GOD’S NOT INTO TEXTING

I admit upfront that I am most technologically challenged. Often, I am the last to be in the know with regard to the latest electronic gadgets. However, there is one latest societal techno craze that needs to be canned. The fad to which I am referring is called “texting.” More specifically, it is the craft of using one’s cellular telephone to type messages to other folks. It seems rather silly that we need to be reminded that it is a telephone, an invention for the sole purpose of talking to others. Ah, therein lays the problem. In our fast paced and ever changing culture we are rapidly loosing our ability to carry on normal interpersonal relationships with one another primarily because we don’t know how to talk with each other. Not only are we losing the social etiquette of conversation, but taking it a step further we certainly don’t have the time, nor will we put forth the effort, or concern to spend TIME with others face to face any longer. It is a foregone reality that a generation has emerged that could be labeled as those behind the mask because when they logon, sign-in, or power up their laptops or cell phones they can be ANYONE they want to be! It’s intriguing, it’s mysterious, it’s fun, it’s the latest and everyone’s doing it. It is also a LIE! There are numerous psychological studies that report that people who live behind the mask lose all inhibitions to say or do anything that they “feel” like doing. Why? Because they are not actually in the presence of the other party in which they are “talking.” As a result, what you and I used to refer to as people skills are deteriorating at an alarming rate.
From the beginning it was not so. What we need to be reminded of is that God as the maker of all life created us to be interpersonal or relational beings. We know this because God Himself is a triune God relating perfectly with the Son and the Holy Spirit. He therefore created us also to personally and intimately relate to Him in order that we might know how HE would have us relate to others. In other words, God intended that we relate to one another personally, i.e. face to face interaction and communication. One of the primary means by which we communicate in our society is obviously the telephone the way it was used before texting. While not as effective as being there, it is an acceptable form of communication, because you can still hear the other person’s voice. You can sense their emotions by listening to their tone, volume, and speed including pauses, sighs, or excitedness. With typed words on a screen you lose relational contact, so let’s go back to the beginning.
Where do we start? I believe that God would have us put our keypads down on our cell phones and go find a closet to spend some quality time in PRAYER. Remember that our primary reason of existing on this earth is to bring glory to God our creator. How in the world can we do that if we don’t spend time talking with Him. May we never get too busy to talk to the Lord and most likely afterward you will find that He has laid on your heart the names of others that He would have you to talk to in order that we might be used by Him to influence their lives and encourage them toward their purpose in life which is also to bring glory to God. God wants to hear you and so do others!