Practical Advice on Utilizing Technology - Panel Discussion | KFW 2018

Lesson Transcript

Let's pray. Gracious God, Almighty Father in heaven, as we come to You in the name of Jesus tonight, I pray that You would bless this dear brother. And soon the panelists will come up, and I pray, Heavenly Father, that You would just energize, synergize, that You would work in a very mighty way as this discussion is engaged and some teaching is given, some practical lessons are shared for us tonight. Would You bless Brother Kyle and bless all of these panelists for Your glory. In Jesus' name I pray. Amen. Amen.

God bless you. Thank you. I bring you greetings from the thriving tiny little town of Guys Mills, Pennsylvania. I live there with my wife, my three children. I split my time right now between my work at Faith Builders Educational Programs and my studies in church history and theology. A little bit on my background in technology, I've got a degree in computer science in 2005 and spent four years exercising that degree as a network administrator following my graduation.

And after those four years, I moved from administrator to user. And I'm now using computers to direct the communications efforts there at Faith Builders Educational Programs. So I use computers a lot. I use them as a tool. And I'd like to think that I've gained a little bit of experience on how to use them well. And sometimes I've even experienced how not to use them well. So we aim for this panel to give you some practical advice.

We aim to at least introduce ways of discipling your thinking, ways of discipling the way you use technology. And before the four panelists come up here and join me and we interact as we present positions, before we do that, I want to direct our thoughts and direct our minds a little bit by using just one word and a phrase and by talking about those for a little bit. My aim here is to stimulate our thinking and by no means to conclude it because we're not going to exhaust this topic in one panel discussion.

The word is this: revolution. The French Revolution, first, was a roughly 10-year period in France that changed Europe forever. Land was freed and old systems of feudalism were dismantled. The king was unseated and the citizens claimed their voice. There's changes of government. There's changes of authority. The Catholic Church was driven out. There was mass killings of clergy, looting, auctioning of church property. There was changes of religious life. And again, you see that change of authority coming in.

You could say that royal and Catholic heads were both ruling. There was old ways of thinking. There's old ways of life, business, religion, and living that were being pulled out, pulled out by the roots. And they were torn down to make ways for new ones. Briefly, revolutions are unsettling times. Revolutions are chaotic. Revolutions are disruptive. Revolutions are uncertain. You don't know what's going to happen when you're in the middle of a revolution.

Now today, we're living in a second or a different kind of revolution. Or maybe it's not so different. This is the digital or the information revolution. And like Gary's told us earlier today, the pace of this revolution is staggering. The pace at which change is happening and the advances in technology that are overtaking us are nothing short of staggering. We've witnessed many movements in our time.

We've witnessed the movement in economy, the rise of technology giants like IBM, Amazon, Alphabet or Google, or Apple, which just became the world's first company with a value of $1 trillion. We've moved from the assembly line to the screen where most Americans now spend the bulk of their working days and outside of their working days too. We've moved from the landline to the cell phone.

And then we started reaching and reaching and reaching once again for first one smartphone and then another one and then another one. And now that we've got a smartphone, we keep on reaching for them. This began in 2007 with the first iPhone. And now today, 11 years later, 2.53 billion people in the world have a smartphone. We've witnessed great achievements in health care, sciences, agriculture, communication, and manufacturing.

Some have taken on the mission to themselves of seeing some of these benefits as they see them and providing access to them globally, right? So you have global access to the internet. It's becoming some people's life mission. Some people are elated with these advances. The profits of post-humanism anticipate the merging of man and machine into something new, a God-like being, always on, always connected, and supremely aware. Yet on the other side of this, there's rumors afloat.

There's rumors of digital dementia, the severing of cause from effect, distraction, addiction, teenage depression, adult negligence, and derailed childhood. We've forgotten our bodies. We've cut ourselves off from the people that are immediately around us. We've lost our literacy. We've fed our craving for approval. And we've become more comfortable nursing our secret vices. We are hyperconnected and paradoxically lonely. We have unimaginable volumes of information at our fingertips. And we're strangely confused.

Some are greatly concerned. So maybe all I mean to say is this: the information revolution, just like other revolutions, has brought chaos, uncertainty, and disruption. Old ways of thinking and living are being torn out. And new ways of thinking and living are being put in.

A thought-provoking article in The National Geographic summarizes our situation pretty well where the author writes, "We may not know yet where we're going, but we've already left where we've been." So this time, metaphorical heads are ruling just trying to make sense of it all. That's the word, revolution. Now the phrase: brooding potential. So let's back up. Let's back way, way, way up. Let's back up to the very first things.

Let's go all the way back to what you could see as another time of confusion and potential to put ourselves into a bit of context. Let's go back to Genesis 1. And I'm going to be using one way that some early church fathers interpreted Genesis 1. And we're going to lay that aside how we think about our own revolutionary time. As some of these church fathers saw it in Genesis 1, God created a cosmic wasteland. The earth was without form. It was created. It was created by His word.

It was created, though, without form and void. There was formlessness. There was voidness in the Hebrew tohu wabahu. There was raw material, confusion, chaos, or in the presence of God, possibilities. The spirit of God moves or hovers over the face of the turbulence. And God draws creation to order. And soon where there was formlessness, there is distinction. Where there was voidness, there is green hillsides. There's teeming seas, jostling cattle. There's man. There's woman.

And where we see this pattern, we see God's glory. Where you see this movement from disorder to order, from chaos to meaning, from randomness to confidence, barrenness to life, you've seen God's glory. You have to catapult forward then through the glory of Abraham's faith, his obedience, the glory of deliverance from Egypt, and the glory of the law, the glory of entrance into the promised land, entrance anyway.

And all of this anticipates the glory of Jesus and His birth, His life, His actions, His teaching, His death, His resurrection. We have seen His glory. And the knowledge of the glory of God is in the face of Jesus Christ. So there's a sense in which as you move along the way of the scriptural story, you see God continually creating His creation. He's continually changing the potential of uncertainty and ambiguity into meaning, confidence, and life. And you see this pattern over and over and over again.

So we can, as we encounter technology, the fear of revolution and its uncertainty, we can recoil into fear. We can lapse into paralysis. Or we can trace and enter the arc of God's continual creation, discerning, embracing, rejecting. And perhaps the spirit broods over our little information revolution too. And where we see chaos, confusion, and uncertainty, He sees potential for order, meaning, confidence, and life. Please stand for a moment. And let's pray. Father, we are Your creatures.

You have made us with Your hands. You have made us for Your glory. Inflame our hearts with Your love. Refine our thinking. Strengthen our bodies for the purpose of Your glory. Amen. Please be seated. I'd invite the panelists. All four of you, please come up. I'll offer just a few words of introduction to the panelists here. And then they'll be taking five minutes each to present a position. And then there'll be interaction. And following that, we'll actually address the questions that you all have.

So very briefly, Gary, you've been introduced already. You've traveled far. His travel has exposed him to a lot of hand-wringing on issues of technology. And he's working on a book on the topic. Chris Blake, welcome. Chris is from Hartville, Ohio. The way he said this, he thinks that the Anabaptist Church is about 40 years away from mainstream culture, trailing it, whereas maybe the Evangelicals are something like 20 years behind. Harry Argo. We've heard him talk already.

Harry is convinced that the media-saturated world we live in affects us. And the question you hear him asking is, "Well, what are we going to do about that?" Kevin Shank? Kevin is from Lancaster, Pennsylvania. He became a computer fanatic, self-described, at a very young age. And he's seen the full spectrum of technology, its benefits, and its detriments. And so that's caused him to think a lot about it. The panelists, please present your positions in the order you are up here.

And then following that, we'll have some moderated discussion. I think all of us here this evening understand that our spiritual lives and our congregations are being challenged by technology. And tonight, I'm going to argue for the need of personal face-to-face accountability. We talk a lot about filters, a lot about accountability programs. Basically, what we're trying to do is use machines to control machines. I'm not opposed to that in a thriving community.

My concern is this: that machines alone will not do the job. You know, this thing of accountability, it's not as easy as it first appears. It's easy to talk about the need for face-to-face accountability. But I personally believe that we should have relationships with others that are strong enough that they can tell by our accountants where we are spiritually. Now, you know, it's one thing to talk about accountability. It's another thing to be asked hard questions at certain times in our lives.

I think there's every one of us, there are certain times in our lives we're hoping that certain questions don't come. That's just where we're at as humans. But it means wanting holiness in our lives, in our personal lives, desperately enough that we're willing to take that. We're willing to listen to the admonishment and challenge of others. I want to just mention this regarding pornography. There are many young men that have struggled with pornography. And I've talked to some who long for accountability.

When someone confesses pornography, the battle isn't finished. It's actually just beginning. And they need someone to walk with them ongoing, probably the rest of their lives. Pornography does something to our minds that's serious. It traces something there that you're going to need spiritual help and someone walking with you. Our churches today, I feel like are doing a very poor job of walking with people, especially in our Anabaptist settings. So how do we implement accountability?

I think local brothers' meetings can be effective if it's not too large of a group. But I want to propose that it's even better, and maybe including this, to have one person at least that is open at any time to ask you difficult questions, that you're vulnerable before that person. Cell groups can be helpful in a larger congregation, two to five people. I think it has to be regular. It has to be planned. It has to be something that you know is going to happen. Why do we neglect accountability? I'll say this too.

I think it's good to have a list of questions. I think it's helpful to make out your own questions. Each of us is tempted in different areas. It's not just the internet. There's other areas as well where we need accountability in. Why do we neglect it? One of those reasons is simply fear. It's just simply raw fear. We need to have a desire for holiness greater than that fear. Sometimes, though, we come from settings where accountability has been twisted or misused.

I think that's a possibility in our lives where maybe someone used it in a way that was not with love. But I want to go back just before I sit down and say this: there's tremendous blessing. And you'll see it in the second chapter and the fourth chapter of Acts, of a community that was pulled together in love. And they were open to each other. They put everything they had on the line. And they were willing to ask each other difficult questions. They were together geographically.

They were together in vision and purpose. They were willing to put their entire lives before the others. Briefly, I'm asking for this: I think our brotherhoods need to think very, very seriously about learning to communicate at a deeper level. Good evening, everyone. My name is Chris Blake, as Carl mentioned before. A bit more context about me: I've been developing software for 10 years or so. I work for a small international Israeli company called Tufin. We work in network security.

I want you guys here to consider a story. And I apologize if you've heard me tell this before. But suppose an alien that had minimal contact with humans came. And they came to this Kingdom Fellowship weekend. And they saw people who were very well-intended and very well-meaning to live out a God-glorifying lifestyle. And they heard Brother Gary talk, Brother Harry talk. And they heard all of these discussions. And they don't really know what our technology is.

But they hear phrases such as, "This is something akin to cigarettes. This is something akin to a Trojan horse." We talk about these things and these ways that, "Yeah, we all know technology is bad. We all know there's dangers. We all know there's this. We all know there's that." And so these aliens, they come. They spectate us. They hear us talk about this technology thing. And then they figure to themselves, "Well, smoking gives you cancer. Trojan horse. Every man, woman, and child was killed. Technology.

From the way that these people are talking, we should be done with this. We should never use anything like this." And then they see us all leaving tomorrow. They see us turn on our GPSs. They see us taking selfies by the lakes. They see us Snapchatting or WhatsApping our friends. And there's a dissonance that they face. They're asking themselves, "These things give you cancer. We've heard the conversations. Everyone is talking. These things are so bad. Yet everyone here has this just weapon.

Everyone is giving themselves cancer. What's up with this disconnect?" And so I think that there is a little bit of a disconnect. I think that we come here with our preconceived notions, ideas, and opinions. We hear things we kind of already know. We pay almost a lip service to it. And we leave exactly the same. So I think that we need to talk about this giant underbelly of things that everyone's already thinking about, everyone's already doing. I was speaking with someone. And she mentioned that it's here.

This technology beast is here to stay. And it's in the room. And yes, we know it's bad. Yes, we know it's wrong. But we're all still using it. Now, a sound position is to just completely throw it out. And if there's some here that do that, that's a sound position. But for the rest of us, I think we all have these questions and these desires, especially people who'd consider themselves youth in my age group. And we have these deeper thoughts and these deeper questions. And we don't really know what to do.

Because yes, we come and we pay the lip service. But we want and need something deeper. I think there's a bit something more than rules. I think that instead of just being a pendulum swinging back and forth, just reacting to reacting to reacting, I think that we need to stand on principles. Because after the cell phone, there'll be virtual reality. And after virtual reality, there'll be augmented reality. And after that, our brain will just be uploaded to some computer somewhere.

So if you make rules here and today, they'll last, but maybe for only the next five years. I think we need principles. And one principle that I use when I'm discerning what is good or bad technology usage is I call it the principle of production versus consumption. What am I doing with this technology? What is my intent for using this technology? Am I just consuming content? Or am I consuming with the intent to produce? Or is this something that is directly producing? So I'll give a quick example of that.

I could go home. I could watch three hours of Netflix. And that would be three hours used for consumption. Now, consumption is not an inherent evil. But in excess, it is. As an alternative, I could have used that three hours I'm not a carpenter. But I'm interested in carpentry. So I could have used that three hours, or even two, or one hours, and looked up a video on woodworking, you know, basic woodworking, DIY. So as a result of that, there's a clear delineation of what I can do with my time.

And so it places the emphasis on us and what sort of person we want to be instead of, "Is this technology good? Is this technology bad?" Who do we want to be at the end of the day? And how will we get there? It's not necessarily consuming a mindless amount of technology. But it's not playing board games all the time either. So I think there's a healthy medium. And as I've expressed before, I think we need to stand on these principles. And we need to open up and have these discussions that we're all thinking of.

I'm Harry Argo. And my interest in technology, as I did it as a profession, information technology, simulation development for the military. And I also did youth work and was fascinated with, or interested in, the impact that media has been on both youth work and on evangelism and missions work. So I developed some theories and speak on it quite often. My thought for tonight is this question of change again. Socrates, one of the first great some people call him really the first philosopher.

He wasn't the first, actually. But he had an interesting argument. Socrates was against writing. The Greek alphabet had just come into existence. We're at really the beginning of the oral era I'm sorry, the end of the oral era and the beginning of the written era, where cultures now were changed by this ability to write down information, which most cultures it was very difficult. The scribes did it. But with the Greek alphabet, writing became democratized, meaning you just learned 26 characters.

You learned to write. But he argued against it. One of his main arguments was that if we can just look in a book somewhere or something is written, we won't remember. We won't commit things to memory. We'll lose our heritage. We'll forget who we are as a Greek people. It will change us. We had the written era, which I spoke of, which he entered. We had philosophy explode into existence. Sciences explode as this writing is able to capture information. And teaching changes. The world really changed.

From then, we moved into another era, many sub-eras. And that was the print era. That's where the Gutenberg printing press made reproducibility really infinite in a sense, that books were being churned out. People became readers. Culture changed. We actually moved into the modern era of logic. And even our theology was very systematized because of writing. The world changed again, leading to the Industrial Revolution and so on.

And as communications scholars talk about now, we're moving into a new era because of media technology. We're moving into what's called a secondary orality. Because people now tend to watch, instead of being deep readers, spending hours reading and thinking deep about concepts, we now think at a shallow level, text level. We're now impressionistic as opposed to logical. We're really moving. It's not the same orality as the pre-print reality. We're in a different reality, a different orality.

And my issue I bring up, similar to that of Socrates, is what are we able to remember now? Because the computer technology does all the remembering for us. Sometimes we don't even know our own phone number. Growing up, we used to know 10 or 12 phone numbers. We don't know even our own. But that's a small issue. The second is what's happening to our thinking? Are we becoming shallow thinkers? Because we're dwelling now at a shallow Facebook text social media realm. And the third change is communication.

Since we are now more passive receivers of technical communication, instead of well-developed oral communicators to our people around us, our neighbor, our friends, what is this doing to us? And along those lines, since we are now depending more and more within the church, depending more and more technology to do our work for us, are we going to spiritually atrophy? Are we thinking now we can win the world to Christ through the internet?

We can spread the gospel out there with the clicks on a keyboard, that I can send it around the world. And people will all come into the kingdom and be disciples. And are we going to forget that, no, the work of the discipleship, it's hard work. It's troubling at times. It's time intensive. It's a commitment to another person to meet the commitment of bringing them up in the faith. Are we going to atrophy? Are we going to even forget the concept of disciple making? That's the concern I bring up.

Even with all the goodness that the internet brings us, which I don't want to tell you that I'm a Ludite, that I want to attack media. I want us to question what is happening to us as we use it. So that's what I ask in synopsis. What are we losing within ourselves as we are gaining other things through the internet? Thank you. So ever since the Renaissance especially, men have been seeking for a comprehensive answer to the solution to all the world's problems.

And by this point in time, most philosophers, I believe, would admit that they have failed. Secular humanistic philosophy has failed to provide any kind of comprehensive, unified solution to all of the world's problems. So what does that mean? Does that mean that we're now ready to embrace Christ? Does it mean that we're ready to submit to the Father and actually come back to where we need to be? Unfortunately, the answer in a broad scope in the world scene is no.

We're not any more willing to come back to the source of life than we ever were to begin with. Rather, we like even if we can't prove that the world is getting better, even if we can't prove that we have an answer to all the world's problems, we like to nurture a sense that we actually are. And so to illustrate this tonight, I would like to unveil an image for you. And this image I am going to call the Lady Progress. So we see here and I'll flash it quickly to the panelists behind me so they can engage with this.

This is a combination of the Statue of Liberty as well as perhaps something of maybe Lady Justice, since she is blindfolded. You see here, she's holding out devices. And I believe that our devices are something of the forefront of the feeling of progress that people are feeding on in these days. It's not actually any kind of solution to the core problems that we have as humanity. However, it's something of an alibi. It makes us think that we're getting somewhere. Because, hey, the new iPhone just came out.

And it can take way better pictures. And it can take 4K video. And it can tell you the next date of an asteroid attack or something like that. Anyhow, so this is the Lady Progress. The problem is that there's a sinister side to all of this progress. Because for every attempt that man has made to make the world better, they found themselves and their efforts thwarted by sin. See, resource hoarding, oppressive regimes, slavery, illicit abuse and misuse, these things never go away.

And in fact, they're only becoming more and more potent as we give ourselves more and more capacities and potentials through these devices that we're making. And even for those of us who are trying to use technology in good ways and effectively as tools for a good cause, we find that for some of us, it feels like these very things that were intended to make life better and easier are actually making life a bit more hectic and a bit more difficult.

Sometimes these inventions that were intended to actually make life more succinct, we find that we feel like we're competing with them. We're struggling to keep up with all the revolution that's been described. So I would like to give you a few pointers of how I believe we can confront this ideology and use technology effectively. So first of all, I would like to introduce to you a tool, a new invention that I have that I've brought along tonight. This invention looks like a normal vice grip.

But the reality is it's not. It's embedded with all sorts of little nerve reactors here that give you the sensation of biting into a Snickers bar every time you close these handles. And furthermore, the tighter you make it, the better it gets. And you know, OK, who wants to take this home with you? I think you would be crazy. Nobody wants a vice grip like this. And I don't think anybody in their right mind would. And why not? The reason is because a vice grip is a very clear illustration of a tool.

It's intended to get a job done. A vice grip gives you the feeling of pleasure through the work it accomplishes. But that's the difference between a vice grip and a smartphone. This gives you pleasure through the work it accomplishes. This gives you pleasure through accompaniment. OK, so how do we bring this into perspective? That's it? You're at five. Keep going. I'm at five. OK, very quick points here. I think we should treat technology as guilty until proven innocent.

The reason why is because all of life should be driving towards a particular purpose. That purpose is to love God and love your neighbor. Another way to say this, I think, is to be reconciled to God and to be agents of reconciliation. So we should run all of our technologies through the living sacrifice acid test. Is this helping us be living sacrifices? Number two, do not use technology to combat technology. OK, there is no replacement and we talked about this for deep intentional relationships. Cultivate them.

Utilize them. My heart was broken when I heard recently of a well-respected minister who fell into the vice of pornography because he was experimenting with internet filtering technology. This is a tragedy. And it's an example of us attacking the problem in the wrong way. Number three, keep technology on the margins. It shouldn't be the core. If you're going to use it as a tool, use it as a tool and lay it aside. In our house, we use a cell phone table. You can use a cell phone basket.

Keep the smartphone where it belongs, not always within reach. Number three, stay in control. Take control of every device. Imagine yourself like you're driving a rototiller. That rototiller is going to want to leap out of your hands and go flying across the yard if you don't firmly keep your hands on the handle. So take this device or this technology or whatever it is and treat it in the same way. Don't let it get away. Take ownership of it.

If you want more advice about how to use internet tools and take control of them, I suggest the good resource integrityonline.org. It's a great collection. Learn to say no. OK, technology is surrounding us with all sorts of opportunities to satisfy our appetites. It's like we're living in a house that is kitchen the whole way. And it's always producing our favorite foods. That's going to show up on your gut after a while if you give in to that. And we have a media gut as well.

And lastly, I would like to say budget your time and your splurges. At our house, we have Sugar Day on Saturday. We have a great pancake feast to celebrate being together as a family for the whole day. And it's a wonderful time of celebration. We try not to eat a lot of sugar otherwise. And accordingly, in a similar way, I have News Day on Monday. Now, here is the solution we've all been talking about this weekend. And that is the suffering church, the kingdom of God. This is the answer to the world's problems.

Thank you. Gary, Chris, Harry, Kevin, Mike. Yes, thank you. OK, we've got time for just a little bit of open season here for the panelists themselves. So there's four of them. They've got us started with their positions. And now I'm going to let them actually kind of tear into each other a little bit, sharpen each other up. OK, we are driving here toward application. So just bear that in mind as you sharpen each other's ideas. Also, deal with the implications as well. So I'm going to leave this time to you.

Is there somebody who'd lead us off with a question for one of the other panelists? I have a question, Kevin, for you. You just told us to make technology inconvenient. Doesn't that fly in the face of technology itself? That depends a lot on what your aim is in utilizing these technologies in the first place. So my wife would look at me really weird if I brought the garage tools into the kitchen.

And I think that's the way we should think about the way that these other technologies are pervading our lives and keeping them in the right places for their appropriate uses. So why not just leave it alone? Why have technology at all if you want to be inconvenient? Sure. OK, so technology is a way that we are subduing the Earth. We're creating tools by which we can harness creation. And we're opening up all sorts of capabilities. And that's a good thing.

I see that as a very connected thing to God's commandment to subdue the Earth. But let's make sure that we are doing that in a way that's consistent with the principles that Jesus himself has given us. Chris, I have a question for you. And related a little bit to what Kevin brought up and something that is important to me. And that is the purpose and context of life is relationship. It's a statement I say a lot when I speak on it, relationship being the purpose and context of life.

And my wife works in an early childhood education and secular firm. And they are always saying that education should be in the context of relationship. This is a secular organization. They say the best education that happens is relationship-based. And you alluded to using the internet show or maybe YouTube to look at woodworking.

OK, and so my assumption is that you are willing to develop or enter into a relationship with someone it's a parasocial relationship with a woodworking expert as opposed to a relationship with a real person who knows woodworking. What are your thoughts? I think that's a great question. I think that what you're asking about is sort of a subversion of the traditional hierarchy, parents, children, and so on and so forth. But to be frank, you mentioned Socrates and reading. Reading already does that.

You go to a library. You have the ability to engage with the minds of philosophers past, present, dead, gone. So if we've accepted books and we all have, I think that it's far too late. It's already here. That subversion is already here. There's already a way to subvert. I do think there is something to be said about the different ways of learning and the different types of learning. I'm sure we all know kinesthetic learners, visual, oral learners.

And in fact, for some people, visually seeing a sculpture, a carpentry sculpture, may be more conducive to their learning than simply step one, step two, step three. So I think that the subversion of these power structures are already here. And subversion is perhaps too strong of a word. I think that you mentioned relationships. Relationships are more than just a hierarchical family unit.

And so if you're not necessarily able to handle any sort of relationship outside of that family unit, maybe there's a deeper problem there. OK, what I'm aiming at, though, something that happened to me in my own life is my deciding to I guess the first course of action when trying to get help going to the internet as opposed to going to a human being.

And in your woodworking business, your desires to learn woodworking, it just seems to me that a first step ought to be, who's a real human being that can teach me from which I can develop a relationship with as opposed to working on the internet in which I'm developing a relationship with someone that's not there. You're developing the relationship with someone you don't know, parasocial relationship. And so that's anyways my point I push back at.

I think it's more profitable with a human being rather than a device. Yeah, I agree. Ultimately, human interaction is how God made us. And nothing beats human face-to-face interaction. I just don't necessarily think it's an inherent evil. Generally, if I were to pick something up like that, it could be any other hobby, playing the guitar. There could be a teacher. But it may be after a long day of work. I've got maybe 30 minutes. Just can't necessarily call someone over. I think that's the same as reading a book.

Is it possible that we could approach this question from the standpoint of good, better, best? So if it's necessary to acquire a new skill and there really is no one accessible to me that can teach me that skill, then it's still good for me to find this information somewhere. But it's not good if I am circumventing or avoiding these natural opportunities for these opportunities for natural relationships.

One of the really interesting things about technology and one of the realizations experts, especially secular experts, are making is that technology itself and our use of it has a formative effect apart from the content. So content is important. What you're looking at is significant. And media is obviously part of that. However, the use of the medium itself has a formative effect, too. So we've got to be aware of that. We've got to learn how to see that effect and how to decode it and respond to it.

So let's move on if there's any other questions or things you want to direct at each other. Kevin? Sure. So I have a question for you, Gary. You talked a lot about accountability. And I would just say that the general feel I got from your suggestion sounded like something that should be thought about and incorporated by a church leader, a church leadership, at least generally with how our communities function.

And so what would you say to somebody out here who may be from a church that really isn't prepared or isn't inclined to handle things the way you're describing and is saying, I need support. I need accountability. I need someone to walk with me. What should I do? It's a great question and also a difficult one. I do think the first plan of action should be going face to face and talking to that leader, do it humbly, and give time even for change. I don't think change has to happen overnight.

Sometimes in our youth, we assume that because it's so clear what needs to happen, it needs to happen now. There needs to be respect in that process. But I don't think we should back off from doing that, going ahead and laying down our request, how we're seeing this thing. One of the burdens I think that young people put on leaders is this. Is leaders aren't sure how committed the youth is to their group, to their congregation. And I think a young man should commit himself.

So he should be able to say that I'm here with you. I'm not running off if you answer this question wrong. I'm with you. But this isn't my burden. It's much easier for a leader then to give good advice if he first senses there's commitment here instead of, I've got one foot over here and one foot over here. And you tell me the wrong answer. And I'm out of here. That's difficult for a leader.

I'd like to just touch on again the question of accountability with this pretty pervasive problem of pornography, even within the Christian community. And that is the fear that men have of exposing themselves and the fact that there can be repercussions. You know, we're in this sort of an aside.

We're in this upside down paradigm now where media technology has made what was completely private now possible of being completely public worldwide, at the same time where what used to be hard to do, like look at a magazine, is so easy on my iPhones. We have this upside down situation. But again, I'd like you to address, what do we do about the fear that men have of admitting and owning up to such a danger to themselves and to their families and to the church? I push on this some in the book Church Matters.

I think it's essential. And I understand that part of what I'm asking for here is a change in how we do church. And that's scary. But I really think that leaders have to be vulnerable. They have to be willing themselves to go to hard places. They have to be willing themselves to be vulnerable about their own lives, about their own shortcomings. If a leader isn't willing to do that, it's going to be very difficult for someone to feel comfortable coming to them.

So they can alleviate a lot of fear simply by being open about their own struggles, their own difficulties. I understand that can be overdone. But I think there has to be an element of that involved. Thanks, Gary. We have time for one more question. And then we need to engage the great questions that we have from you all. If there's nothing on the tip of your minds, let's move into the questions. So we've tried to pull these questions together. There's a good many of them.

So we've tried to pull them together into some lumps or categories so that at least if we don't answer your question directly, we might hit on it by addressing some other questions. It's our hope. Probably don't have time to get through them all. But we'll do our very best. So first, I'll just start you off with softball. MAC or IBM? No, I'm kidding. Let's start off with this question instead. So the question is, what is considered social media? WhatsApp, Voxer.

And then the broader question, how is this affecting us? I think a good definition that we can use can be we can think about a family. So you have your nuclear family, your mom and your dad. Then you have your children. Then you have your extended family, your cousins, and so on and so forth. I think a definition of social media that we can use that might be appropriate is a family that is another layer outside of the extended family. It's more superficial. It's pretty much entirely superficial.

And the social aspect is you feel like you're a family when you're not really. Yeah, I would say it's a mediatization of friendships. And actually, the medium that's used, similar to what you mentioned earlier, there are the effects that the medium has on us, formative effects, biases, logics. They call it media logic, which infiltrate us. But they also shape the relationships. They get shaped. And the social media, I think, starts to, again, change relationships into a mediated form of relationship.

But the relationships themselves maybe on face value look good, like many friends. He calls himself a friend. But it's interesting in the scholarly realm of the studies that are out there that they're pretty much a conclusion that your social media friends aren't social media. They aren't friends. When they do all sorts of experiments, when someone gets in trouble, who's there to help them? And it's almost never a social media friend. It's always the person who's proximal. So something to look at in that.

Maybe a follow-up question on that is, how do you relate to peers who are, you could say, addicted to social media? Not through social media. I would say, first and foremost, relate to them in real life and as naturally as possible. And some of us are more comfortable being forceful than others. But perhaps you can say to that friend who you're struggling to make meaningful connections with, hey, I'd like to take you out for coffee. And by the way, leave your cell phone behind.

I want to have a face-to-face, deep conversation with you and think about what you want that conversation to look like. I think one of our challenges with an issue like social media is we like an issue to be black and white. And many times, we try to push every issue into black and white. So social media, for example, there are strong feelings about this issue. But there are legitimate reasons for social media. I work with people in restricted countries. They use it simply because it's encrypted.

I can communicate with them back and forth. But the problem with that is, as soon as we say it's not wrong, then we have people using it for wrong reasons. And to me, if I personally do not use social media for anything other than business, I'm not interested in finding out the details of everyone's life. I furthermore think it's extremely unhealthy to a congregation for someone to be constantly transmitting what they're doing all the time. There's something very egocentric about that.

It might feel good to the person. But if they would simply consider, from a kingdom perspective, the amount of time they're taking in other people's lives and all the details of the daily life that they're transmitting on, I've heard reports and I did interviews with people. And every time some, and in particular, women are worse at this. But every time they turn around, they want to tell somebody about it. And if they have 50 people on their list, someone's getting ding, ding, ding all the time.

Imagine the wall that's putting up, what it's stopping in that community with regard to reaching out and blessing other people. So just because it's good in some situations does not mean the thing is right. There's a wrong perspective of this as well. And I think it's extremely powerful. And I think we need to be very warned about it. I think social media can be very deadly in our communities. We need to be communicating face to face and not as much on social media. Let's move on. Sorry, there's a lot to say there.

I'm going to throw a hand grenade in. And here's the question. Can the internet be safely used? Or is complete abstinence the best option? I think, as I mentioned before, it's here. It's here to stay. There's a large portion of us here that are already on the internet. I don't recall who said it. Maybe it was Brian. Someone said something that was very interesting. He said, the Anabaptist people are very good at abstinence. But we're not so good at moderation.

And I think that that's an important thing that we need to consider. I think it's too late. You know, we're on the train. Someone also said, the train's taken off. I think it's a bit too late to say, can we abstain? Because it's insidious, pervasive, everywhere, whatever words you want to use. It's almost inescapable. I believe the internet can be safely used in many of the same ways that the library can be very useful.

However, let's just be honest about the fact that very few of us struggle with overuse of our local library. Yeah, I think it can safely be used. I think it has to do with the attitude of the user. And that is to absolutely minimize wasteful use, minimize detrimental use, and be aware of it, be cognizant that I have a possibility of just wasting my time, wasting other people's time, atrophiing myself. I'm aware of that. And I then seek to optimize my own development. We are always developing.

And to make sure that the internet is not a hindrance to that, it can be a help. I mean, have you saw my list of reasons? Yes, please. Can you pull it? Yeah, thank you. OK, anybody else? I'll tag another question along with that. One of the ways that technology has really changed the way we live is in families. OK? And it's changed how children are raised. It's changed how young people spend their time.

It's changed the level of interaction that parents can give or what they feel like they can give their parents or to their children. So the question here is, how do we, as parents, lead out with the revolving door of technology, especially with our youth who are normally adapting faster than we are? I think the best way to lead out in the area of technology is to lead out, period.

So be the kind of person who is living an inspirational life, who has a value-centered life, who is living with all the gusto that you can for the Lord Jesus and for His kingdom and His causes. And I think that, you know, as you're doing that, that many of these questions, many of these problems and dilemmas will fall into their proper places and perspective. Kevin, what do you do when, as a parent, you have no idea what's out there? And so you're leading. You have your children's heart.

But you don't have a discerning metric for what's good, bad, right, or wrong with respect to anything technological. So how do you, you know, again, do you abstain? Or how do you moderate? So I think one of the most significant effects of technology is the relationships and attachments that it creates between people and devices. But there's also other kinds of vices. There's also other kinds of vices related to relationships.

And we all know that, you know, peer relationships can be very damaging, whether or not technology is in the picture. And so I would say the best thing to do as a parent is to approach this like you would any other kind of relationship problem and seek to capture the heart of your children, seek to know your children, to understand them, to communicate love to them, to get to the place where they can trust you. And if this is a difficulty for you, then it should probably be your number one focus in your life.

I'm not a parent. So-. Does that answer your question? To some extent. I guess, more practically speaking, what does that mean? How do you show that? What are some steps that you do? I think you mentioned you have a cell phone area where cell phones are there and only there. What other sort of things? Sure. So one of the biggest things I think you can do is be the kind of person who's putting intentional practices into your life to make connections with your children. There's a lot else that's required behind this.

But there's something very beautiful about sitting down for a meal together as often as possible as a family and engaging each other in positive ways around that meal. There's also a whole host of other things that you can do to make meaningful connections with your children. Take time for your children. Read to them if they're young. You know, maybe take them out to eat if they're older. And really pursue their hearts. Don't let the precious years waste away without actually making them a priority. I'm sorry.

I'm not talking about--I apologize. I'm not talking about technology. Because I just really don't think that it's essential for a parent to be in the know-how about technology in order to effectively combat the pressures that their children are facing through technology. Because you will engage with them as you actually engage with the hearts of your children. Here's a challenging question. OK. One more thought on that. Because of the--well, two parts to this issue.

And the first is, I think children should be grounded in reality. And the internet is an alternate reality. There is so much false, fake, fabricated information out there. And those children can't tell between real and false at those ages. It's immaturity. That's what immaturity is, a misunderstanding of reality. And so they're now basing their worldviews, their interpretation of true reality based on the internet if they're on the internet. It's the same with entertainment.

When children are in entertainment, they then are interpreting reality, their future interpretations, based on their memory of entertainment. Even the American Psychological Association says no screen time before two years old, no screen time. It's too damaging for the child. OK? Because that's the second issue, that the screen time, the technological screen time, formats the mind, aside from what nature does in forming or natural reality forms the mind.

And the problem is, at those ages, their mind is changing so fast that the little entertainment, the little internet interaction they have, has a long-term impact. One more quick thing, if I could say this about this. I would like my father to stand up, please. So unless you misunderstand me, I'm not trying to sit here and give advice as if I'm an expert parent. I'm just repeating what my father did for me. OK? So if you need a face to talk to, there's a lot of good fathers here.

But if you need a face to talk to about how to parent your children, that would be a good one. I think sometimes we underestimate also the fact that many of our youth are craving leadership. There's a home in our community where they invited young people in. I think it was every Tuesday night, just children, youth from the community, to come in. And they wanted just to have time with them, build relationships with them, reach out to them. They had a basket right inside the door.

And it had a sign on it that said this: We like social more than media. Put your phones here. These were young people that were not coming from Christian homes. But they all obediently shut off their phones and put it in the basket and enjoyed an evening without it. So sometimes we think that leadership won't work. But I think sometimes we have youth that are actually craving real relationships. We have time for just one final question here. I'm going to make this as practical, as specific as I can.

Now, you know there's concern anymore about the really addictive nature of smartphones just as a platform, with studies saying that, you know, the average power user of a smartphone is touching their phone something like 5,000 times a day. So something about the platform there that really wants to get your attention. It wants to suck you in. I'll just make this as practical as I can, I guess. Where have you seen smartphone use done well?

And what are some of the practices that you've observed, creative ideas, like when you come to our house, we're going to have supper, put your phone in the basket. It stays out there, things like that, anything that you can pull out of your memory here that says, that seems to have worked? I would say this, real briefly. When I was doing interviews, that's one thing I observed was that youth who are doing well typically have older people who have built relationships with them. And there's leadership there.

It's not older people just turning them loose. Neither is it older people just saying no. But they're working with them through this process. I think that's very important, Gary. A lot of the times, people that are my age, there's this disconnect in terms of age. And then there's this disconnect in terms of technology. And often we hear no all the time. And so what ends up happening is there's something that's very jarring. Here's this person that I'm supposed to look up to and respect.

And yet they seem to be keeping me at a distance, so to speak. So I think that the formation of those relationships are very important. And I think also, to speak to the question, I think we can use a practical example of how us four panelists kind of engaged this panel. We did use technology. Joel presented us with an initial email, all introducing each other. We exchanged ideas and thoughts back and forth via email. Then we had a conference call. We tried to have a conference call.

We tried to have a conference call. I guess it was successful because we're all here. So and during that, we used it as a medium. It was something that we could have, you know, talked endlessly for hours about idle things. But we used it for a purpose. And we had a purpose in mind when we were using it. And I think that, as I mentioned before, are we going to just be consuming content with these mediums?

Or are we going to--is there some end to this technology that's fulfilling my purpose, that's fulfilling the call that Jesus has put on my life? A couple of things on that. You know, there's interesting studies coming out now that social media use is related to lowering IQ, very interesting to find that because of the shallow levels. And that was another point. Sorry. What I want to say is subduing this media, subduing it through ordering your life. Again, what has worked for me? I don't always do it.

But for great periods of time, I will do this. I have my--at the end of my devotion time in the morning, I have my to-do list. And I have my to-don't list. My to-don't list, sometimes that includes, you know what? Today, no. And I will say I will do this sometimes. And it makes some people mad. Unless I have something urgent coming, ring her off, no internet. From 8:00 in the morning till 8:00 at night, I have too many, too many important things to do, too many things. I can't let this thing distract me.

So it lets me focus deep. And that's what they're finding. That's why I brought that up now. I remember why, is that we are in this scattered mindset now by the internet technology pinning us. And it's creating people that cannot focus and go deep and think thoroughly. OK? That's the IQ issue. And so I've decided, no, I'm not going to let this turn me into a shallow person. I subdue it. I have times when I look at it. Sometimes I don't look at it. I'll pick a time now for this hour, lunchtime.

I need to do some shopping for certain things. I'll do that, then stop it. But I'm not letting it rule me. OK? That's all we have time for. Roll the medium. Don't allow the medium to roll you. Thanks, Harry. I think that's all we have time for here. Kurt, we will conclude. And then I'll invite you back up. You have the floor.