Would you believe it if I told you that the average US adult spends 11-plus hours each day consuming visual media?

What if I told you that was a conservative estimate?

It is estimated that 15 hours or more will be spent consuming media. Of course that includes the World Wide Internets and your ADD-never finish reading one thing-because you just clicked another link-habits. But still…

The advent of smart phones and i-everythings and tablets has dramatically increased the rate at which the good people receive information.

Apparently that is why our attention spans are so short and you probably have stopped reading by now…but for those pressing on…

I have but two considerations, nay, categories, for which to think about our consumption.

1. Quantity

– How much media am I consuming?

– Ephesians 5:15-16 urges followers of Jesus to make the best use of time. Why? The days are evil. Not just the big stuff either like murder and rape and war. But lust, envy, jealousy, greed, pride…the media is a vehicle for driving these things into our minds and hearts.

– So what are you doing with the time God’s given?

2. Quality

– What material am I consuming?

– If I watch Scarface will I become a drugged out, womanizing mobster? No. That’s not my style. But if I’m desensitized to those things and to the filthy, foul-mouthed language of it, then I’ve become consumed. I’ve been overtaken by darkness.

– What I’m listening to on the radio or iPod will inevitably find a dwelling place in my heart. If girls are objectified and called obscene names and viewed as objects of my pleasure…well, that’s pretty much what girls will become to me. No matter if I really believe they’re created in the image of God.

All that to say, please stop watching The Bachelorette and The Bachelor and House Wives of Anywhere and pornography and most of what’s on TV and Victoria’s Secret commercials and Hardee’s commercials (Carl’s Jr. for our West Coast readers). Pay attention to the message that’s in the medium of the media.

What is this show, commercial, advertisement, or song trying to get me to buy into? Is watching the news seven times a day making me a doom and gloom person?

So little time. So much media.