I stumbled across a video link on Kevin Sorbo’s facebook page the other day. I typically don’t stop to watch every video I happen to notice. If I did, I’d get absolutely nothing else done. I think it was his comment that drew me in, so I stopped to watch it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tdz4DvDG_gg
Wowsers…. I really really really hope my children don’t look up at me and catch me tethered to my silly phone instead of them. Now for the truth. I think I’ve actually done this to them. I can recall a few times that I was engrossed in something I was doing via smartphone. Heh, Heh… In cases like that “smartphone” is deliciously ironic. There’s little ‘smart’ about ignoring your little ones, or anyone for that matter.
It appears to me that while I’m cognizant of my use of that little device around my kids, I can do better. After all, what was life like before a phones were computers? Better yet, what was life like before phones attached to your hip?
Something tells me I’ll survive if I lay that thing down. There’s plenty more in Cutt’s animation than how we’re viewed through the eyes of others, but rather than shred our society in one fell swoop here on a little blog, I opted to base my commentary on what popped out at me first.
Besides taking issue with the decay of western culture, I also have serious reservations about the negativity Christians can fall into. Essentially, I could compose a compelling blog entry on a daily basis that would pick apart all the poor habits, sins, and little nasties we should all be avoiding like the plague. I’d rather show some thanks and Glorify God with hope, love, and prayer.
I grew up in a ‘yall come and love church.
I’ve been to the fire and brimstone churches.
I like both messages. Both are important. Both are present in scripture and biblical. It would be easy for somebody like me to find a new subject to rant routinely upon, but that wreaks of yin and no yang. There’s a Heaven, and there is certainly a hell. There is black, just as there is white. There’s discussion on sin and that on love. My pastor mentioned the other day during sermon that a chief reason he chooses to preach book by book, chapter by chapter, and verse by verse is to keep not only himself, but the parishioners honest too. If we start and go straight through, we aren’t cherry picking the good stuff. It’s all God’s word, right? Right. So I’m duty bound to consider it all; the good and the bad.
I don’t want to beat down the parents who have their faces in their phones. Another approach would be to remind us of the love we have to give and receive. Just think of all the really great things you could be doing during those some tiny portions of time? What about that walk you take? Have you visited with your daughter about the book she’s reading? How about picking up a pair of binoculars to see what you can spy out in the country together? What about recording audio of conversations between you and your tiny son? My dad did that with us kids on a reel to reel recorder as little tykes. …And yes, I was totally full of it as a little boy. Just think how much fun those will be in 30 years? That’s just a fraction of the stuff you should be doing with your kids instead of playing Angry Birds or checking the gossip rags on the net.
We don’t have to look any further than Proverbs 22:6 – Train up a child in the way he should go, Even when he is old he will not depart from it.
Salt and light my friends…