05/06/2026
So many quips and quotes...
So little time to preach
I wonder what Mary and Martha’s phones might look like:
- Martha = the open browser with 27 tabs
- Mary = the single window that matters
- Psalm 46 = God saying, “Close the tabs.”
Martha says to Jesus, “Tell her to help me.”
She wants Jesus to pull Mary away from his feet.
And isn’t that exactly what distraction does?
It doesn’t just make us busy—it pulls us away from the presence of Christ and makes that feel justified.
Phones are no longer tools—they are environments
They function as:
- identity shapers
- attention directors
- emotional regulators
- meaning-makers
What would it take to recover a more sane use of technology, a more reflective lifestyle? These practices might begin to take us there:
- Silence (Psalm 46)
- Single-focus attention (Mary)
- Embodied presence
- Unhurried relationships
- Deep reading / reflection
“We don’t need to abandon our phones.
But we may need to relearn how to put them in their proper place.”
Maybe we’d start with…
- no phone at meals
- no phone in the first 10 minutes of the day
- intentional “quiet spaces”—like no phone in a waiting room, instead learn to wait, use those moments to go through the most important people in your life, one by one, and ask how you might bring a little extra light, energy, joy to them in the coming day or days.
One author put it this way: “We’re not rejecting technology—we’re refusing to let it train our souls more than Christ does.”
Have you noticed that Museums have slowly removed benches in many galleries? The reason is that people don’t linger anymore. They move, snap, scroll, move on. Art is no longer something you behold. It’s something you capture and leave. If you take that thought and apply it to our day to day “We have become tourists in our own lives—moving quickly, documenting everything, but rarely staying long enough to actually experience it.”
Technology can really bless our lives, but if we aren’t careful it can just as easily rob us of the spiritual strength and resilience that makes us faithful followers of Jesus. As Mad-Eye Moody was fond of saying in the Harry Potter series, “Constant Vigilance!” That’s why this amazing new world at our finger tips requires from us.
Archived Posts
So many quips and quotes...
So little time to preach
I wonder what Mary and Martha’s phones might look like:
* Martha = the open browser with 27 tabs
* Mary = the single window that matters
* Psalm 46 = God saying, “Close the tabs.”
Quotable Outtakes That Didn’t Make the Sermon This Week
“When you try to control everything, you don’t just exhaust yourself—you quietly replace trust in God with trust in you.” & more
There is a challenge when it comes to preaching the Word of God.
Preachers are called to open up and interpret the word—inspired and written down thousands of years ago—and make it relevant to a very different world. On top of that there’s a degree of persuasion that goes along with the process.
What Jessica Really Meant to Say in Her Sermon…
When Jessica or Rick or a guest preacher takes the pulpit it’s hard for me to write a One More Thing Blog. I can’t share with you what didn’t make it into the sermon because I have no idea, not having written or delivered it.
Jesus Keeps On Ruining Funerals!
I didn’t have anything this last week that didn’t end up in the sermon. No catchy illustrations that didn’t make the cut. No theological insights that slowed down the main point. No one can ruin a funeral like Jesus. Told as I saw it and that was it. So I did some quick research and I thought I’d share just a reminder of what Easter is all about.
When I Don’t Get To Give My Benediction
Yesterday’s sermon talked about how we are in the thrall of self-centeredness—caught in a system that rewards those who climb to the top, even when you have to climb on the back of others. I talked about a famous sermon by Dr. Martin Luther King, ....
Some Good Quotes that I Didn’t Get To Last Sunday
I have been working out of Adam Hamilton’s excellent book, Why Did Jesus Have to Die? And when I find something that says what I want to say more succinctly and expressively than I can, I like to quote it...