Digital Faith

 I am a digital immigrant. I was born into a world of rotary dial telephones and slide rules, cash registers that resembled slot machines, schools without air conditioning, encyclopedias that occupied an entire shelf in the book case and paper maps that unfolded to fill the front seat of the car.  

 I started my immigration to the digital world about 40 years ago when I walked into Toys R Us with sweaty palms and bought my first computer, a Commodore 64.  It had 64k of memory and a floppy disk, used machine language and gave you time to get a cup of coffee while loading a program. You can still find Commodore 64s in a few attics, basements and museums.

 My oldest son is also a digital immigrant, though he was only eight years old when he started his digital journey.  After he grew up, he started his own computer support company and now manages an IT team for in an energy company in Wyoming.

 My grandchildren are digital natives.  They were born into the digital world and have never known anything else.  My younger grandchildren were playing computer games by the time they were four. At 12, 10 and 6 they each have their own iPad.    

 I like the digital world.  I would not want to go back.  I live with my iPhone and PC. I can browse the web and check email anywhere in the world.  I have conducted business and managed my bank accounts from Nuremburg and Tel Aviv. I felt a little sacrilegious when I started reading my Bible on my iPhone and my Kindle.  It seemed like it wasn’t really a Bible if I couldn’t flip the pages and smell the ink. I had to remind myself that the first Scriptures were handwritten on scrolls and that books came centuries later. 

 But there are dangers in the digital world that did not exist before.

 The world of virtual reality can undermine relationships in the real world robbing us of time, energy and emotional maturity.  More than one career has been destroyed by inappropriate posts on Facebook and Twitter. Pornography is at your fingertips.

 It is not unusual to see several people sitting at a table, each focused on their smart phone, none of them speaking to one another. Craig Detweiler writes in his book, iGods, “The iMac begat the IPhone and the iPad, and each one starts with me – or rather “i.” They enhance our ability to connect and to serve, but they can also create an inflated sense of self, believing the entire world revolves around “me.” … In an age of status updates, personalized shopping, and lists of followers, we are experiencing the rush of becoming iGods of our own making.”  All this sounds strangely like the first temptation, “When you eat of it you will be like God.” (Genesis 3:5).

 Our challenge is to incorporate the timeless and eternal truths that never change into our digital world with a digital faith that connects us with God and with one another.  The greatest commandment remains:  “Love God with all your heart, mind and strength and love your neighbor as yourself.”