The more time-saving amenities we employ, the less time we have. The more freedom we have to simultaneously pursue a gazillion goals, the less fulfilled we find ourselves to be. The more connectivity we utilize, the less we actually “connect”. Is it just me or does anyone else find our non-stop, plugged-in pacifier often leaves us feeling—empty?
With the average number of Facebook friends being 338, how can we explain the fact that some of us find it hard to name three loyal and faithful confidants? Our circle of online followers looks like a thriving collection of friends, and it really is so nice to connect with friends old and new with the swipe of a finger. But have we traded twenty-five-minute phone calls for five-word comments? Even to pick up the phone and call someone today seems like taking an extreme risk of presuming to intrude on their time. What if it’s not convenient for them? After all, it would take up time. Time! And the finicky relationship challenges of speaking to a real live person – who has time for that?! Most of us never make it past small talk. Maybe even with our husbands.
If we’re honest, we may have to admit our true relationships are suffering from the ever-widening influence of the “god in our pocket”. Siri saves the day over and over. YouTube shows us how to do everything. Facebook keeps us in the know. Instagram keeps us flattered. Pinterest keeps us trying harder. And then there’s Google. Google gets our desperate pleas for wisdom. Do you think anyone has ever googled: “Help! I’m overwhelmed!”? I have.
And so, we bend to carry the load of the gods. It gets heavier day by day. “Both the idols and their owners are bowed down” (Isaiah 46:2 NLT). And God waits. He gets our leftovers. Our hurried devotionals. Our spoon-fed podcasts and sermon shorts. Gone are the quiet moments, the daily gatherings, the deliberate cultivation of an ever-deepening relationship. The still small voice is silenced. We are numbed and distracted when just the hint of what we lingered too long glancing at is multiplied in our feed the next day. Algorithms know our slightest nuances, our wants and needs better than any living person on earth. And Google answers quicker than the persistent knocking Jesus encouraged (Luke 11:9-10).
Yet we are left doggedly seeking; never satisfied. Craving but never fulfilled. Depressed or even suicidal. We have forgotten how to connect in meaningful ways. Our receptors are shriveled from disuse. And most of all, we are lost. Lost in one of those old-fashioned garden mazes – a labyrinth of technological advancements we might never escape from.
It is my non-professional, unresearched, gut-feeling that the number one thing to suffer in our world of technological conveniences is our human-to-human and human-to-God relationships. From the time we rise to the time we drop the phone on its charger, we can live largely independent lives from each other. All the while being helped, enabled, and entertained by the handy lifeline we tether ourselves to. We appear not to need each other. We can go through the week without the contact of other Christians, enjoying only surface contact with loved ones, and, most frighteningly of all, ceasing to pray rather than obeying Scripture that exhorts us to “Pray without ceasing” (1 Thessalonians 5:17). We’ve all heard the sobering statistics of sky-rocketing suicide rates amongst young teens that coincide alarmingly with the recent decades of social media use. Maybe the erosion of meaningful contact at home is just as much to blame as bullying and self-confidence issues outside the home? After all, the delicate emotional state of a child in distress would need more than a cursory glance to discern. Babies, toddlers, and school kids – none are exempt from the well-documented effects of excessive screentime, and all are a study in themselves.
How did we get here?
While Gen Z has never known a time before screens, I have. As a kid, I came from a conservative home with parents who banned a TV screen. And I’m thankful they did. As a young married couple, we set out to do the same. And we did. But then something curiously strange happened: the mobile phone. We now go to bed with not one but two screens inches from our faces. And a wall between us. Oh, it’s not really a wall, is it? It’s not that bad. Our content is good. He’s researching how to split his honeybees into two hives and I’m looking up the latest remedy for an ache or pain. But here’s the catch – the daily, compounded use of non-stop technology in our lives may be the silent, sinister plot by someone too smart for more blatant temptations! We are not noticing the drift. It is nearly imperceptible. And while there may be a myriad of other distractions in our hectic lives, our lack of healthy communication and meaningful relationships flies under the radar. Yet it affects everyone – spouse, children, aging parents, local church Christians, the unsaved around us, and God. With ears untrained to recognize the Shepherd’s voice, we forget that all relationships take time. They do not develop by accident. And no one is nurtured in a room where everyone is on their own device.
God was saddened by His people turning away from Him in Israel’s day; perhaps He grieves for us as well. I sure don’t have Baal erected in my backyard, but if the end result is the same, does it matter what we call it? Man was created for God’s pleasure, for a relationship with Him. From the garden of Eden to the present day, the devil has undermined and interrupted that relationship. And though God dealt a death-blow to the devil’s plans by the sacrifice of His own Son, the devil still actively seeks to steal, kill, and destroy (John 10:10). Surely we didn’t need the advent of AI to see that his evil intent is to replace the need for God and to rob God of His rightful praise and the adoration of His people.
So about that maze I’m wandering in . . . can you show me the way out? How do we live in this technically-charged world and stay intentionally focused on the Lord? How do we take our urgent needs and concerns to the Lord first and to Google last? How do we stop spending every waking moment entertained and distracted from His work? How do we begin again to interact with others, saved and unsaved, on a deeper, more caring level? And how do we restore to God what is His – walking with Him in the cool of the day?
“And they heard the voice of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day: and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God amongst the trees of the garden” (Genesis 3:8 KJV).
