More Connected Than Ever, But Desperately Alone

Being a career journalist and writer, I’ve always been fascinated by communications. I often marvel in thinking about how much the art of communicating has changed just in my lifetime.

 

For instance, my first memories of the telephone: it was the old-fashioned kind, with receiver cradled on its base, a rotating dial for placing a call, and a simple combination of letters and digits for a phone number. The first one I remember was CH (for Charter) followed by five numbers. We didn’t have an area code yet.

 

For a while we had a “party line,” sharing the same phone line with one or more neighbors. Occasionally we’d pick up the receiver to make a call and hear someone else’s voices on the same line. We’d have to wait for them to hang up before we could use the phone ourselves. When our phone did ring, we had to pick up the receiver and hear the voice to find out who was calling. Can you believe it? 

We’d fret over missing a phone call because there were no answering machines – and nothing vaguely resembling voicemail. Printed telephone books contained the names, addresses and phone numbers of everyone in our town. If the city was large, the phone books were huge. The alternative was to dial ‘0’ and get a real person called an “operator” who could provide needed information and phone numbers. Social media? The only thing remotely akin to that was secretively listening in on a party line conversation.

 

Fast forward to today: Never in the history of civilization have people been more connected. We’ve got phones, email, texting, the Internet, hundreds of TV and cable networks, streaming services, and video communications platforms. Everything literally at our fingertips. And yet, people have never been more isolated.

 

Why do we, surrounded by such a vast communications jungle, sometimes feel so desperately alone? Because no matter how many “friends” we may have on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter or any other social medium, there’s no substitute for eye-to-eye contact and a human touch.

 

We were created for relationship, first with God and then with one another. In the creation account given in the opening chapter of Genesis, after He created animals, birds, fish and other living things “according to their kinds,” the Lord decided to create humankind. “Then God said, ‘Let us make man in our image, in our likeness…’” (Genesis 1:26).

 

God clearly desired relationships with His foremost creations – man and woman. After all the wondrous but non-speaking living things He designed, the Trinity of God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit wanted a mutual love relationship with mankind. But after “the Lord God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life” (Genesis 2:7), the Lord understood the man needed companionship. We might say, someone with skin on.

 

“The Lord God said, ‘It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him’” (Genesis 2:18). After introducing Adam to “all the beasts of the field and all the birds of the air,” God determined “for Adam no suitable helper was found…. Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man. The man said, ‘This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh….’ For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife…” (Genesis 2:19,22-24).

 

Ever since that time, human history has been an unending saga of relationships, good and bad, healthy and unhealthy. As we were designed, God wanted us to yearn for eye contact, touch, conversation, and even the scent of other human beings.

 

Despite its many benefits, technology can provide no substitute for these needs. That’s why we read declarations such as Proverbs 27:17, “As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another” – as we interact and rub shoulders with one another, we can help each other become better people. 

 

In relationship we can support one another and help in carrying each other’s burdens: “Two are better than one because they have a good return for their work; if one falls down, his friend can help him up. But pity the man who falls and has no one to help him up! Also, if two lie down together, they will keep warm. But how can one keep warm alone? Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken” (Ecclesiastes 4:9-12).

 

During the pandemic, many churches were closed, ostensibly for health reasons. But those closures didn’t enhance spiritual vitality. We need one another – followers of Jesus Christ aren’t intended to function in desperate aloneness. This is why we’re admonished in Hebrews 10:24-25, “And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds. Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another….”

Relationships are hard. It’s easier to press “Like” on social media or type a quick reply to someone’s post. But relationships are vital. We need to be intentional, to look up (from our smartphones) not only to smell the roses but also to enjoy and engage in the real relationships all around us. 

Finding Tranquility in a Noisy World

Much as I hate to admit it, I’ve got an addiction – and I suspect you do, too. It’s an addiction to noise. 

We wake up and our sleep cobwebs are hardly dispersed before we flick on the TV, radio or grab our smartphones to find out what we’ve missed while we were sleeping. Getting into our cars, almost immediately we turn on the radio or CD player. If we go to the gym, we’re probably wearing headphones and listening to tunes or a message of some sort from an MP3 player.

At the coffee shop, eating lunch at a restaurant, or at the dinner table, we struggle to keep our hands off our phones, even though there are perfectly intelligent, conversational humans sitting within an arm’s length from us.

Noise. Noise. Noise. The constant din is so relentless, we’re almost oblivious to it. We lose the sense that sometimes, noise annoys. Occasionally we have that rare experience of being somewhere that’s quiet, where tranquility still exists. Then we begin a frantic search…for some noise. As if we require noise as much as we do oxygen, food or water.

The problem with noise is it makes it almost impossible to hear the Lord. The Scriptures speak of the “still, small voice” of God (1 Kings 19:12). This passage appears soon after the Lord had used the prophet Elijah as a virtual one-man band, fending off hundreds of false prophets representing counterfeit gods, and then accurately predicting the end of a 3½-year drought.

After receiving word the evil queen Jezebel had put a contract on his life, Elijah fled, physically, emotionally and spiritually spent. After giving the prophet time to recover from the stressful events, God had a special message for him. He sent a mighty wind, an earthquake and fire, but the Lord’s voice wasn’t in any of those. At last came a still, small voice – the gentle, understanding whisper of God telling Elijah it was time to return to action.

Sometimes when I meet with friends I ask, “What do you think the Lord is telling you these days?” Often they shrug their shoulders, no sure how to answer. It’s probably because they’ve been so immersed in noise – TV talk shows, music being piped into the mall, YouTube videos, or just preoccupation with apps on their smartphones – that there’s no way they could hear even if God spoke to them audibly.

I don’t have a simple remedy for this, being a fellow struggler with the “noise makers” of our day. My “addiction” truly is problematic. I find myself too often visiting favorite websites or checking out social media to see what my “friends” and contacts have been up to or what they’re saying. In the evenings, turning the TV on is almost a reflex.

But there are times, wonderful times, when the “sounds of silence” find me – and I find them happily refreshing. As I write this, the only sound I hear is that of my fingers tapping on the keyboard. A small airplane just flew over, but for a few brief moments, the accustomed noise has subsided.

Although there were no phone apps, TV programs, radio commentators, or even billboards to distract them, folks in biblical days still required intentionality to find quiet. Speaking to the psalmist, the Lord commanded, “Be still, and know that I am God…. I will be exalted in the earth” (Psalm 46:10). King David, with enemies in hot pursuit, wrote reflectively, “Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him” (Psalm 37:7).

In a recent meditation, Cindy Hess Kasper wrote about a college president urging her students to “power down” for an evening, setting aside the cell phones and stepping away from technology entirely for a while, so they could spend the time in prayer and listening to quiet, worshipful music. The effect for many of the students was a surprisingly pleasant respite from the frenzy of daily life.

Maybe we should consider something along those lines ourselves. Even more than once. As the old TV commercial used to say, “Try it. You’ll like it!”

Social Media, or ANTI-Social Media?

Once upon a time in a land far, far away, families gathered around campfires, wood stoves, or in gas-lighted parlors to talk, share stories, or recapture family memories. Or they congregated at a dinner table, not only to eat but also to converse. They’d ask mundane questions like, “How was your day?” – and actually wanted to hear the answer.

Then devices called radios were invented, becoming centers of attention as mother, father and children – and even extended family – would join in a living room or kitchen to listen to the news, comedies, dramas, and suspense shows. Sound effects incorporated into programming flung imaginations into many directions.

Next came the television, at first having a grand total of three stations for most users. Because program selections were limited each evening, parents and offspring again convened to laugh together, share shivers during mysteries and thrillers, and sing along to musical variety shows.

Are we in danger of becoming, as
Gary Turk suggests, "a generation
of idiots, smartphones and
dumb people"?

With the advent of cable TV, programming choices exploded in number, and in most homes TVs multiplied so each family member could view the show of their own choice. No need any longer to huddle together, to laugh or cry together. Uniting around entertainment became so old-fashioned, and now, so-20th century.

Today we don’t even need individual TVs. We have tablets and smartphones with live-streaming, along with a vast menu of movies, online-only programs, apps, and videos – myriad alternatives for grabbing and holding onto our attention. Even email has become outdated for some, replaced by texting and social media. Who needs to talk to one another, to gaze intently into someone else’s eyes – and listen? If we do feel the need to look, there’s always Skype or FaceTime.

Intentionally or not, we’re increasingly dispensing with the bother of real, physical human contact. Even in shopping malls, restaurants, or meeting rooms, noses are buried in technological gadgets that spare us the annoyance of having to take part in direct, personal, face-to-face interaction.

This point is well-presented in “Look Up,” a clever video produced by Gary Turk, a viral filmmaker and speaker from London, England, and posted on Viral Thread. In a slow-paced rhyme, he starts by declaring, “I have 422 friends, and yet I am lonely.” Then he adds, “this media we call social is anything but…. We’re at our most happy with an experience we share, but is it the same if no one is there?”

It seems, if anything, our “social media” has turned into anti-social media, encouraging isolation and diminishing our capacities to engage and reason with and care for one another. We’ve all seen car bumper stickers that read, “Co-Exist,” but how can we do that alone, in solitary settings?

This is why one of the underlying precepts of the Bible is the idea of genuine relationships – God’s desire to have a relationship with each of us, individually and collectively, and the value of our relationships with one another.

It’s been like that from the start. After creating the first human, God declared, “It is not good for man to be alone” (Genesis 2:18). The Lord then fashioned “a helper suitable for him,” woman. Nothing suggests God’s reasoning was, “Well, Adam needs someone he can text.”

After first sending out His 12 disciples, Jesus then “appointed 72 others and sent them out two by two ahead of him to every town and place where he was about to go” (Luke 10:1). He instructed them not to take even a purse or bag or sandals, and definitely didn’t command them to bring smartphones.

Writing to his young protégé, Timothy, the apostle Paul said, “And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable men who will also be qualified to teach others” (2 Timothy 2:2). Addressing believers in the city of Philippi, Paul wrote, “Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me – put it into practice” (Philippians 4:9). In both cases, truth, principles and practices were taught in the context of close, highly interactive relationships.

The writer of the book of Hebrews also underscored the importance of “hanging out” together, communicating in meaningful ways. “And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds. Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another” (Hebrews 10:24-25).

I’m not advocating a boycott of social media, or refusing to utilize the advantages of email and texting. But when they transform into anti-social media, inhibiting us from appreciating and enjoying real time with real people – preferring tweets, icons and emojis over eye contact and real smiles – then maybe it’s time for social mediation.

Let’s not become, as Turk warns, “a generation of idiots, smartphones and dumb people.” After all, as he notes, “when you’re too busy looking down, you don’t see the chances you miss.”

Being Sapped By the Apps

My first computer was a Macintosh 512K, given to me in 1985 by a kind friend who was an Apple dealer. He figured it was about time for me to become liberated from my electric typewriter and enter the new and exciting world of word processing. He was right. Even in its primitive state, the 512K changed my life in many ways.

If you’re old enough to remember, the 512K was a slower-than-molasses machine with a tiny black-and-white screen that could hide in a corner of my present iMac monitor. Only at the time, we didn’t know it was slower than molasses. We just figured snail’s pace was how desktop computers were supposed to operate.

I remember writing for a few minutes and – having learned the hard way about the necessity of periodically saving the work you’d done – selecting “Save” from the menu. (We used to quip that Jesus wasn’t the only one that saves.) The computer would grind away, as if trying to figure out what to do with the data – sentences and paragraphs I’d just keyed in. It took so long I’d pray that the power wouldn’t go out before my eloquent words could be preserved.

Apps can sap the energy on our smartphones,
tablets - and in our minds.

Fast-forward to today, when computers of all kinds, including smartphones, possess far more power and capacity than room-sized computers did back in the “olden days.” Even applications – we know them as “apps” – offer possibilities for work, entertainment, information and efficiency that seemed inconceivable just a few decades ago. Ah, the wonders of technology!

Of course, as with many things, there are drawbacks. One is that apps can provide instant access to almost anything we want or need, but also can drain the power from our rechargeable devices. It took a while to realize that unless I fully closed out an app, it would continue running in the background, draining power from the battery. I couldn’t just bounce from app to app if I wanted to continue using my iPad or iPhone for an extended time without having to recharge it. Now I consistently close apps not in use. Beware of being sapped by the apps!

A similar principle affects the “computers” between our ears. We have “apps” – apprehensions, anxieties, worries and fears – that all can sap us emotionally, psychologically and spiritually. They too can “run in the background,” plaguing our subconscious even as we’re trying to concentrate on other matters.

Some time ago a personal issue arose that wasn’t going to be resolved quickly. I spent much of the day attempting to work as usual, but felt like I was running in place, expending a lot of energy but not going anywhere. Then it occurred to me – my “apps” of apprehension and worry were humming in the back of my mind, depleting my mental resources.

What do we do at times like that? Fretting over circumstances might not be very productive, but often it feels like we’re doing something about the problem, even if it’s just worrying. But there’s a better solution.

We can do as the apostle Paul urged: “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:6-7). We often say we’re trusting God to handle the various trials we encounter, but are we refusing to close out our “apps,” allowing our worries and fears to wear us down?

The apostle Peter expressed similar thoughts when he wrote, “Casting all your anxiety on him (Jesus) because he cares for you.” Then he warned: “Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith…” (1 Peter 5:7-9).

So we can let apprehensions and concerns consume us, sapping our spirits as we let them flourish in our subconscious minds. Or by faith we can turn them over to God, believing – and acting upon the belief – that He is more than able to handle whatever challenges we face.

Admittedly, that’s easier to say than to do. But it’s the only way we can truly experience “the peace that passes all understanding” we’re promised, if only we’ll accept it.

There’s More There to This Square

How many squares do you see?

If you’ve been on Facebook recently, you probably saw the square above. Browsers were asked the actual number of squares in the illustration.

At first glance we see the obvious – 16 larger squares, eight smaller ones, and the large square that includes them all. But if you start counting squares within the larger squares, you find more. I’ve counted 40, although I haven’t read the official tally.

For me, the point of this is there’s often more to things than we notice at first glance. For instance, some of my best friends are people that didn’t impress me initially, but as I got to know them better I discovered there was much more to them than I had realized. (Hopefully some have found that true of me as well.)

Computers, or even smartphones, are similar. Utilitarian that I am, I typically use my iMac or iPhone for specific tasks. When I discover other things they can do I wasn’t aware of, I want to smack my forehead and scold myself, “Why didn’t you know about this earlier?”

Years ago a friend of mine made an interesting statement about the Scriptures. He said he believed the Bible was “a good primer…but then you move on to something more sophisticated.” That, in my opinion, is probably the most uninformed statement in the history of mankind.

As a senior in high school, I read the Bible cover to cover, front to back, as a personal goal. Upon finishing it I closed it and told myself, “Well, I’ve read the Bible,” and proceeded to decide what to read next. Frankly, at that stage of my life I understood very little about what I had read in the Bible. It was a version written in archaic English, which didn’t help, but my thinking then wasn’t far from my friend’s view.

Over the years, however, I’ve learned like the square above, there’s a lot more to the Word of God than first meets the eye. As I’ve said before – like peeling an onion and finding another layer below the one you just removed – the Bible has multiple layers of meaning and truth, far more than anyone could master in a lifetime.

I’ve read through the Scriptures numerous times over the years and each time I discover insights and understanding I didn’t see before. Reading specific passages repeatedly, such as a chapter of Proverbs each day, unfolds new things even though I’ve read and meditated over them previously.

So when the apostle Paul writes in 2 Timothy 3:16-17, “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man (and woman) of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work,” I’m convinced that’s true.

The Bible in fact is “a good primer.” But you’ll never find or read anything more sophisticated.