Don’t forget what’s around you, too. There could be more to your picture than you realize.

Selfies … what a fun way to include ourselves in our pictures of beautiful scenery or surrounded by family and friends. It’s something we couldn’t do prior to 2010 when Apple gave us the iPhone 4 with a front facing camera.

It was obviously technology that we had been waiting for. The International Business Times calculated that young adults (18-34 years of age) will take over 25,000 pictures of themselves in their lifetime. And that’s fine as long as we are part of the picture and not always the entire picture.

Something subtle can happen when little by little what we see through the lens is less about others … less about the beauty and wonder around us and more about our preoccupation with ourselves. That tendency can lead us to become like the man looking into the mirror every morning and singing to himself “You’re just too good to be true … can’t take my eyes off of you.”

King Solomon in the Old Testament didn’t take selfies when he became the king. He was ‘others-centered” and cared deeply for what happened around him, but soon saw himself as more important than his calling and began believing his own press!

Lucifer was a dazzlingly beautiful angel who became obsessed with self-portraits. Here’s how God critiqued his flaws and fall: “But you said in your heart, ‘I will ascend to heaven; I will raise my throne above the stars of God; I will sit on the mount of assembly in the remote parts of the north.” Isaiah 14:13 Amplified Bible 

As Jesus was observing people in the temple in worship He actually saw and heard a religious leader – a Pharisee – as he took selfies of himself. “The Pharisee stood [ostentatiously] and began praying to himself [in a self-righteous way, saying]: ‘God, I thank You that I am not like the rest of men—swindlers, unjust (dishonest), adulterers—or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I pay tithes of all that I get.’” Amplified Bible 

These are three examples of those who no longer included anyone else in their selfies!

The issue here isn’t really about taking or not taking selfies; a lot of great times can be chronicled by this wonderful feature of our cameras. Just make sure there is more in your pictures than just yourself.

^“Don’t be selfish; don’t try to impress others. Be humble, thinking of others

as better than yourselves. Don’t look out only for your own interests, but take

an interest in others, too.” Philippians 2:3,4 NLT