underway to resist all cultural trends to conform to new modes and methods of social interaction which are, quite frankly, selfish and not of God, but unchristian and from the evil one.
During the pandemic many families were split with ideological and malicious propaganda, and most I suspect remain split, in many cases with siblings close for their entire lives no longer having any communication whatsoever…. in many cases now for over 3 years!
That great evil inflicted upon us as a society, right down to the family level, was malicious and clearly designed to divide and destroy families, which it did in spades, and may have also helped to convince us that in this new world order “ghosting” is the new modus operandi for relationships you’re having issues with.
That’s why I’m writing this post. Ghosting is evil…absolutely poisonous for Christians.
I’m just going to leave a few quotes from scripture to reinforce the importance of our being aware of the extra effort we need to make with difficult relationships in our lives these days because of these trends and forces we’re coming up against.
We need to bring the “Holy Ghost” into all our relationships, those we have, those we have yet to make, the close friends, the intimate and not so intimate family, and for the love of God and neighbor, spurn ALWAYS and forever “unholy ghosting”.
“Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.” [Colossians 3:22-14].
“Brothers, if someone is caught in a trespass, you who are spiritual should restore him with a spirit of gentleness. But watch yourself, or you also may be tempted.” [Galatians 6:1]
And don’t sit back waiting for a confession from someone else you believe sinned or committed some relationship crime against you, and therefore you believe should take the initiative to repair the breach.
Even in such cases, scripture tells us we are to take the initiative and go to that person!
“Moreover if thy brother shall trespass against thee, go and tell him his fault between thee and him alone: if he shall hear thee, thou hast gained thy brother.” [Matthew 18:15].