Wednesday, August 9, 2017

Ultimate communication .......... Parables 625

March 9, 1999

Electronic mail has revolutionized business and personal communication. With a computer and modem, anyone can send messages around the world in minutes, even make and cultivate friendships in cyberspace.

However, e-mail has the same annoyances as regular mail. Total strangers somehow get my address and send me Spam or unwanted advertising — electronic junk mail. Occasionally, I get chain letters too. “If you make ten copies of this and send it on to ten friends...”

Yikes, I have enough to do. I use this technology when I want to say a few words without feeling guilty that I didn’t have time to write fourteen pages.

Carnegie Melton University in Pittsburgh researched people who spend far more time in cyberspace than I do. According to their data, the more that people use e-mail, chat rooms and discussion groups, the more depressed, stressed and lonely they feel. They also add that being on-line replaces time people should spend building deeper relationships with family and friends.

In my limited experience, electronic discussions, no matter how intimate they seem, do not reach true intimacy. Impressions easily created in mere words fall flat in face-to-face relationships. With e-mail, it is easy to fake who you are and how you feel. Even regular mail and the telephone fail the intimacy test. To pass, we need to look into each other’s eyes.

The Bible says the eye is the lamp of the body. Philosophers say it is the window to the soul. Ordinary people know that the look in someone’s eye can tell them a great deal about that person’s heart and mind.

At least that is true for human relationships. It simply does not apply to the ultimate cyberspace communication — prayer. We do not have to look into the eyes of God to get close to Him. We just talk or even think and God knows exactly what we are trying to communicate. He speaks back through the Bible or sometimes without words into our minds — and we hear Him. We know who is speaking and we grow deeper in our relationship with Him.

I am amazed how we can fool each other with the best of technology yet our hearts are open to God using none whatsoever. It is as the psalmist wrote, “O Lord, You have searched me and You know me. . . . Before a word is on my tongue You know it completely, O Lord.”

Spoken or written prayers help us express ourselves to Him but His understanding goes deeper than what we say. He knows what we really mean and how we really feel before we even tell Him. Not even our closest friends can do that with the same accuracy.

Actually, prayer is not really cyberspace communication. The Bible says if we put our faith in Christ, He comes to live in our hearts. We are “a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in us, whom we received from God.” Our messages do not have to go from ‘server to server’ around the universe searching for His address because He is right here with us. Nothing could be quicker.

Further, going on-line with God doesn’t require a modem or computer. Anyone can do it anywhere and anytime, without any costs and in any language. No one has to learn how to type on a keyboard or open any software. Nothing could be easier.

If spending too much time online makes people lonely, prayer has the opposite effect. Consider evangelist Billy Graham’s definition of loneliness. He says it is the way we feel when God is calling us to spend time with Him. When we do that, we are filled not emptied.

These days, I’m beginning to wish I could get paid to read and respond to e-mail but when I pray, there is no sense of lost or wasted time. God never sends Spam or junk mail, only peace and a sense of being with Him.

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