Pursuing Wisdom in a Digital Age - Technology and the Christian Life
Outline:
1. Wisdom is the ability to use and apply the truth that you receive.
2. Wisdom rejects pride and entitlement and embraces humility.
3. Wisdom rejects passive consumption and actively seeks God and his ways in all of life.
- Question your cravings
- Direct your attention to a deeper hunger in your soul
- Be intentional about your content for the sake of deeper satisfaction and joy.
4. Wisdom chooses to slow down.
Scripture References:
- Prov. 4:5-7, 23
- Hosea 4:6
- Isaiah 8:20-22
- 2 Timothy 4:3
- Proverbs 16:16
Application Questions:
- Is your life marked by a genuine and consistent pursuit of wisdom?
- Is your constant craving for entertainment deteriorating your ability know God and his ways in life?
- Does the cross of Christ prompt you to slow down and take in the beauty of his finished work and his constant presence in your life?
Discussion question:
- what is wisdom? Why does it seem that wisdom is not valued very much today as something to be pursued?
- How serious is the need to pursue wisdom? What are the results of those who do not pursuit wisdom?
- what are the ways that our digital age deteriorates wisdom?
- How do we cultivate habits that enable us to pursue wisdom?
- Why are we bored with God's Word?
- How do we change our cravings? How do we learn to crave deeper joy and knowledge in life?
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Prov. 4
Get wisdom, get understanding;
don’t forget or turn away from the words from my mouth.
6 Don’t abandon wisdom, and she will watch over you;
love her, and she will guard you.
7 Wisdom is supreme—so get wisdom.
And whatever else you get, get understanding.23 Guard your heart above all else,
for it is the source of life.
Hosea 4:6
My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge.
Because you have rejected knowledge,
I will reject you from serving as my priest.
Since you have forgotten the law of your God,
I will also forget your sons.
Isaiah 8
20 Go to God’s instruction and testimony! If they do not speak according to this word, there will be no dawn for them.
21 They will wander through the land, dejected and hungry. When they are famished, they will become enraged, and, looking upward, will curse their king and their God. 22 They will look toward the earth and see only distress, darkness, and the gloom of affliction, and they will be driven into thick darkness.
This week we are starting a series of sermons on technology that will continue until the first week of June.
Next week we will focus on mothers day and then the following week we will come back to our topic once again.
When we speak of technology I am mainly referring to the types of technology that have a screen. TVs phones and computers are the types of technology that have the most obvious and powerful effect on our hearts and minds - and these are the forms of technology that are growing at unbelievably rapid rates.
Some folks may think, "I don't have any social media accounts, and I don't watch much TV at all, so this really is not for me."
This is a mistake. Even if you are a person who considers themselves to have a minimal use of digital technology of any kind - you are surrounded by a world that is submerged in it.
The way I've chosen to break this down is to focus on the specific aspects of our hearts and minds that technology most powerfully impacts.
- Entertainment and wisdom
- Relationship and human connection
- Hard work and laziness
- Identity and calling
When we think about the REASON why a screen is so powerful - we inevitably start with the concept of entertainment.
Why is it that the screen is so powerful in its ability to pull in and keep a hold on our attention?
Because we have a craving to be wowed and entertained.
And our age has perfected the art and science of entertaining us so powerfully that we can't resist it.
This idea is explored in a novel written in 1996 titled Infinite Jest. The story is a complicated comedy that makes fun and questions the American obsession with entertainment.
A man who is driven by his desire to be the best film maker ever, creates a video that is so entertaining that anyone who watches it, can't stop watching it ever again and goes crazy if you take it away.
The video tape then becomes a massive threat to society, and something that Canadian terrorists try to use to destroy America.
The author raises up a point that has been raised by many others - that the greatest danger to the world today is not bombs or bullets but the power of screens to entertain us and take control of our hearts and minds.
This began in the 1980's when TV broadcasters realized that they can get a LOT more viewers if they didn't just give people the news - but gave them the most shocking and attention grabbing headlines - from there on - EVERYTHING on TV - News, shows, movies, talk shows, even TV PREACHERS - became more and more about entertainment.
the more powerfully you can grab peoples attention - the more MONEY you will make from them.
That is really the bottom line.
this was all expanded infinitely when the smartphone arrived where now the leap is made from the TV to your pockets.
From here on out, almost every single feature on the smartphone - from news, to instagram, to ticktock to twitter - is working POWERFULLY to grab and hold your attention as long as possible.
Why is this of such critical importance to us today?
Whatever holds your attention - defines your identity - reshapes your heart and determines your whole life.
this is why Solomon tells us in proverbs
"Guard your heart above ALL ELSE, for it is the source of life..."
As Solomon is thinking about all the things that grab at your heart and at your attention - he is also saying - at the end of the day there are only two directions that your heart - you are either pursuing and growing in wisdom - or you are growing in foolishness.
For Solomon, this is the dividing line for everything.
One of the greatest threats of a digital culture is not just that it wastes our time or makes us lazy - it is that it deteriorates our hearts and minds away from wisdom, making us spiritually shallow and weak.
Because as we become a culture of constant consumption of media and entertainment we become a culture that moves further and further away from wisdom and depth.
Wisdom is one of the greatest things lacking in our day, even though we have more information and knowledge than any age ever before. And in Scripture, wisdom is one of the most important things that we are to pursue.
So how do we pursue wisdom in a digital age?
1. Wisdom is the ability to use and apply the truth that you receive.
Why is Solomon so obsessed with wisdom?
Because wisdom is not just about WHAT you know - its about HOW you know it.
Wisdom is the ability to use and apply the truth that you receive.
"Wisdom is knowing what to do with knowledge gained through various means of education: how to apply knowledge and information in everyday life; how to discern if something is true or not; how to live well in light of truth gained. Wisdom is not merely knowing the right answers. It’s about living rightly."
McCracken, Brett. The Wisdom Pyramid (p. 66). Crossway. Kindle Edition.
There are many intelligent people in the world who's lives are in ruins - they are foolish and sad people.
WHY?
Because simply being intelligent and talented and wealthy does not mean you know how to live and how to be happy.
One of the reasons why we struggle with the idea of wisdom or maybe find it boring or not interesting is because we don't really understand what it is.
We think as long as I get everything I want - I will be happy. (an idea that someone on a screen probably taught us)
LIFE IS NOT THAT SIMPLE
If everyone in this room instantly got everything we want right now - most of us would likely end up sad, alone, mentally unstable or addicted to something - miserable.
Most of us already know what is most important in life - God, loving people, serving, not being selfish, working hard, etc
But how many of us are living lives of perfect balanced joy and goodness?
A lot of the messes we create we create because we are pursuing good things - health, family, work - even ministry.
But we are constantly falling into foolish extremes and imbalance that create new problems in our lives.
Solomon says "LISTEN TO ME - the most important thing you need is wisdom - this is when the Holy Spirit is taking the truth of God and working it through various sources into your heart - that its not just stuck in mere knowledge - its transforming your inner heart - its changing how you think, its teaching you to make the right decisions, to see the dangers, to avoid evil..."
Wisdom has to do with the quality, the condition of our hearts and minds.
"above all pursue wisdom, and guard your heart and mind..."
How?
2. Wisdom rejects pride and entitlement and embraces humility.
Proverbs 9:10
“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding."
Proverbs 16:18
Pride comes before destruction, and an arrogant spirit before a fall.
Everything starts with understanding how little we are before God and how desperately we need wisdom.
You will only have this humility when you understand that pursuing wisdom and fearing God and learning to structure your life properly is a VERY SERIOUS issue in your life.
Wether we realize it or not, our digital age disciples and teaches in the opposite direction - we are the main audience AND we are the main character.
We are the main audience, with the click of a button or a swipe on to the next video we have the power and the right to as much as we want.
Social media teaches us that WE are the main character and WE are on the center stage of our lives - we are entitled to what we want and no one can stop me.
In an article from the New Yorker is titled "We all have main character energy now" the author writes -
"As a TikToker put it recently, “Why does only buying the groceries I need for 2-3 days make me feel like the main character in an Italian summer memoir[?]” In the video, a woman carries a tote bag full of basil down a sunlit sidewalk, to a soundtrack from the lambent Italian-summer film “Call Me By Your Name.” “TikTok and social media has made it more attainable for you to write your own story,” Yasmine Sahid, a twenty-four-year-old actor and TikTok creator who began making her own main-character videos last August, told me. “You can kind of cast yourself in these mini-movies.”"(1)
Everyone is making a "get ready for work with me" video
Everyone wants to go to the gym so they can make videos of themselves lifting weights.
We laugh and think - its so stupid!
"Well I don't make those stupid videos I never even post them..."
But we FEED this impulse by making the decision to keep scrolling and keep clicking and keep watching - it feels good and it makes us feel in control.
We talk about the struggle with self control - where does self control start?
Humility - I am not my own.
This life belongs to the Lord. If I just run it in my own way I will end up a miserable wreck.
Humility makes you shift your attention.
"my son, PAY ATTENTION TO MY WORDS..."
Humility understands that the world is complex - the digital age makes us foolishly confident in our ideas about the world. Not every conspiracy theory is true and just because you watched a documentary on youtube does not make you an expert - real knowledge and real wisdom is slow coming
One of the top struggles pastors are sharing today is that their churches are dividing over very confident opinions about ideas they learned online. There is a new confidence that WE KNOW what others don't know.
Humility makes us understand that real knowledge takes time, wisdom is slow coming. I need to be careful with my opinions.
3. Wisdom rejects passive consumption and actively seeks God and his ways in all of life.
Wisdom cannot ever be achieved passively - it requires our whole being. Why? Because wisdom is about knowing God and his ways. Its part of an active relationship you have with God.
Proverbs 9:10
“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding."
Prov. 4:7
7 Wisdom is supreme—so get wisdom.
And whatever else you get, get understanding.
From the very beginning we are created as human beings to live in a personal connection with our God - God walked with Adam and Eve "in the cool of the evening breeze" - and their ability to know life flowed out of this active relationship.
Wisdom is about actively pursuing God and discovering all this ways in life - his ways are high, they are complex, they are beautiful.
This is what makes life always new and exciting.
The world of constant stimulating content works in the completely opposite direction. This is very powerfully demonstrated in an experiment in the 1950's.
"In the 1950s, the psychologists James Olds and Peter Milner modified the chamber so that a lever press would deliver direct brain stimulation through deep implanted electrodes. What resulted was perhaps the most dramatic experiment in the history of behavioral neuroscience: Rats would press the lever as many as 7,000 times per hour to stimulate their brains. This was a pleasure center, a reward circuit, the activation of which was much more powerful than any natural stimulus.
A series of subsequent experiments revealed that rats preferred pleasure circuit stimulation to food (even when they were hungry) and water (even when they were thirsty). Self-stimulating male rats would ignore a female in heat and would repeatedly cross foot-shock-delivering floor grids to reach the lever. Female rats would abandon their newborn nursing pups to continually press the lever. Some rats would self-stimulate as often as 2000 times per hour for 24 hours, to the exclusion of all other activities. They had to be unhooked from the apparatus to prevent death by self-starvation. Pressing that lever became their entire world."(2)
These stories are crazy fascinating and many of us CLEARLY see the correlation with human behavior and technology.
Example - how many homes are full of trash, living in poverty - but have a super expensive TV and the latest phone?
The technologies around us feed on the human desire for pleasure and entertainment and give us the pleasure button in our pockets. This is why its so hard.
The average US ADULT spends 2.5 hrs on TV and 2.5 hrs on social media.
How is that even possible?? Its a fact though. We are becoming a culture that ALWAYS NEEDS a little dose of entertainment.
You may think, well that does not apply to me. First of all, check your screen time reports before you say that too confinement. But second of all, even if you don't spend a lot of time in this - realize that the people around you at church and in the world DO.
One of the reasons this is done so well is the algorithms behind every digital content we digest.
The algorithms that serve us our endless feeds of videos and content know us better than we know ourselves.
Added to this is the powerful pull of FOMO - fear of missing out - I NEED to keep up and I NEED to know what everyone is up to!!
Think about it. You scroll or binge the series - you need you need you need - but then you feel so sick and shallow and gross.
It's crazy how we can follow our cravings even though it makes us miserable.
Isaiah 8
20 Go to God’s instruction and testimony! If they do not speak according to this word, there will be no dawn for them.
21 They will wander through the land, dejected and hungry. When they are famished, they will become enraged, and, looking upward, will curse their king and their God. 22 They will look toward the earth and see only distress, darkness, and the gloom of affliction, and they will be driven into thick darkness.
Wisdom rejects passive consumption. Wisdom is active.
- Question your cravings
Wisdom starts with questioning the craving for more consumption.
Its begins with the realization, "this really isn't making me a deeper and more satisfied person. It actually makes me more miserable."
- Direct your attention to a deeper hunger in your soul
Deep down we are all wired to know and love God in all of life. Deep down we are all created to discover the beauty and complexity of God's purposes and plans.
"blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness for they shall be satisfied"
We are created to know God and his ways. We are created for depth and complexity.
Did you know that your CRAVINGS can change - that you can crave and desire things that are deeper and more satisfying?
The more we intentionally seek God and his wisdom in our lives - the more our cravings are transformed. This is the freedom of discipline - that you learn to delight and desire the things that are good for your soul.
At the end of the day, raw discipline WILL NOT WORK - if you constantly crave junk, you will return to junk.
Example about people quitting alcohol for health reasons.
- Be intentional about your content for the sake of deeper satisfaction and joy.
Its not wrong to enjoy a good movie or show, or even to spend some time watching funny videos. The problem is our lack of intentionally. We become mindless passive consumers who are always responding to our impulse for pleasure and distraction RATHER THAN present, alive human beings who are seeking after the good and the beautiful.
Entertainment is a gift that can be SO HELPFUL in our stressful lives! But we need to think about what we consume and why?
Are you choosing content that is merely entertaining you all the time or are you choosing content that is deepening you in a healthy way?
Wisdom is about actively pursuing God and discovering all this ways in life - his ways are high, they are complex, they are beautiful. This is what makes life always new and exciting.
4. Wisdom chooses to slow down.
Psalm 131
1 Lord, my heart is not proud;
my eyes are not haughty.
I do not get involved with things
too great or too wondrous for me.
2 Instead, I have calmed and quieted my soul
like a weaned child with its mother;
my soul is like a weaned child.
"listen to my words, keep hold of them, never let them go..."
The digital world around us makes money if we never unplug from the screen.
And it is changing our brains. Attention spans are shrinking. We are loosing our ability to spend time in quiet contemplation.
One of the reasons why anxiety and depression are exploding today is because of the impact of our constant stimulation and information overload is having on our brains and bodies.
The philosophy of our time is that everything must be done FAST.
I have a constant struggle with this myself.
God's Word tells us that some of the most important things in life are done slowly.
Its really interesting to think about the fact that God chose to give us his Word in the form of a book.
Of all the methods he could have chosen, this is the BEST ONE.
We talk constantly of the struggle with Bible reading - be honest the reason is that it seems boring when compared to the phone laying next to it.
GUYS the BIBLE is NOT BORING - its the most powerful source of eternal truth you will ever encounter.
But the Bible is given to you in a format that you can really enjoy only when you truly slow down and direct your heart to a deeper hunger.
"i have calmed and quited my soul.."
There is no drive through quick version of spiritual growth and wisdom.
God gives you his truth in a format that FORCES you to slow down.
You want eternal wisdom and joy in your heart? Stop treating God like another instagram or youtube video.
quiet your soul. come as a child in need. stop everything else. realize you need nothing else.
We often use the excuse - I am just in a busy season right now, when it passes I will have a little more time to slow down, to read, to pray to reflect.
False.
You are allowing yourself to believe the lie that slowing down to spend time in prayer and Scripture is a luxury I cannot afford. This is a lie. Its just not as stimulating as everything around you.
It doesnt matter our season in life, we are always on the path of foolishness or wisdom. And there is no progress in spiritual wisdom without:
- silence and solitude
- prayer and meditation on God and his truth in your life
- reading Scripture
- reading biblical content
God gave us a book with pages for a reason. Christians have always been known as people of the book, and of books. People who value reading, thinking, reflecting, slowing down.
Simple test for us today: how difficult is it for us to get through more than one chapter of Scripture? How difficult is it for us to pick up any christian book and finish it?
Reading is hard work. for all of us. dont make that excuse.
slowing down forces us to come to grips with the fact that the most important thing in our life has already been complete - Jesus on the cross, freedom from sin and death.
A lot of our spiritual struggles come from expecting some intense spiritual high or emotion to feel God's presence.
The reality is that God has given himself to us in Jesus. We chase some spiritual high to know that God is close but in Christ, God is telling us, "I am already here - in everyday life."
Application Questions:
- Is your life marked by a genuine and consistent pursuit of wisdom?
- Is your constant craving for entertainment deteriorating your ability know God and his ways in life?
- Does the cross of Christ prompt you to slow down and take in the beauty of his finished work and his constant presence in your life?
1.https://www.newyorker.com/culture/infinite-scroll/we-all-have-main-character-energy-now
2.https://www.huffpost.com/entry/compass-pleasure_b_890342#:~:text=What%20resulted%20was%20perhaps%20the,powerful%20than%20any%20natural%20stimulus.