Refining my frustrations …
For a number of years now, I have been more than deeply dissatisfied with many of the patterns of tech use that have become normalised in our day. Initially, the source of this dissatisfaction was difficult for me to place. Everywhere I looked I seemed to observe an encroachment of technology into our private lives, the character of which was completely failing to agree with my intuition. But why?
Why was I so annoyed that fewer and fewer online spaces were inaccessible unless you first signed up? Why was it so painful to watch people default to an immediate and cursory use of Google for the “answering” of all questions and, worse still, to call this act “research”? Why was I so utterly repulsed by the concept of exchanging my biometric data in return for mundane conveniences? Why was I lamenting the conversion of all electronics—and all people in possession of these electronics—into motion detection cameras? Why was I so angered by mass phone use during church services?
I was (and I still am) frustrated at corporations and their reckless invading of everyone’s lives. I was (and I still am) frustrated by the lack of concern expressed by most of my peers on this topic. But the source of my frustration felt deeper than any of these particular issues.
Then, one day, I recalled the following scriptures:
Genesis 1:26
Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness… "
Genesis 1:28
And God blessed them [man]. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and SUBDUE it … "
Man has been made in the image of God. The Almighty Creator has placed something of Himself inside each of us and that deposit comes, necessarily, with a value to our lives so incomprehensible that I will immediately stop trying to explain it. That same deposit also comes with a command to SUBDUE the earth. To have dominion. To create. To reflect our creator. This is the correct order of things.
The history of technology is in one sense a story of humanity subduing the earth. But although we have learnt to fly, eradicate countless diseases (whilst making some of our own…) and drastically increase life expectancy, the story of technology is not free from corruption. Technology is also being used to control thought, to control speech, to abuse and manipulate the mind, to destroy the infrastructure required for meaningful private life and personal agency, and to convince people to welcome such change. These latter examples are not a demonstration of the subduing of the earth. This is the subduing of man. More accurately, this is a subduing of man by a small number of men.
Technology that subdues man is an affront to the image of God which we all bear. It permits complete strangers, predators even, to gain intimate access to precious hearts and minds, creating a vantage point from which the redirecting of these precious hearts and minds can be remotely executed. The allure of convenience-tech and the illusion of a scarcity of options is embedding this vantage point in a great number of people.
To those who make these abusive technologies, the average person is seen as anything but a precious image bearer of God. The average person is seen as no more than a data point - and hopefully a lucrative one. Again, this is an affront to the image of God which we bear.
To accept this kind of technology—and those behind it—into our homes and minds (and into our children’s minds) is to forget the value imparted to us from God himself. And to allow your “subduing muscles” (forgive me) to atrophy in the endless pursuit of convenience is to forget your call.
I believe that this is the very heart of my frustration.
Just as God called the first man to SUBDUE the earth, he calls all who follow after to do likewise.
Reject all which dulls your image bearing.
Selected scriptures
Now, after that brief sermon, let us search the holy scriptures for passages aligned to this theme.
I submit these scriptures with no further explanation.
Let the reader understand.
Genesis 1:26-28
26 Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” 27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. 28 And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”
Jeremiah 17:9
The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?
Romans 12:2
Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.
1 Corinthians 6:12
“All things are lawful for me,” but not all things are helpful. “All things are lawful for me,” but I will not be dominated by anything.
2 Corinthians 2:11
… so that we would not be outwitted by Satan; for we are not ignorant of his designs.
Galatians 5:22-24
22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. 24 And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.
James 1:27
Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.