Chris Howlett

Heading Out

Well, I'm sitting in Bluegrass Airport, waiting. Not sure why I needed to be here two hours before my flight. I'm going to Detroit.

I am excited, though it is always difficult to leave the house and say good bye to Roz and the kids (though Roz brought me to the airport, so I said goodbye to her here).

The first night we're in South Korea we will be at a hotel, so I know I'll have Internet access there. After that I'm not sure because we'll be at a retreat center and a place they call "Vision Land," both owned by the church.

Our schedule is busy each day, but S. Korea is one of the most wired countries in the world, I should be able to get
Internet access every day.

So, check back in a couple of days and I will be in Seoul.

Jesus, Moses, and the Apple iPad

The iPad has made its long-awaited appearance at San Francisco's Yerba Buena Center and all the oohs and ahhs have subsided and tech pundits are chiming in on the cool things it does and some of the cool things it doesn't do.

The anticipation for this was pretty big, Doonesbury poked fun at it, saying tech geeks are calling it the "Jesus Tablet" because they think it will save them; news networks covered the event; tech blogs live blogged about it and have written hundreds of entries about different aspects of the device. Newspapers will be filled with stories about it tomorrow. There is a lot of buzz.

I am an Apple fan and I enjoy gadgets. I have a MacBook Pro, an iPhone 3G, an iMac, and a Kindle (not an Apple product, but a cool gadget). Ever since the first calculator I ever held, at my grandmother's house when I was in the first grade, I have been fascinated with machines that make life simpler. Of course, some of our machines actually make life more complicated and stressful, but that will have to wait for another day. So, I like gadgets and think they're pretty cool, but there is something about all the attention this one is receiving that gives me pause and encourages me to reflect on our relationship with our stuff.

All the attention the iPad has received has been of a different character that I believe is insightful into our relationship to our things (whether it's high tech or low tech stuff). Sometimes I we delve into a form of idolatry.

Three things in particular caught my eye. One was the Doonsebury Cartoon in my earlier blog entry that I reference above (Jesus Tablet). The second thing was a reporter on Fox Business today who, when talking about the new tablet device (at the time we didn't know it was going to be called the "iPad"), mentioned that no tablet had received this much attention since Moses came down from Mount Sinai carrying the Ten Commandments. Then, I saw the video of Apple's CEO Steve Jobs  standing on stage at the launch of the iPad with a picture of Moses about to smash the tablets containing the Ten Commandments when he descended Sinai and witnessed the idolatry of the people of God (some irony in that particular choice of visuals). Next to the pic was a quote from the Wall Street Journal: "Last time there was this much excitement about a tablet it had some commandments written on it." (I guess the people at Fox read the Wall Street Journal).

I really think the iPad looks like a great product, a super simple computer that almost anyone can use. And the price point came in much lower than expected (the low end model is $499 versus expectations of $700 -$1000), and I think the second generation will be even better, much like the iPhone. I'm not sure if I will get one because I have a MacBook Pro, an iPhone, and a Kindle. This new device can't really replace those, so it would be a fourth device that, although pretty neat, doesn't really fulfill any need I have). I'm definitely not an iPad detractor, I just think the buzz leading up to this launch has pushed our idolatry of stuff to new levels. People really do have a faith-like response to the latest and greatest device. They think happiness and life fulfillment is packaged in neat packages from Cupertino, or Redmond, or (insert wherever Dell Computers, Blackberrys, and Kindles are made).

Of course, happiness never does. Certainly technology has contributed to life satisfaction. Imagine, just imagine for a second, what was life like before the washing machine (not too different for most married men!). But seriously, life has improved. Improvement, however, has not come without a price. What do we do with all that leisure time? Is life more meaningful? Most of us do not toil on farms eeking out a subsistence living from the ground, but have we increased our sense of fulfillment? Probably not.

You see, the truth is that no matter how high tech or low tech your life is, meaning, purpose, contentment, and ultimately peace come from a totally different source: the Creator God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Seems simplistic, old-fashioned, and out of touch, but truth is truth.

Salvation By Computing Device?

 

Well, I am an Apple fan and I plan to check out the big announcements tomorrow about the new Tablet. I probably won't be buying one anytime soon, though (I think the price point is going to end up being a little high for me). But I found this comic strip and thought it was pretty funny. Unfortunately, the way a lot of people act about their technology devices, it does seem like they look to them for a bit more than they are able to deliver. I enjoy technology just as much as the next guy, probably more, but come on folks... it's a computer.

You can check out other Doonesbury comic strips here.

New Year Prayer

Talk of the New Year has already grown old and we are only sixteen days into the new year. A prayer that John Wesley adapted and used in Watch Night services (all night prayer meetings on Dec. 31/Jan. 1) is a helpful tool in reassessing our values at the beginning of a new year.

Join me in this prayer and together let us see what God can and will do in and through us in 2010.


A Covenant Prayer in the Wesleyan Tradition

I am no longer my own, but yours.
Put me to what you will, rank me with whom you will.
Put me to doing, put me to suffering.
Let me be employed by you or laid aside for you,
exalted for you or brought low by you.
Let me be full, let me be empty.
Let me have all things, let me have nothing.
I freely and heartily yield all things
to your pleasure and disposal.
And now, O glorious and blessed God,
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
you are mine and, and I am yours. So be it.
And the covenant which I have made on earth,
let it be ratified in heaven. Amen.