Tony Reinke’s 12 Ways Your Phone Is Changing You is quickly becoming one of my favorite books. It’s undoubtedly relevant – who among us doesn’t own a smartphone, tablet, or computer? His descriptions of the the text messaging, social media posting, GPS dependent, attention deficient smartphone user are spot on. Truth be told, at times, I feel like I’m reading about myself. But that’s not what makes the book so compelling. Beyond merely identifying how technology is changing us (for the better or worse) he gives keen insights into how we as Christians ought to think about technology. And he does this while striking the a perfect balance between technophobia and technophilia. He reminds us that technology is a gift from God, meant to enhance the worship of our Creator. But like all of God’s good gifts, it can be misused and abused by sinners like you and me.
Here’s an excerpt taken from Tony’s introductory chapter, “A Little Theology of Technology.” I hope it’s enough to entice you to pickup a copy and read more.
In the beginning, God created Adam out of and Eve out of a rib. Yahweh bent down and exhaled breath into their lungs, and they awoke into a strange world of oceans and sunshine and mountains and fruit and unnamed animals, untilled soil, and untapped materials, such as diamonds, gold, silver, and iron (Genesis 2:10-14). God first commanded his creatures to make babies, to collect food, and to govern the animals. But in those early commands, God already had drawn his endgame into his blueprints. The garden was only the beginning. The goal was a globe of technological advancement, leading to a creation so refined that the city streets will be paved thick with crystal gold, a creation so radiant and luminescent that we can hardly imagine what it will look like in the end (Revelation 21:18-21). So when Adam and Eve awoke and walked into the garden, an unseen, much larger plan was also set in motion. The untilled garden would become a glorious city.
We find ourselves in the middle of this garden-to-city unfolding of history, and God is governing the entire process in several ways. Between the guardrails of natural law, as well as the guardrails of the abundance and scarcity of certain raw materials in the earth, and carried forward through his image bearers, each wired for innovation, the trajectory of technological progress – from the garden to the city – was set in motion. This process is entirely initiated and guided by God.
But between the muddy rural beginning in the garden and the gleaming urban finale, we must fill in the story, because it’s where we find ourselves: east of Eden, west of the Great City, journeying now in God’s sovereignly guided history, holding smartphones.