Simple Lives?

I have a friend who doesn't own a cellphone. I've only met one other person who does not have one. No, my friend is not technologically or gadget illiterate. In fact, he often shows me more about the information highway on his Mac than I know. And while I'm no computer guru, I do alright in the tech world. I know, you're thinking he must be employed in a profession that doesn't need or promote the use of cell phones. Actually, he's an investment or wealth manager and I'm betting he's the only one in his profession that doesn't have one! It doesn't seem to have affected his business either. His clients are loyal and are quite comfortable referring his services to others. I've tried so many times to talk him into buying a cell phone. Not for chatting, or business, but in the case of an emergency while traveling. I've even suggested he just buy a pre-paid cell phone and put it in his glove box to use when the need arises. Nope, nothing doing, he won't budge.

Recently I made the decision to quit using my cell phone while driving without a hands-free headset or Bluetooth. I just got to thinking that boasting about multi-tasking while driving makes about as much sense as bragging about your ability to woof down 20 hot dogs in one of those ridiculous food eating contests. It's just not smart. Who among us hasn't come up on a car in the middle lane of the Interstate going below the speed limit, holding up traffic, with someone behind the wheel chatting on their cell phone and completely oblivious to traffic behind them? "I don't do that," I smugly think to myself with the arrogance of an uptight Pharisee. My smug bubble was punctured last night. A local television reporter was promoting his upcoming story about the dangers of texting while driving. And I was so comfortable when it was the sin of someone else. Ouch! Guilty!

What's so important that it can't wait until I arrive at my destination, or pull over to return a text message? Nothing! I'm not with NASA and on call for falling satellites. I'm not a heart surgeon, although I have slept in a Holdiay Inn Express before. There is nothing I receive from my text buddies that warrants an immediate response. Even the serious family and life issues I deal with as a pastor can wait until I'm not driving. So, as of today, no more texting while driving. It's flat out dangerous and it presumes an arrogance, or false confidence about my own driving skills, therefore, putting others at great risk!

So where's this leading? What has become of us to make us think we're so important we put others in danger? What's so important that it demands a "within the minute" response from us? Nothing! I'm all for technology but it has become so intrusive and even rude. Consider the person at the adjacent table in a restaurant who answers their cell with the obnoxious ring tone then proceeds to have a conversation while there his fellow dining companions put conversation on hold because of him. I don't know of one pastor or company meeting that hasn't been interrupted by a ringing cell phone at some point. And I've written before about the number of people talking on their cell phone's in public restrooms before so I won't go there. And I haven't even mentioned the amount of time we've added to the workday with email. Or the amount of work that is left for another day, or uncompleted because reading and responding to email ate up our time. And so much of our email is really unimportant.

Our tech savvy, need to be "in the know" world is crowding out any chance we have to introduce or maintain the discipline of simplicity. Years ago, Richard Swenson, M.D., wrote a best-seller entitled, "Margin" (it was updated and re-released in 2004 by NavPress) which challenged the "busy" American lifestyle. Swenson, a futurist was way ahead of his time in seeing the need for us to increase the "margin" in our lives. His point, margin is a good thing and most of us are so busy filling up the margins of our lives that we don't see it until we have completely filled the page with non-stop activity. Our obsession and compulsion with high-tech gadgety has only created an insatiable appetite for minds, mouths and fingers that never stop talking, typing and thinking. We can't turn it off! We won't turn it off! To do so would somehow suggest we are weak, out of touch and disconnected. God forbid that any of us would unplug!

We would do well to listen to the mystics and heed the calls of Richard Foster, Thomas Merton, Mother Teresa, Dallas Willard, Kierkegaard and others who stress the value of simplicity. Kierkegaard, the Danish theologian wrote of the significant connection in seeking the Kingdom of God between our doing and ceasing: Then in a certain sense it is nothing I shall do. Yes, certainly, in a certain sense it is nothing, becoming nothing before God, learn to keep silent; in this silence is the beginning, which is, first to seek God's Kingdom.

Not long ago I unintentionally left my cell phone at home for the entire day. I have to admit. At first I felt like you do when you forget your wallet, or purse. But throughout the day I began to have a great sense of peace almost as one who had been freed from chains. It was very liberating. I was able to focus on people and really give them my undivided attention. I enjoyed great moments of silence. Emptying my mind of busyness and non-stop buzzing, and filling it with meditations about God and absolute stillness. I thought I learned from that experience, but technology and the "go-go" lifestyle sucked me back in within a few weeks. Not anymore. I am going to fast from my cell phone and computer at least one day a week. Silence and simplicity, quite a paradox for 21st Century travelers. "Be still and know that I am God." - Psalm 46:10