How God Used YouTube to Bring Me Closer to Him

It is so amazing the things that our God can do when we give Him our full attention. This past week, I had an incredible experience as God helped me to grow in my relationship with Him. I am so thankful to trust in a God Who shows up in places we would least expect Him. He taught me so many things this week and it all started with an afternoon spent watching YouTube videos.

This week I decided to spend some time away from Instagram. I was struggling to feel close to God and I knew that was partly because of all the time I was spending on social media. In the past, taking time away from Instagram has helped me grow closer to God. He always seems to teach me so much more when I give Him my full attention. I have to shut out all other voices so that I can hear His voice only.

God taught me so much this week! He always amazes me with the things He can do if I give Him my full attention. As always, I am hesitant to share because it is personal but I feel that God wants me to. I enjoy hearing stories from other people about their experiences with God and I pray that my experience will help someone else grow in their relationship with Him.

I want to be careful that I don’t make others feel jealous or that their relationship with God isn’t good enough. We are each on a different journey and growing at our own pace. I want to share what has worked for me because it might help someone else. The truth is, this all happened because I had been struggling and I asked God to help me.

This amazing story starts last Saturday. It was late at night and I was thinking about how I was struggling to have a personal relationship with God. I had been asking Him for a while to help me feel close to Him but He didn’t seem to be answering my prayers like I wanted Him to. That night I realized how much of my time I had been spending on Instagram. It seemed to be more and more each day. In one spontaneous moment, I felt like I needed to take a week away from Instagram. I now know that God had so many reasons to lead me to make that decision. It is so amazing to be able to look back and see how God’s plans work out.

As soon as I stepped away from Instagram, I felt closer to God. This was especially evident during my daily Bible reading. During this week, I read one chapter of Jeremiah each day. After reading each chapter, I would pick one lesson that I felt God wanted me to learn from that chapter. Maybe I will share more on these specific lessons later. Little did I know, the experience I had during the first couple of days was nothing compared to what was to come. 

The big moment was Tuesday afternoon when… get this… I started binge watching YouTube videos. God’s ways are wild! I was scrolling through YouTube’s recommended videos for me and I came across a video from Kian Tilton’s YouTube channel. I had never heard of her before and I thought her video looked interesting but I kept scrolling because I didn’t want to spend a lot of time watching videos. Not long after that, another one of her videos was recommended to me. Something in me felt that I needed to watch that video. I don’t remember exactly what video it was but I know it had something to do with her relationship with Kyle. The video captured all of my attention and I couldn’t stop watching! I watched so many more of their videos after that and I ended up watching them all afternoon. 

Their story is so amazing and a beautiful example of God’s presence. God taught me so much through their relationship videos. Normally I would feel guilty after spending that much time watching YouTube but this time I didn’t feel guilty at all. This gives me the assurance that God wanted me to watch those videos and that He did have something to teach me through them. I never would have expected God to bring me closer to Him by having me binge watch videos! While all of the videos I watched on Kian Tilton’s YouTube channel were about her relationship with Kyle, God used them to help me grow in my relationship with Him.

The biggest thing God taught me was about prayer. Throughout their relationship, Kian and Kyle have prayed about everything. In every single video I watched, they mentioned prayer and sometimes they even showed themselves praying together before making a video. God used this to show me that I need to pray about EVERYTHING. He cares about even the smallest things and I should talk to Him about everything in my life. This was also a common theme in my daily Bible reading throughout the week. 

Another big thing that God taught me is that He does speak to us. That sounds so obvious when I say it but I had been in a period of doubting that. I have seen so many people on Instagram say that we shouldn’t believe people when they say that God told them something. This led me to shut off my mind from God because I didn’t think that He would tell me anything. I began to believe that everything was just my own thoughts and that it was silly to try to listen for God’s voice. I had believed the things I had read on Instagram and that was so damaging.

It is a damaging perspective to say that we can’t believe anyone who thinks God told them something. God is here and He is a part of our lives. This week, God taught me directly from Him that He will speak to me. He showed me that He will talk to me, lead me, and show me what He wants me to do. I need to focus on Him and trust in Him. I had so many feelings of doubt and so many walls up because of the things I had read on social media. God took those walls down and showed me that I should talk to Him about everything. He showed me that I can trust in Him to lead the way and He will show me what decisions to make. This is something that was so evident in Kian and Kyle’s story!

After spending so much time learning about prayer, I now want to talk to God all the time. Something in me has changed! While prayer used to be awkward for me, it is now so natural (at least when I am praying on my own) and something I want to do constantly. This feeling is so indescribable and I want everyone to be able to experience it for themselves.

God has shown me that He is here with me and He wants me to tell Him everything. I used to only pray in the morning and at night. I would think about praying during the day but I would take a mental note to include those things I thought of in my evening prayers. Of course, by the time night rolled around those things were gone from my mind. Now I take the time to pray in the moment. It doesn’t matter where I am, God is there and He wants to hear from me. It is also so amazing to praise God during the day and thank Him for all the blessings that are constantly around me.

Something else God taught me through Kian and Kyle’s videos was boundaries. While their video was about boundaries in their personal relationship, God taught me about the boundaries I can set in my own life. It became very obvious to me that I need to set boundaries for my time on Instagram. I can’t keep falling into this trap of spending more time on social media than learning from God directly.

As Kian and Kyle showed in their video, boundaries are something you need to talk to God about. He will help you set those boundaries and maintain them. I trust that God will show me the boundaries I need to set and He will keep me accountable. It is so amazing to be able to talk to God about everything and trust that He will lead the way. I am so thankful that we have a God Who wants to talk to us and Who will help us through life. I want God to be a part of everything I do!

During my week away from Instagram, I grew so much in my relationship with God. He always amazes me with His power and the things that He can do when we trust in Him. I asked God to teach me something big this week and He did more than that, He taught me many huge things! What a wonderful feeling! I never want this feeling to fade away. Our God is so big and He does marvelous things. I pray that everyone else can experience this wonderful feeling in their own lives. God wants to have a personal relationship with you too!