In the early 1960’s, Toronto Professor Marshall McLuhan said, “The medium is the message.” He
meant our inventions will shape us. He even wrote of a Global Village
and predicted the Worldwide Web decades ahead of time. A devout Roman
Catholic, he saw the effects popular culture was having on people, long
before PCs, cell phones and satellites. He saw people being shaped by
technology, and he said the effects may not be good.
Today we see these effects all around us. The constant barrage of
instant information shapes our thoughts and chips away at our ability to
choose what’s important. So long as we have a laptop and Google, we
think we have all we need. The young especially are finding it hard to
exist without their iPhone, and they are becoming more and more
dependent on questionable technology.
Can we even
imagine life without our gadgets? With them we inform, entertain and
communicate. We don’t look at things, we “iPhoto them” and perhaps look
at them later. People take “selfies” no matter how appropriate the time
or place. We can’t even go to the grocery store without our cell phone.
And when our batteries go dead, we’re nearly helpless.
This is not good for us, and the Apostle Paul said so 2,000 years ago. In Romans 12:1-2, he wrote, “Don’t
let the world around you squeeze you into its own mold, but let God
re-mold your minds from within, so that you may prove in practice that
the plan of God for you is good.” (J.B.Phillips)
We may not be able to stem the tide of excessive technology, but we
can keep it from holding us hostage. Every day we can ask God to help us
focus on what is really important - His Word and prayer which will help
us follow Him and love our neighbor. Every day we should remind
ourselves this will soon be replaced something else. But the Gospel of
Jesus Christ will remain.
Don’t be shaped by the world. Ask Jesus to shape you His way.
Rev. Bob Tasler
www.bobtasler.com
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