Getting hacked is not only annoying, but it can be quite scary.

Recently, Victory Church Tulsa, an Ambo TV partnering church, endured this unfortunate experience when its Instagram account was compromised by a Turkish hacker. For approximately nine days, the foreign hacker controlled the church’s page, posting inappropriate content.

Although the experience was frustrating, Paul Daugherty, senior pastor of Victory, chose to use this experience as an opportunity to regain his peace. 

In his most recent sermon titled, “I Got Hacked, But Got My Peace Back,” Daugherty admitted feeling vulnerable during the ordeal. “It was a scary moment, though, for us as a church…we didn’t even know what had happened. They started posting scandalous pictures…We started trying to defend ourselves…It was a helpless situation.”

Thankfully, the church regained control over its account after much prayer and reaching out to Instagram.  

Standing on the other side of the incident, Daugherty saw it as a metaphor for how the devil attacks our peace. “I think the devil is a hacker. He wants to hack into your heart. He wants to hack into your peace…and he will use situations on the outside to hack into the inside.”

Daugherty explained that no matter what occurs in our life, we can control whether or not we allow the external things to affect us internally. 

“Peace means when things are beyond your control you’re going to stay calm; you’re going to trust that God is working everything for good. You’re going to do everything you can do on your side, but you’re not going to stress…you’re going to be in a place of peace.”

The pastor and musician also used the experience to reiterate that although platforms like Instagram are great to reach people, they are not essential. Our peace should not rest on how popular we are.

“We can grow the church without Instagram, and that’s a good thing…Sometimes we make a big deal out of things that aren’t that big of a deal…we think the world is ending–someone unfollowed me…but that’s really not going to matter 30 years from now…in the long run we really are going to be ok.”

(image/ screengrab)