Prisoners of Our Own Device

There might not have been a more world-changing invention this century than the smartphone. I remember in high school we would ask our math teacher if we could use a calculator, she deny us by saying, “Are you going to be carrying a calculator in your pocket every day?” Well, it turns out we would, plus a phone, computer, encyclopedia, message system, gaming console, news feed, and music player.

As great as the devices are, they come at a high cost and not just to our pocketbooks. Since the mainstream adoption of the smartphone, there has been a stark corollary increase in anxiety, depression, and suicide, especially in the younger generation. It is easy to see the distraction they make on the roads, in the classroom, and in the workplace. As author Jonathan Haidt put it, “The phone-based life makes it difficult for people to be fully present with others when they are with others, and to sit silently with themselves when they are alone.”

This convenience can become a prison that keeps us from our families, alienates us from friends, and draws us into a world of gossip, smut, and quarrels.

So, what do we do?

Maybe it starts by putting it down. Monitor your and your children’s time on your phone. Block off times, like at the dinner table and before and after worship, when you don’t use your phone. Set time limits for social media and games. Be conscious of the effect it has on you. Spend more time being social and less time on social media. Prioritize those in front of you.

Don’t let your phone become your prison.

“promising them freedom while they themselves are slaves of corruption; for by what a man is overcome, by this he is enslaved”

2^nd Peter 2:19

Comments

I Know All Those Words, But That Sentence Makes No Sense To Me

Let’s say you travel back in time six hundred years or so. Luckily, you happen across a fellow that speaks English. Upon hearing your tale, he describes you as nice, smart, and handsome. Wouldn’t you feel good? You shouldn’t. As Sol Steinmetz in his book, Semantics Antics , explains; Nice originally meant someone who was foolish, ignorant, senseless, or absurd (middle English 1300). Smart for the first 300 years of its use meant causing pain, sharp, cutting, or severe, a sense that survives in the idiom "smart as a whip.” Handsome wasn’t complimentary. When coined around 1425, it just meant easily handled; it didn’t have its current positive connotation until 1590. You might think he said you were a kind, intelligent, good looking bloke, when in reality he said you were a foolish pain easily dealt with. Words have an annoying habit of changing meaning over time in the same language and it becomes even more compli...

Master Your Self

In a contest for the toughest president of the United States, it would be hard to go against Theodore Roosevelt. He was known for his “manly” pursuits hunting big game, climbing the Matterhorn, participating in boxing match while president. (These weren’t play fights, he lost the vision on one eye because of them!) Once before he was about to give a speech an assassin shot him in the chest. Roosevelt refused to go to a hospital and insisted on giving his speech, still wearing his blood-soaked shirt! Teddy might have become tough but he wasn’t born that way. He was a sickly child that suffered from severe asthma that almost proved fatal. As was a young boy, doctors discovered that he had a weak heart, and advised him to get a desk job and not strain himself. He was homeschooled because of his many illnesses and spent most of his time indoors. But then as a teen his father, whom Teddy Roosevelt revered, told his son, “ ...

Until Midnight

In Acts 20, there is the tragicomic event surrounding a young man by the name of Eutychus. He did what a lot of folks before and after him did, he fell asleep during a sermon. Unfortunately, he was setting in in the third story window at the time. So instead of nodding off and hitting the pew in front of him, he fell to his death. The good news was the apostle Paul was delivering the sermon and had the ability to bring him back. I don’t know, however, if we can judge Eutychus too harshly. The sermon had gone on till midnight. Paul wouldn’t finish it up till daybreak. That’s a long lesson. I know some folks that might want to jump out of a window if I had a lesson that long, yet these Christians wanted to be there to hear Paul. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not pushing for all night sermons but I think we might need to adopt these folks' dedication. They knew that Paul was only in town for a limited time only and they were determined to ...

Ecclesiastes 12:10

Search This Blog