Smart phones have completely changed my life.
I’ve been empowered to do many things at the same time: I can listen to music and text while I’m talking to someone as I’m finishing my lunch.
While I can do more at once is amazing, I can’t say that it always produces my best work. I have several shirt stains to prove it.
I can listen to music, text, while I’m talking to someone as I’m finishing my lunch, but does my friend really have my full attention and is he or she convinced that they have my attention as I am staring mostly at my “black wife” aka my iPhone?
One of Jesus’ close friends, Martha, was busy making everything around the room pretty and welcoming for Jesus but was it the best thing to do at that moment? Honestly I don’t come down on Martha; I mean if you had God sitting in your living room wouldn’t you want to tidy up?
But while Martha preoccupied herself with “many things” (Luke 10:41 NKJV), she missed a priceless moment with Jesus. I’m sure she had future opportunities to be with God, but that single opportunity where Jesus physically sat in her living room and spoke the Word (v.39) was lost forever, never to be regained.
Should there be a time to multitask? Yes, but I feel certain that focusing on one thing is becoming increasingly a lost art.
While my phone is great, it does rob me of moments to completely engage and enjoy it. I see it worse in my spending time with Jesus.
I want to dispense my prayers, break the silence with my worship playlist, have my bible app open, listen to a sermon podcast, quickly answer a text, stop that itch in the middle of my back, and somewhere at the bottom of this “to do” list: be still for the quiet voice of God.
How much of your life is passing away while I swipe through your newsfeed?
May be the best resolve is to see the possibility of each moment especially with God as irreplaceable; therefore urgently be all there.
Try one thing.
Not only can it be stress relieving and stain free, but it can also be rewarding.
I forgot how cool the ocean was until I was taken out to surf. While I spend most of my time under the board, I was enjoying every minute of the clear water, the soft sand, the bright sun and deep ocean bottom.
When King David realize how fully satisfied and joyful one can be with God he exclaimed, “You have put gladness in my heart, More than in the season that their grain and wine increased” (Psalms 4:7 NKJV). With all the demands of being king, David took time alone to be with God (Psalms 27:4).
Is me being always busy really that urgent?
Should seeing and savoring Jesus be the center drive of my day because it is what completely satisfies me?
How many of us have yet to relish this encounter?
I made an excellent discovery: the best way I found to save battery life for my iPhone is to turn it off and let it sit there for a while.
Why take some time and unplug and tune-in to what’s around you and (more importantly) Who is in you.
FOLLOW THE SON 