Sitting on the Porch

Archive for April, 2011

I once interviewed for a strategic technical position with a very large (and unnamed) national company, and told my interviewer that “technology is worthless unless it has the potential to effect a positive change in the human condition.” Perhaps that was the reason I didn’t get an offer from them. Or maybe it was the toilet paper on my shoe.

Or maybe it’s that I joined the over-fifty crowd almost two years ago, and I may see the advance of technology differently than someone who has only seen a green screen in a computer museum.

My fascination with technology only started around 1977. In her lifetime, my grandmother saw the practical application of electricity, indoor plumbing, automobiles, air and space travel, and the exponential growth of the electronic world. I am continually fascinated by man’s capacity to invent and discover. And I am equally horrified to see that we have managed to take the good things God created for our use and find ever more efficient ways to dominate and even destroy ourselves and others with them.

It’s been said that the more a culture discovers and explains the world, the less it depends on God. That could be true for a couple of reasons.

• The more we know about our environment, the less fear we may have of the unknown. And the more thrilled we are with our own intellectual superiority, the fewer mysteries we attribute to our creator.
• Much like an episode from the Twilight Zone, we may no longer be able to function without the technologies we have invented. Instead of becoming masters of the gadgets we have created, we have submitted to them.

Are we dependent on our own brilliance rather than seeking the true source of Wisdom? Are we submissive to the environment that we created, or do we rest in the arms of the Creator?

Advances in Science truly fascinate me, but the most exciting thing for me is this: Each new discovery opens up many more layers of the unknown. The more we discover, the more we realize how much we don’t know. For me as a Christian, I marvel at the work of God in each new discovery of science, and my weak faith grows as I hear about new mysteries being studied.

Disclaimer: During the writing of this article I answered a few phone calls, checked my Twitter feed and read this article on my iPhone, changed my Pandora station to Bela Fleck & the Flecktones, checked email, and used a Bluetooth headset to advise a client about an upcoming album release on iTunes. I’m about to make a cup of tea from an instant water heater in the kitchen and read my favorite tech blogs on my Kindle.

You now have permission to quote Matthew 7:5 to me. “You hypocrite, first take the iPhone out of your own ear, and then you will hear clearly to remove the headset from your brother’s ear,” or something like that.

This week is Holy Week, in which Christians of all denominations celebrate the very human passion, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, which is at the same time the greatest Mystery of all. This would be a good week for us all to practice unplugging from the technology we depend on and stand in awe of the Mystery of the Resurrection.