From YouVersion Bible App Devotional, “Reconnected”

Day 5: Community

I talk to a lot of very connected people—people who, from a distance, look like they have more friends than they know what to do with. But most of them tell me they are actually lonely and wish they had more friends. We are the most digitally connected generation in the history of planet Earth and it would not be a stretch to say that we are also the loneliest.

Watching groups of friends choose to stare at their phones rather than engaging with each other when they are together is, if you think about it, insane. If you had beamed into our current reality from 1980 and saw friends doing that, you would think they were avoiding each other because they didn’t want to be together. This is a problem.

The Amish will never have this problem because they won’t allow themselves to. They aren’t anti-technology; they are pro-community. So they weigh the potential value of every piece of new technology before allowing it.

We don’t have to give up technology to have community, but we can be more intentional about the limits we place on technology that may be hindering us in finding true community. [Emphasis added by me] If you don’t have a thriving community where you live, I have good news—you can find one. If you do have a thriving community, I have good news for you too—you can make it better.

Prayer

Lord, please give me guidance and wisdom as I seek to have community with those around me, and please help me wisely place limits on the technology I allow to come into my life. Amen.

My Thoughts

One of my pet peeves is going into a restaurant and looking around at all of the people having a meal together, but they aren’t really together. They each have a device in their hands and are communicating with online friends, or maybe even strangers, instead of those sitting with them. I like the restaurants that have a “no cell phone” rule during meals rule. They are few and far between, but I think it’s a great idea since people won’t govern themselves.

Our lives on earth are so brief; the Bible says it’s a vapor, a vanishing mist. And yet we while away the hours we have on devices that have no emotions and no real connection to us. I understand that technology has some good uses, like being able to communicate via a blog or a text message. But, for the most part, I think technology controls parts of our lives that need to be tuned into people and not an inanimate object.

When my husband and I go out to eat, rare in these days of tight finances, we each put our phones away and talk to each other. It’s not important what we say, as long as we are taking the time to look at each other and really talk. If we had our phones on the table as so many do, that would be a distraction to having our attention focused on each other as it should be.

I am sad for the current generation of young people because their parents are showing them by example that it’s okay to make the device a priority instead of the people around you. I like what the author said about the Amish. They wisely choose what technology to allow into their community, not just accepting all of it as “progress” and “good.” We would do well to follow their example.