Leave Your Phone In The Car!

You’ve probably seen the situation play out over and over again. You’re in the middle of a conversation, a meal, a movie, and a ding or vibration brings whatever you’re involved in to a screeching halt. You rush to check whether a notification has graced your phone. And, oh, the sweet satisfaction when you see a miniature number in the upper right corner of the app (whichever app it might be). Meanwhile, whatever else was going on in your life at that exact time was on the receiving end of the pause button. If it wasn’t you, it was someone that was with you.

I keep hearing the same description of our generation—that we are the most connected, disconnected group of people in history. I wasn’t shocked when I heard it the first time, and most people aren’t when they hear it. Seriously, if there are strong apologists for the side that believes that we are the most technologically-connected and emotionally-connected people in history, I don’t know what to say. I just feel sorry for them because they confuse artificial connections through texting, social media, etc. for live, person-to-person relationships.

It’s the personal connections that shape and completely transform our lives. No amount of Facebook Likes, Instagram comments, Snapchats, texts, or tweets will ever replace or compete with deep, genuine, face-to-face relationships. And, yet, we keep “phone relationships” in the race. Why is that? We may have our spouse or friend or parent sitting and talking with us, and then that blasted phone lights up. Why is there more validation, more satisfaction, and more of a rush from the impersonal notification rather than the live interactions with your friend?

I have to say that I am extremely thankful that my relationship with Christ is extremely personal. It’s not a dispassionate, unreliable text conversation like the one below:

The problem I see every day inside the church is that we allow ourselves to get distracted from actual relationships. If the Church is truly about having a family that serves the Lord and reaches people for Christ, then why do we think it’s okay to substitute the personal for the impersonal?

Each and every person has value. God has infinitely more value than any person. When we enter the sanctuary or the Church doors, our devices should honestly be in “airplane” mode. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been singing a song in worship while my pocket is buzzing. And, while my attention should be focused on lifting up my Lord and Savior, my thoughts are scrambling to figure out if that was the vibration for an email or a text or a tweet. That’s sad.

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[quote bar=”true” align=”center”]No healthy relationship can be sustained by miscellaneous points of contact through social media or texting alone.[/quote]

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Even more, if we can overcome the awkwardness of meeting new people in church (largely created by our social regression due to technology), we may let the relationship decompose. No healthy relationship can be sustained by miscellaneous points of contact through social media or texting alone. We all crave connectedness, so it’s vitally important that we engage regularly with others—face-to-face.

There was a time when I would find my parents after church ended and ask my father why he didn’t answer my call. His response was simple: I left my phone in the car. Now, whether leaving his phone in the car was intentional or by accident I don’t know. However, I do think there’s something to it.

If I’m going to church and actually giving my all to (1) God and (2) others, then I need to be completely distraction-free. There’s a sense of liberation (and sometimes panic) when I leave my phone at home or in the car. It forces me to reach out to those around me, and that’s a good thing.

Not having your phone with you is like taking the training wheels off your bike. When there’s a lull in the room or a pause in the conversation, you have no escape. You’re forced to stay engaged or meet someone new.

Next week when I park the car outside the church, I think I’ll leave my phone.

It’s time to shake things up.

Z. Montgomery