Jesus the Techie

I’m sitting in a global “coffee” chain.  It’s probably the closest thing we have to a community well…a gathering place for folks to come and hang out and soak up some “community’.  Some have called such gathering spots Third Places.

(Mark Batterson introduced me to the concept of Third Places.  Check out his thoughts here and here.)

I’m typing on my laptop.  Connected to the global internet wirelessly. My smartphone is by my side.  Emails are rolling in.  I’m getting tweets and facebook posts.

As I look around.  A grandmother is enjoying some joe with her daughter and a teeny-tiny baby.  Grandma has her pink-encased phone sitting on the table.

A couple of dudes are sitting with a laptop between them…a narfarious business deal?  Working on a plot to take over the world?  Planning a presentation for the Board of Widgets-R-Us?

My wife sits across from me.  She’s been having a sporadic conversation via her phone/laptop with a group of crazy pastor’s wives she will soon be spending a weekend away with.

Surrounded by the greatest technological marvels the world has ever know.  We communicate.  We plan.  We dream.  We send our thoughts across the world.  And oddly, there isn’t much interaction between the folks actually sitting in the room together.

So, I’m wondering about Jesus.

He used the technology of his day…gather with folks and talk to them.  Sometimes around a well.  Sometimes on a hillside or in a home or in a boat or on the road.  Face-to-face.  Personal.

If Jesus were sitting in this coffeehouse, would he be talking with everyone in the place?  Would he be tweeting and texting and emailing?

I may be looking to justify my own reliance upon tech, but I like to think he’d used the tools of the day.  He’d be using the tools of the people to connect with the people.

At least that’s where I’m landing today.  What do you think?  Are we more connected with these modern tools?  Less?  If more, in what ways?  If less, should we be doing something differently? Is it more complicated than all that?  Another case of both/and?

Talk amongst yourselves (or tweet/post/text/email/pin…).

Life is better together,
Shawn