If it isn’t LOVE it is just NOISE!

Does it feel like the world is getting louder? Like someone turned up the volume on hatred, misery, war, judgement, cruelty, evil, betrayal, harshness, and impulsiveness? Yeah…it’s definitely getting louder.

So much noise. So little love. 

All the noise should not surprise us. The world has always been a noisy place, but today we have more ways to tune into the noise. We blare our news channels of choice, endlessly scroll through babbling nonsense online, and feed the relentless compulsion to add our voices and unique perspectives to every subject under the sun.

So much content. So little love.

What in the world are we doing? Why are we listening to this nonsense? We know it is noise. We know it isn’t from God. We know that it is irritating us and feeding our descent into depravity. We know it, but we keep tuning in.

What if instead of being turned off, we just turned it off? It is possible. 

The 24-hour news cycle does not need to be watched. We can be extremely well informed without ever watching a second of that madness. News channels are designed to keep us watching. Communicating basic information in clear and concise ways does not keep people glued to the screen. The incessant droning is orchestrated to keep us locked into the noise. Consuming the noisy rhetoric has consequences. People become unable to have thoughtful conversations that value a diversity of perspectives. People speak in weaponized soundbites and become deaf to anything that does not tickle what their itching ears want to hear. Critical thinking is replaced with a critical spirit. It’s just noise.

Social media does not need to be consumed. You are not missing anything, and nobody is missing you. I completely abandoned social media years ago. After spending fifteen years carefully cultivating my social media presence across multiple platforms with a planned strategy, I simply gave it up. I made no announcement. I just stopped logging on. I had thousands of followers and was an avid contributor. Guess how many people have told me that they miss my social media presence? Exactly zero. It took me about six months to detox from the noise of social media, but once I stopped consuming that noise, my soul became much more peaceful and loving. 

“If I speak in the tongues[a] of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.” (1 Corinthians 13:1 NIV)

If it isn’t love, it’s just noise. Turn off the noise. Stop consuming the noise. Stop spreading the noise. 

You were created in love by love to be loved and to share love. Let love be the soundtrack of your life. Tune into love. Look for love. Recognize love. Celebrate love. Share love. 

Our world tends to scoff at love. There seems to be a prevailing attitude that discounts love…believing that somehow love isn’t enough. People roll their eyes at love and say things like, “we need real world solutions to real world problems.” 

Love is the solution. Love is the answer. Everything else is just noise and noise is the problem.