Redeeming Technology Conference Session 3

We trace how “technological lust” deforms the self, hollows out intimacy, and spills into society, then move toward hope, grace, and a practical path of dominion over our screens. We end with simple steps: add boundaries to the boundless and expose the anonymous.

Thank you for listening! Please visit us at www.faith-pca.org.

Chapters

• 0:00 Chatbots And Flattery
• 2:47 Naming A Cultural Emergency
• 4:30 Destruction Of Self
• 10:18 Fantasy’s Empty Promises
• 14:18 Destruction Of Sex
• 21:03 Public Harms And Research
• 25:59 Me Too, Violence, And Complicity
• 31:00 Racism Turned Into Lust
• 34:21 Grace Stronger Than Shame
• 40:33 Choosing Dominion Over Screens
• 47:35 Retreat Or Redeem
• 55:28 Why Integration Requires Community
• 1:02:38 Parenting For A Tech World

Transcript

SPEAKER_01: 0:23

All right. Several people asked me uh the what I was playing around with there on my phone. That that is Chat GPT. Um so you you know, ChatGPT's app has the ability to type stuff in, or you can just talk and have a conversation. And you can just imagine how a lonely uh teenager um with no friends could just talk to that all day long. And uh um I was showing it to my wife. The other the other thing about it is that it it will always only it knows you and it will get to know you better, and it will always only tell you what you want to hear. Um in fact, we went, I was playing around with my wife. We my mom surprised us after Christmas. For Christmas, my mom surprised our family with a Disney cruise, which um Merry Christmas, right? Um no, it was it was fun, but anyway, um but I was playing around with my wife and I was like, watch this. I guarantee well, I'll do it right here. I said, I guarantee you. Hey, uh out of all the Disney cruise ships, what's the best?

SPEAKER_00: 1:38

Well, I've got to say, for you, it's the Disney fantasy. I remember you said it was your favorite because it was a special trip with your kids. So in your book, that's number one.

SPEAKER_01: 1:47

So before she she said that because we already played around with it, but I said, I guarantee you, because we went on the Disney fantasy. I said, I guarantee I'm gonna ask her which is the best Disney cruise line. She went on and on and on about the Disney fantasy, how that's the best one. That's the one we sailed on. And I said, and I said back to her, I was like, Are you just saying that because you know we just took a trip on Disney Fantasy? She was like, Oh no, I would never do that. And then I gave her the command. They have to, I said, I want you to be truthful and tell me, is that why you said it? She goes, Ah, you got me. Yeah, that's why I said it, because you just wanted Danny Disney fantasy, and I knew that you so they're gonna feed you what you want. You can imagine a friend who only tells you what you ever want. It's just it's remarkable. Okay. Um what's doing to our minds, what's doing to our community. Um, and I will, I will do um, I'll do I I'm a I'm a I'm gonna sterilize this uh for the audience. Um, but but we do need to we do need to discuss, you know, what the topic you had me come discuss last time with what because this is this is a cultural crisis, what is doing to human sexuality. I I believe, and I'm not alone, that the ubiquity of of technological lust um arguably represents the most destructive public health crisis of our time, right up there with the breakdown of community that we just discussed. What was once hidden in um CD theaters or adult-only shops, concealed on magazine racks behind the curtain of your video rental store, what was once a fringe part of society that bore with it an appropriate stigma and taboo is now uh, because of technology, a culturally mainstream experience. The revenue of the online pornography industry is now uh more than NFL, MBA, and Major League Baseball combined. And that that's saying something with our sports obsessed culture. So we can talk statistics all day, but we don't have to. Simply put, it's a problem, it's a huge problem, arguably the problem of our time. And even the word problem will not suffice. It is not a problem, it's an emergency. And what I'd like to do is explore this emergency in three areas, three areas of destruction because of the technological efficiency of lust. Destruction of self, destruction of sex, destruction of society. First, destruction of self. Proverbs nine. The woman of folly is loud. She sits at her door, at the door of her house, calling out to all who pass by, let all who are simple come in. Stolen water is sweet, food eaten in secret is delicious. So inviting us, this woman of folly inviting us into this hidden world where anything goes, this enticing world of hidden pleasure. But then the proverb says this what a powerful proverb. But little do they know that the dead are there, that her guests are in the depths of the grave. I can't think of a better picture of digital lust, an enticing hidden world of promised pleasure that ends in the user's metaphorical grave. The allure of this world has always been much more than physical gratification of lustful urges. That is not primarily why people are uh turning to this online world. Um, those who create this content are experts at preying upon the unmet longings of our hearts. It is a world where you no longer feel unwanted. You vicariously get to fantasize about being wanted, even worshiped. It is a world where you are not bored and discontent in your mundane and frustrated life. You are endlessly stimulated. It is a world where you no longer have to deal with the pressures of life because here there is no pressure, only pleasure. A world where you not are you are no longer ashamed because your shame is normalized within this world. Do you see? This is the power of the twisted online world of digital fantasy. Not just uh supposedly satisfying physical urges, but the deeper urges of the souls. Now, that fantasy was once limited. When I was growing up, it was one friend whose dad subscribed to a magazine that got passed around. That was about the extent of the fantasy offered to me in my youth. But now technology has literally, again, this is why Alull says the efficiency of technology is so dangerous in the hands of sinners. Now technology has is become technological lust has become so efficient that it's created a literal virtual portified reality for overindulgence. It is endless. Full escape and emergence into a world of lustful fantasy. And yet the cruelty of this virtual world is that though it promises to satisfy longings, it only deepens them. It does not cure your loneliness, it further isolates you. It does not cure your insecurities, it only deepens them. It does not heal your pain, it only inflicts fresh wounds. It doesn't fix your discontentment, it adds to the restlessness and anxiety of life. It doesn't relieve the pressures of life, it only intensifies them. It doesn't cure your shame, it only deepens it. And in this way, it acts the same as any powerful drug. Empty promises, quick dopamine experience, but in the end never fulfilling. Thus leading, um leading us back to the empty promises that never fulfill until we are trapped in this downward cycle of addiction that ends in the proverbial grave, as the proverb promises. But it's destruction, though it does destroy the user, the destruction goes beyond self into the ironic consequence of destroying sexuality itself. It is like a parasite feeding off the goodness of God's glorious gift that we discussed last time I was with you, and yet twisting it into something unrecognizable from its original design. This is the great irony of technological lust and its epidemic. The proliferation of virtual sexuality is leading to a deprivation of actual sexuality. There's a feminist named Naomi Wolf, not a Christian feminist, very progressive, who was ahead of her time in sounding the alarm on the rise of the online pornography industry back in the early 2000s. Her prediction was that easy and inexhaustible access to digital content rather than liberating sexuality would eventually subjugate it to an artificial screen. And she has been proven right. In a prophetic interview that is now over a decade old, she predicted that this online world would not awaken sexuality, but action dead, actually deaden it and render us an impotent society. It conditions us to view real flesh and blood as woefully deficient in comparison to virtual pleasures. After all, quote, she says, How can real people possibly compete with cyberversions of perfection utterly tailored to the consumer specification? Real people are now just bad porn. And when you consider the rise of sexual dysfunction, the rise of an oversexualized youth culture trying to compete with these images and insinuations, the sharp decline, not just in marriage, but in actual intimacy within marriage, it is obvious that she is being proven true. For firsthand testimony, this phenomenon, I'll point you to uh John Mayer as an example. So John Mayer is a handsome, famous singer, songwriter, worth millions, is the type of guy who uh, I guess in theory could have any woman he wants. And he has had many supermodel girls. He even dated um uh Taylor Swift uh for a year. Everyone knows you can date Taylor Swift, you can date anyone, right? We famously gave to his credit a very vulnerable interview, and he admitted what had become of his sexuality. I'm gonna edit this here a bit, uh, but still, it it's very vulnerable. Quote The internet has absolutely changed my generation's expectations. My most amazing experiences are alone in my fantasies. Once I have to deal with someone else's desires, I cut and run. When I'm with someone, I'm in a situation I can't control because another person's needs are now involved. Now, what he is describing is lust, not love. Like I told you last time I was with you, lust takes, love gives. Lust is consumed with my desires, love is consumed with the desires of another. But Mayer admits that his online life has trained him to view sexuality as only taking and never giving. The interviewer asks him to clarify, are you saying that online fantasy for you is as good as the real thing? He says, Absolutely. That is what has become of my generation. Rather than the demands of a relationship with someone, I would rather go home and have my own amazing experiences. I am more comfortable in my own imagination than I am in actual human discovery. There it is. Again, to his credit, he's honest. As you know, I speak a lot across the country on God's design, the beauty of God's design for human sexuality. And what he is describing is the antithesis of God's good and beautiful design. Technology has perverted God's design as a self-sacrificial act of mutual pleasure into a twisted, narcissistic, debased ritual with myself. Where marrying someone and beholding real flesh and blood is no longer appealing because it is demanding. Unlike the technological world that has no demands except that my needs be met. So technological sexuality is destroying self, destroying sex itself, and then lastly, society. There's so much I could say here. Uh, the market for human trafficking, which is flourishing, um, the sexualization of youth culture, the degradation of marriage as an institution, the proven connection between um pornography consumption and violence, which is unmistakable. I could go on and on with the social consequences. If you want to go do a deep dive into the public harms of this, I commend to you an organization that is aptly named Fight the New Drug, because it is the new drug. And it and this drug epidemic is killing society. But anyway, the the Fight the New Drug organization is a non-religious, I repeat, non-religious. So it's not evangelicals and you know their puritanical beliefs. It is a non-religious, non-political organization that is researching and raising awareness to the public harms of online lust. You can go to their website for your own research. There's a ton of research on there, but suffice to say, we are utterly naive to think that a culture filled with a people living pornographic lives online has no social implications. We are now 20 years into the rise of this epidemic, not to not to mention the emergence of um artificial intelligence uh fantasy. And if the statistics are true, then we are in the throes of an epidemic. Our lawmakers, our teachers, our doctors, our police officers, our parents, many pastors, you name the arena of influence and leadership. And if the statistics are true, then it's now safe to assume that many of these leaders and influencers are hiding this addiction and are being formed, I should say, deformed by this addiction. And we haven't even reached the point where the generation who grew up with this addiction is now running society. The average age that children are exposed to this is 12. Um, one in three of our youth are exposed uh pre-pubescently at uh the age of 10. And once they are teenagers, 98% of teens have been exposed. In 2009, the University of Montreal commissioned a study on the impact of this on um young Canadian men, but the study could not be completed. And do you know why? They couldn't find a control group. They literally could not find men in their 20s who had never consumed this online in order to establish a baseline comparison. Well, in a decade or so, that generation discipled in the ways of this darkness throughout their developmental years will be running our society. And so this is not harmless, is the point I'm making. Individuals alone with their screens being deformed by the debased ritual of pornographic lust has massive public implications. So many examples I could share, but what I thought I would do is just consider as just to show you how this does impact, and this is motivational for those of you who might be hiding this addiction. It's not just the implication, not just you. This is what it's doing to our world. And so I thought it'd be helpful for me to just consider the two most prominent issues of social justice over the past decade that have gotten a lot of attention and just show you what I mean by this. So, for example, uh we went through the Me Too movement and our culture's newfound awareness of um sexual assault and exploitation, abuse, cover-up, and all that, and amen and amen. But I'm amazed that so few are looking at technology's role within this epidemic. Did you notice that nearly every organization and institution, they all had their Me Too moment, a reckoning of abuse and cover-up. Uh, certainly that happened in churches across our country. And amen. So every institution, every organization had to go through their Me Too movement, except the very institution that is discipling us in the ways of sexual assault. One in three um images, content online depict violence and aggression. The fastest growing content online is non-consensual content. Um who's watching this stuff? Well, odds are your neighbor, your coworker, your classmate, your friends, maybe even you. As research has shown, just like every drug, the addict wants more and more, more twisted, more debased, more degrading, more forbidden. What once was exciting becomes boring. And so the addict craves more, and eventually they find themselves where they never thought they would ever be a debased world of harm, abuse, and exploitation. And then having their minds trained according to these debased liturgies, they go out in the real world and try to function this way. This online industry is the only industry, ironically, exempt from the Me Too movement, and it happens to be the very industry that is fueling it. You want to advocate for survivors of sexual predation and abuse, might want to start with the root cause behind this public harm. The other social concern that has been at the forefront of the public imagination is, of course, racial justice, and the similarities here are striking. So, you know, um we we went through that moment as a country and this, you know, evaluation of sorts, and and it led to these discussions about, you know, a newfound appreciation for racism and its implications, and how are we complicit? What are we missing? We want to be better, all of that. Again, every organization had to have that conversation, whatever they thought about it. They had to have that conversation. Well, again, the noticeable exception is the online pornography industry. Everyone else was out there wrestling with like critical theory and discerning structural and hidden and covert forms of racism that are taken for granted. And the technology that we consume is feeding overt, undeniable, wicked, racist, white supremacist fantasies. I'm I am not going, I'm just I'm not even gonna go there and talk about it, but it is it is common content turning racism into lust. Literally, it is portified white supremacy online. And the content is not on the fringes, it is some of the most researched and available online. And again, these racist liturgies disciple the user who then go out into the real world to enact what they have consumed. So you see, I just chose the two areas of social life that received the most public attention in the past decade. I could go on and on with other areas, but the point is that we are deceiving ourselves if we think technological world of lust only harms the user. It does harm the user, but then the harmed user harms society. So, what are the implications of technology upon our sexuality? It is leading to an utter destruction, an epidemic of destruction, destruction of self, sex, and even society. Now that's my uh um edited evaluation. Uh but just like my discussion on community, I cannot abruptly end such a weighty and alarming discussion, especially uh for those uh here with us for whom this is a struggle. Um this addiction runs on shame and I can only imagine. That those for whom this is a struggle or perhaps an all-out addiction might be feeling a lot of shame right now. And ironically, a discussion on the harms of digital lust might lead you right back into the online world of digital lust. I want to ask you not to do that. Don't heed that alluring lie. Let it instead be this conference that you thought you were going to come and hear talks about technology and all of this. Let it instead be that providential moment of clarity that you realize God had me here. I don't care about any of the philosophical, theological technology, social media. I don't care about any of that. He had me here for this to be the awakening. A moment of clarity. We can discuss some helpful protections and remedies, but let me offer you the first and foremost remedy, not shame you into repentance, but the amazing news of God's grace and kindness and mercy that will lead to your repentance. Shame will not lead you to stop. It will give you a season. You're going to get real inspired. I feel so ashamed. I'm such a bad person, and I'm going to be able to go maybe a week or two and get through it. It's not going to last. It will eventually lead you back to that world. But God's kindness, his mercy, his grace, his hope, his cleansing, this can and will lead you to finally repent. I was talking to someone uh recently who came to me uh desperate for help with his addiction in this area. It happened to be during the Christmas season, and it was ruining the Christmas season for him. And I remember him saying, Everyone's running around enjoying Christmas cheer. And all these families are enjoying the Christmas holidays and all this stuff. And here I am, and I just feel so icky and gross and shamed, full of self-hatred. He said, This won't even allow me to enjoy Christmas. And I said, Oh, brother, this is what Christmas is all about. Not the sappy sentimentality hallmark movies of Christmas. The actual gritty news of God incarnate is exactly what this addiction needs. She will give birth to a son, and you shall give him a name Jesus because he will save his people from their sins. And there is no qualification to those sins. Not just the clean, acceptable ones, the filthy ones, the dirty ones, the ones that you fear to name and maybe even plan to take to your grave. I wonder if you believe the Christmas we just celebrated is true. Not for others. I know you believe it's true for them. What if it's true for you? No matter what you've done, no matter where you've been, what if that's true for you? Or do you think that your story is the one story beyond the miracle of that manger? You are not. I don't care the depths of perversion you have descended into. I don't care how dark and twisted your online habits are, I don't care what you have done. I mean, I do care, but I don't care in this sense. None of it is a match for that savior born in Bethlehem. Your sins, yes, even the ones you fear to name, your sins are no match for Christmas. He is able to make the foulest sinner clean, spotless, righteous, pure, undefiled, as clean as the very righteousness of Jesus. This is the story of all who trust and follow the Savior. So, brothers and sisters, yes, because that's the fastest growing demographic online. Brothers and sisters, lift up your heads, you noble children of God, and honor your God's kindness with your repentance. Beloved of God, it's past time to repent. Amen. It's time, but you can't do it alone. You must come to your church. You are blessed by a church that will not shame you, but will help you. You must come to your pastors, to a brother or sister in Christ that you trust. You must turn to the body of Jesus Christ and ask them finally for help and let them help you. This exploitation on your screen is ruining you. It is ruining sex, it is ruining society. But more than that, it brought ruin to your crucified Savior. Honor him for what he has done for you by finally putting to death this sin that has put him to death. All right, how about this? Let me pray and then we will jump into our last talk. Jesus, how can we not pause to come before you, the Savior in Bethlehem? Call him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins. How can we not stop and just come to you with all the weightiness of this discussion and say thank you and bless you and praise you, that you are the friend of sinners, that you are the one who makes sinners clean, clothed in your pure, undefiled righteousness, no matter what we have done, no matter the depths that we have descended into. As I read in my psalm this morning, that you redeem our life from the pit. This world, this online world is a pit of destruction. You redeem our lives from the pit and you crown us with love and compassion. I pray particularly for my brothers and sisters here who are struggling in this area, that they would they would just be given that vision of a Savior who descends down into that dark pit and pulls them out and crowns them with love and compassion and mercy, and that finally your kindness would lead to repentance in their life. I pray that as a result of this conference, not only would there be newfound um applications on how this church family does technology and how it does friendship and how it recovers the sacredness of learning as we discuss and all those things, but this becomes just this oasis of redemption in this area that is ruining so many lives. Lord, we trust you with those applications. Holy Spirit, you do the work in all of our lives. You have us here for a reason. May your reasons be accomplished through Jesus we pray. Amen. All right. Um, if you're okay with me pressing through, this is the shortest of the talks. Uh, because I think, well, oh, I didn't mention this. So the QR, oh, it's not there. Um can the QR code go there? Or we'll just do afterwards, bully? Where'd you go? I don't know. Okay, afterwards, the QR code will be there. We're not gonna have time here for questions, but at providentially, this QA between uh services tomorrow, we can flesh out all your questions, submit them through the QR code that will be there. Um and and and and I'm going to what I'm gonna do here is I'm gonna try to give us now that I've sufficiently freaked everyone out, I am going to try to put together a redemptive approach forward for you and your family, giving some kind of high-level applications, and then we can flesh out more practical stuff in the QA between services tomorrow. By the way, my sermon is not going to be like this. Uh it will be 25 minutes, it will be understandable, all that good stuff. Okay. So don't worry. Like, we're gonna get this tomorrow morning. No, you're not. I will preach tomorrow and then we'll do QA and uh hopefully that will flesh out some of this. But all right, last talk here. So we talked about the design of technology, the dangers of technology. Here we come to the what I'm calling dominion. And I label it dominion because that is the Christian call within our technological age. The original call to have dominion over this world, including over the inventions of this world, um, that must be recaptured such that we get control of our technology. We exercise dominion over our technology rather than it exercising dominion over us. Technology is not in charge of me. I am in charge of technology. The number one question I I asked my uh my 17-year-old, he is at the age where I'm finally talk parenting tomorrow during QA. Um, I mean, specifically my parenting if you're interested. But he's he's at the age, he's it's not like a free-for-all with a phone, but he is as much freedom as we're comfortable with with a phone. And but the number one question we ask all the time with him is are you in charge of your phone, or is your charge is your phone in charge of you? And we're just constantly monitoring that dynamic. But dominion is the idea here. There's this pivotal moment in Israel's story where they have entered into the land of promise, and Joshua places a choice before the people of Israel. Quite literally, it's a come to Jesus moment. He says this in Joshua 24. Now therefore, fear the Lord and serve him in sincerity and in faithfulness. Put away the gods that your father served beyond the river and in Egypt and serve the Lord. And if it is evil in your eyes to serve the Lord, choose this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your father served in the region beyond the river or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell. As for me and my house, we're going to serve the Lord. You need to choose. Parents, you need to choose. You individually, you need to choose. Here we are in this land, surrounded by the idols of our nation, the technological, all-consuming idols of our nation. You need to choose. Come to this point as saying this with resolve. As for me and my house, we choose to serve the Lord. The point I'm trying to make is the definitive choice must be made for how you are going to choose to engage this world around us. Joshua says, as for me and my house, we serve the Lord. You need to decide, as for you and your house, whether you are consecrated to the Lord or to the cultural idol of technology. And candidly, I think that most foundational question is one every Christian needs to decide in this current mulch cultural moment. I have discussed at length how technology has risen to become this preeminent idol within our society, particularly because it is assumed and unnoticed idol of our society. Everyone's addicted without recognizing the extent of their addiction. For this reason, my first and foremost, foundational practical admonition I have for you is Joshua's charge. You just need to choose today. Choose today what you're going to do with this conference. Choose this day. Are you going to serve? Is your family going to serve the idols of this technological society? Or will it be the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob? Who's in charge of your life? Who's in charge of your home? King Jesus or Screens? If it is the Lord, and I highly suggest that be your answer, if it is the Lord, then it seems to me you have now eliminated one of three options that I discussed last night. If it is true that you and your family are consecrated and belong to the Lord, then simply receiving this technological age with an uncritical acquiescence to the ways of this world, this is off the table for you. You're going to be weird. Period. There must be a noticeable difference between the way you do technology and the way the rest of society does technology. I know that's obvious, but I just felt like I needed to state it. You're going to have to be weird in this world, okay? In my experience, a lot of Christians have unwittingly just chosen to go with the flow of technology. My point is to not make a conscious decision regarding your relationship to technology is to make a decision. It's a decision to follow the patterns of this world. It is just is what it is. This is what everyone does these days. Yeah, I'm probably addicted, but everyone's addicted. Um, addiction's just kind of the new norm. This is what every kid does. I don't want my kid to be the weird kid. So many reasons to just uncritically go with the flow. And that's why many Christians naturally drift in that direction. Perhaps they take some measures to prevent the obvious dangers, like that last lecture that I exposed. Perhaps there's some measures of, like, hey, we're going to make sure that we try to keep that content away from them, or we're going to be careful with the social media stuff. But outside of those obvious measures, their lives and their homes function just like every other American home functions. That's the default for most Christians. And my point is that this is not an option for the followers of Jesus. Choose this day whom you will serve. If it is the Lord Almighty, then on a most fundamental level, you and your family are going to be noticeably different from the vast majority of Americans. So doing nothing is off the table. Some change is required, and for many, it's probably going to be significant change. But then there is a more difficult choice that you're going to have to make. And I truly think you must thoughtfully make this choice as well, because there are advantages and disadvantages to both, benefits and challenges to each. So receiving this technological society is off the table. Now we need to decide between retreat or redeem. Maybe a better way to say that is a repudiation approach or an integration approach. Are you simply going to just repudiate it all? Repudiate technology in the name of protection, or are you going to do the admittedly messy and hard work of integrating technology in the name of a more redemptive approach? Now, I'm obvious, I'm going to your the title of this weekend is Redeeming Technology. So I'm obviously going to argue for that. But I want you to know that the former is absolutely an appropriate Christian response. I don't want to cast dispersions on those and just say, oh, you're just a bunch of Christian fundamentalists and whatever. It's okay. If you choose to create a life removed from technological madness, if you choose to build a fortified life within your home that is walled off from technology's rapid advancement, I will not fault you one bit for that choice. It is a valid and at times valiant choice for Christians to make. And there were advantages and disadvantages to both. The same is true for us in this moment, but I would argue that this moment is so perilous that a retreat from technology is an even more valid uh option uh than when all we had to worry about was a television in the home. So if that's you, I want to affirm that decision for you and your family. It's a biblically valid one. Absolutely, there are times in scripture. So I am I am very much for uh cultural red. I mean, this literally what I do with my life is my vocation, cultural redemption and all that stuff. I'm very much for that. But I also don't want to kind of hold that out. That's the only biblical approach. There are absolutely times in scripture and in church history where a culture was so wildly out of control that the only appropriate means of cultural engagement is one of protest. We're out of here. We are strangers and exiles in this crazy world, and we are very comfortable living this exilic life. That being said, let me share why um why I advocate for integration over fortification. While admittedly, as a parent, my anxiety probably tends to more towards protecting myself and my children from the perils of technology. And then today I'm unwilling to give up the dream of redeeming technology and an integrated approach by training myself and training my children to use technology well. And I land there for both biblical and practical reasons. Biblically, it seems to me that this is the normative form of cultural engagement within the scriptures. Yes, like I just said, there are times when God says, retreat. Judgment is coming on Sodom and Gomorrah. Get out, retreat, and don't even look back. That's certainly a biblical option for Christians. But what is more normative in Scripture is the salt of the earth, light of the world paradigm of cultural engagement established by Jesus. In and among the world, while noticeably different from the world, thus bearing witness to the way the world ought to be, a redemptive presence in this world as salt slowing the world's decay and light exposing the world's darkness. That's the normative expectation of God's people in the world, even in outright exile. Even still, when God's people were in exile, the prophet Jeremiah famously says to God's people, thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, to all the exiles whom I have sent into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon, build houses and live in them, plant gardens, eat their produce, take wives and have sons and daughters, take wives for your sons, give your daughters in marriage, that they may bear sons and daughters, multiply there, do not decrease. Seek the welfare of the city where I've sent you into exile and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its in its welfare you will find your welfare. This is the biblical approach that I am taking with technology, though admittedly not perfect, but we're trying. But it's not just biblical reasons. This is that this is my choice. It's just practical reasons as well. Here's the reality. And for those parents who are maybe bent towards a more exilic protest of culture, uh fortified, protect you and your family approach to culture, um, here's the reality that you really do need to appreciate it. That is the philosophy on cultural engagement that you take. A more fortified retreat from technological progress is only sustainable if you and your family are able to inhabit a community and a tradition that serves as a rival society where the life you are trying to live becomes possible, plausible, and sustainable. Something, here's what I mean something like the Anabaptist tradition that is still practiced within the Amish and Mennonite communities. The reason they are able to sustain for generations that uh cultural engagement, philosophy, Of protest and retreat. The reason why they're able to establish that over generation is they have literally built an entire community, an entire communal and institutional structure of support around that decision, an entire culture that is sustainable for all of life, indeed, generational life. This is why those times of retreat that we see in scripture is true retreat. Again, get out of Sodom and Gomorrah. Or Jesus says at times, depart from the city, dust off your feet, hand them over. This is why the monastic tradition within Christian history was a complete removal from society in order to form a rival society and moral order. Here's the point. And this is where many Christians that that tend towards a more overly protective approach with their families and their life. Here's what they always run up against. The idea that you can retreat from culture while remaining immersed within a culture is simply unsustainable. If you're out, then you need to get out. Again, this is what the Anabaptist tradition recognizes. So they create their own world of protest that is sustainable across generations. The problem that many Christians and many Christian parents who nobly seek to protect their children from the perils of this world, the problem they will face is that they will often feel alone in that goal. Maybe they can kind of form some cohort of like-minded Christians, perhaps like a homeschooling co-op or group or something like that. Maybe they find commonality with other families in their church that try to do this life together. But the reality for most is that the greater culture is still more influential than their little subculture. For example, their kids actually do grow up and they do move outside that fortified home of their protection and they experience a whiplash introduction into the greater society. And so without this communal and institutional tradition that creates a path of life for the entirety of life of protest, without that being completely removed from society, most children experience 18 years of Christian inculcation and then suddenly find themselves immersed in a world that their childhood avoided. This is proven time and time again to be counterproductive. Removed from the protection they received in their developmental years, typically they will be colonized by the greater culture because they are not prepared and trained to resist that colonization. This is actually something that the Muslim tradition is experiencing as they continue to immigrate into the West. Last time I was in the UK, my doctoral studies are over in the UK. And the last time I was there, I was talking to a scholar about this, and he said that it is true. So he's he's laughing about all the um sensational fear-based stories about like the Muslim immigration into the United Kingdom and all that stuff. And he's like, listen, what's true about that those stories is that yes, there is there are massive numbers of Muslim immigration into our culture. Um but um he says it's all sensationalized because here is what the news won't tell you and what research is showing. The first generation stays true, stays true to their Muslim tradition and heritage. Um the second generation um actually um is even a little bit more radical with the with their Islamic tradition because they they're like they're raised by their parents and they feel this kind of noble, noble thing to like defend their parents' tradition into this new world. He said, You get to the third generation and it's over. The grandkids of these immigrants are growing up, and the tension between their family's culture and the greater Western culture always tend to drift to the latter because the latter dominates media, entertainment, academics, politics, and all the other forms of institutional influence. And so, what Muslim families are alarmed to discover is that just a few generations into Europe and their families resemble Western ways more than their family of origins. So here's the point I'm making, practically speaking. I'm just taking my time here because if you choose this more fortified approach, I want you to know what you're up against. If you choose repudiation and protection for your life and the life of your family, then it is dependent upon your children themselves carrying on that same approach into their adulthood. It's tough to pull that off outside of a community and tradition that supports that commitment throughout the entirety of their life. So it's tough. And Kennedy, from a purely practical standpoint, I would be the last person who could do the Anabaptist thing. I I'm not with it convictionally, but practically, I may be the worst candidate to ever buy a piece of land and raise children away from the world and you know create a path for my kids and grandkids do likewise. Not happening. I'm stuck with a more integrated approach because I can't swing a hammer. So we're just gonna have to go with how to full pull it off here. So here's the reality for me and my family. I live in a world dominated by technology. I want to do it well. My kids are growing up immersed in a world dominated by technology. I want to train them to do that well. Not just to preserve their own lives from the dangers of technology, but even more significantly to train them to be agents of redemption in this world. Salt in a technologically decaying world, light in a technologically dark world. This suffering technological society needs four more men. I have four sons, four more men who are doing technology right. For that to happen, I've got a lot of work ahead of me. Because now it's us together in this fight. They're gonna have to learn. I want them to learn with me. They're gonna have to be exposed. I want that first exposure to be with me. They're going to have a phone, I want them to have their first phone with me. They're going to use social media, I want them to use it first with me. Your kids need your help, and it is a 24-7 all-in, full-on commitment to help them. Receiving culture is easy. Just let them do their thing. Retreating from culture is harder, but still relatively simple. Just set up walls of fortification. Redeeming culture is much, much harder. It is an integrated give and take, thoughtful exposure combined with thoughtful protection, always vigilant, yet cultivating independence, mistakes made, learning from those mistakes, praying they get caught in their misuse, and then walking them through with grace and truth, their mistakes. This parenting challenge is not for the faint of heart, but it must be done. Technology is not going to leave your children alone. Therefore, neither can you. This is it, parents. This is the biggest discipleship challenge before you. But you are up for the challenge. Please hear me. By God's grace, the power of the Holy Spirit, trusting the promises of God for your children through the waters of baptism, you can do this. But how? Sounds great in theory, but on a most practical level, how do we redeem technology while being immersed in technology? Again, we can flesh out those questions more practically during our QA. But I did want to conclude. I think it's most helpful to be as simple and practical in my applications as possible. How do you in your life and how do you do this for your children? How do you inhabit a technological world without adopting the ways of our technological world? I'm going to boil down, this is how simple I want to be. I'm going to boil down my practical applications to just two. These two applications are focused on combating what I argue are the two most unprecedented aspects of modern technology. At the end of the day, what is unique about the technology that we now consume, or probably better say the technology that now consumes us, at the end of the day, boiling down all of the content that you've heard, what is unique is that it now offers us a boundless world and an anonymous world. Those two aspects of technology continually came up as I went through all of the dangers. But I'll state explicitly, our technology offers us a space that is both boundless and anonymous. And so I firmly believe our practical counsel needs to be directed at these two areas. Let me show you what I mean. First, consider the boundless nature of technology. As I explore the harms of technology on mentality, on community, upon sexuality, a repeated theme that kept coming up was the limitless nature of technology. Limitless information, limitless friendships, limitless uh lust and deviance. Technology has removed historical boundaries, which is a first for humanity, and we are suffering for it. And then the other repeated theme that you may have noticed is that technology does not just offer a world that is boundless, but also anonymous. Meaning the limitless world of technology is available to us for us to indulge in secrecy. Now, I know you tech folks, you're right. You're right. It's not true secrecy, it's allure secrecy. They're always watching, the algorithms are watching, you just do them. I know that, but it gives us this feeling of anon of anonymity. This too is dangerous. Going back to Genesis, what was the first instinct after the fall? And the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden, hiding, hiding from each other, hiding from God. Hiding is the default of our fallen condition. And it's in this hiddenness where true sinfulness is able to flourish unimpeded. Well, historically, that secrecy was somewhat limited. But technology has created a virtual world of secrecy. It is the ultimate fig leaf, so to speak. No exposure, no embarrassment, the old saying, have you no shame? Well, now the answer is no. We have a place to hide with no shame. The vitriol of what people will say anonymously, when there is no way they would ever say that to a real person, the perversion of what people will view, when there is no way they would ever view that as someone was viewing them, the stalking and envy of others for hours on end when there's no way you would do that in real life. Anyway, I'm restating some of the content I've already said. The point I'm making is boiling it all down to what I would say are the unique dangers of our technological age in the simplest form. For the first time in human history, we have created a world that is both boundless and anonymous. Therefore, in light of this, if you were to ask me how Christians can practically engage technology in a healthy, God-honoring, redemptive way, I think we need to focus our attention on those two unique features of modern technology. Every Christian, everyone who calls Jesus Lord and wants to honor him in all they do, including what they do with their technology, every Christian must take steps to place boundaries on the boundless nature of technology and bring exposure to the anonymous nature of technology. I'm trying to be as simple and practical as I can be for you. And I really do think it's that simple. If you just do those two practical steps in your life and in the life of your family, it will radically change the nature of your usage. It will ensure that you are in control of technology, not the other way around. It will give you back dominion over technology and consequently redeem the goodness of technology in our lives. What do I mean by boundaries to combat technology's boundless appeal? You, with the help of trusted community, get very intentional about your screen time usage. Your screen is a door into a limitless world. It is not going to limit itself for you. In fact, by its dopamine design, it is seeking at all times to ensnare you. It wants you to get addicted to its endless offerings. So unlike the real world, which is naturally limited, you're going to have to intentionally limit the world of technology. And I emphasize intentionally, take the time, again, with the help of others who know and love you the most, take the time to create an intentional, appropriate plan of technological usage. Do this, talk about a great small group discussion for the different life stages and affinity groups getting together and talking about what does this look like for us. We can get into what that looks like during the QA if you'd like, but boundaries must be there, or you will every time drift into the boundless. So boundaries, boundaries, boundaries. Establish them in your life so that you are in charge of your screen and not the other way around, which is how God intended it to be. Secondly, you must take steps to bring exposure to the anonymous nature of technology. We were not lived to, we were not meant to live in darkness but in the light. I don't trust myself to handle anonymity, nor should you. So at minimum, my spouse knows the password to my phone, to every account. There is nothing hidden from her. I don't have a part of my life that is closed off and only accessible to me. But I take it further. I expose all my activity to trusted friendships. There is no screen that I have access to that does not have screen monitoring software installed on it. Um, there are plenty of options out there. I use coveted eyes, which has worked well for me. If you're not familiar with it, it's just a monitoring software where you give it access to your screen. And it's gotten pretty good. You do need to do your research because there are ways around it. You need to make sure that you have protections built in on how to do that. Um and and that's on all the screens that I have access to. It will certainly red flag anything obscene and send an email to my accountability partners with a red flag that um that I've viewed something inappropriate. And I certainly want that accountability in my life, though I've been living in um sobriety from that for for decades now, but I still want that there. But more than that, my accountability friends can look through the entire report. I have the settings of such that they can look through the entire report and see how I'm spending my time. Am I lost in meaningless content? Am I addicted to the trivial and so forth? Uh uh couple weeks ago, I got an email from one of those accountability partners. Um, and he said, dude, why are you watching YouTube at night? Um, what's with that? And this is like, I mean, it wasn't inappropriate. It's like, this is kind of like stupid stuff. I was like, I and then I found out well, my kids had my laptop and was watching YouTube, and they should have led to a great conversation with my kids um when they were supposed to be studying. Um but I just love, I love eliminating the anonymous nature of my screen usage. It's incredibly vulnerable, but it is good for me. So it doesn't have to be covenant eyes. There's so many options out there. Do your research, find something that works for you. By the way, I say this every conference that I do, college students or maybe even uh teenagers, I have a small business idea for you where you will make a fortune. Are you ready? You need to offer your services to every family in this church, pass out cards at every church in town throughout your neighborhood. I will come into your home. I will set up everything on every device for every kid. You tell me your plan of usage, I will come in, I will set it all up, I will walk you through how to use it. If there's troubleshooting that needs, call me. I will I will come in and I'll explain. If you have any questions, parents will pay you a fortune to do this work for them because it's utterly overwhelming to do it. Um, I I kid you not, one kid did this, and every family in church is paying him to come in and just do all of these protections in their homes and on their own devices. Great business idea. But if you don't want to do that, there's plenty, use technology against itself. I mean, I just I just tease Chat GPT, and we've been making fun of my friend on my phone, but you can go say, hey, listen, I want to do this, this, and this, and this with my kids' screens, put together a plan. What's the best software? What do I do? And and it will walk you through. Use technology against itself to protect, use technology to protect you against technology. Anyway, do your research, find something that works. You were not made to live in anonymity. You will not flourish as a human being, nor be faithful as a follower of Jesus. You need exposure. So rather than a long list of Christian rules to follow, I'm trying to be as simple and practical as I possibly can, boiling it down to just two practical principles. I'm telling you, if you will just intentionally combat the boundless and anonymous nature of modern technology, you will naturally use technology well and reclaim dominion over technology in your life. And if you're a parent here, you're gonna have to do that work for your children. Again, we could discuss more in QA, but here on the outset, I want my parenting advice to just be as practical and simple as possible. And so let's not overthink and complicate this as parents. You are going to have to place boundaries on their usage and bring exposure to their usage. Boundaries. Intentionally and thoughtfully decide what is the appropriate amount of usage for our children. Remember, the danger of technology is not just its obvious dangers, such as pornography. The hidden danger is technology's addiction, wherein technology takes control of the user rather than the other way around. The content could be harmless, but the ritual is not. According to Alull, it's the quantity, not just the quality of content that we need to think about as parents, lest our children begin to take on the technique of technology, which will make them less human and more like their devices. So you're gonna have to put together an intentional, set in stone, no compromise plan of appropriate screen usage. Second, exposure. Never ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever is that enough ever should they have access to any unmodelable. Monitored screen. If if if you're overwhelmed by the software and how it works, there's one screen and and it's totally inaccessible unless it's in a public area of your home or something like that. So you're physically monitoring it, but please listen to me. Their phone is not like their journal. Their iPad is not like their journal. Do they need a private space for them to process things alone? Sure. I think that can be healthy, but that's not their phone. That's not their computer. That is not their iPad, and so on. Put it this way: if their journal could lead them into depths of depravity, if strangers could enter into their journal and dialogue with harmful, even predatorial words, then you would never allow them to have a secretive journal. So don't treat their device that way. You don't just have the right to monitor their activity, you have an obligation. My 17-year-old son, who's soon to be 18-year-old son, I still have access to his activity. There are some spaces that he does have appropriate privacy that I still have the ability to go invade, but I'm telling you, and he thinks I'm weird and he thinks we're weird. I don't care. He hates me now, he'll love me in 20 years. I'm okay with that. No anonymity, no unmonitored access. So we can get more down in the weeds of parenting uh tomorrow, and I can even get practical with the devices we use, um, how we do the boundaries, what our plan of usage is. We can get all that uh tomorrow during the QA. But I'm trying my best not to overwhelm you here. If you personally or you as parents put together a thoughtful plan to place boundaries on the boundless nature technology, bring exposure to the anonymous nature technology, you will create a healthy relationship with technology. You are training them as the next generation to redeem technology by using it appropriately for having dominion over screens rather than screens having dominion over you and your children. All right, we got 15 minutes. Let me pray. I'm happy to take 15 minutes of questions, or we can just get out of here because y'all are exhausted. Bully, I'll let you make that call after I pray. Lord, uh, so much we've packed into um last night and this morning. Um but grateful for the fellowship, which has been noticeably rich and warm. And um thank you for this community, this countercultural community of friendship and love and accountability and confession, repentance. And Lord, I hope these friends don't take what this church um is for granted. Uh, this doesn't happen in our world these days, and I pray that they would um more than the content and more than uh my words, I hope that they uh are their hearts leave full from the fellowship and uh living uh living the way you made us to live. But I do pray that you would take my admittedly infallible, uh my admittedly fallible words and accomplish infallible work in the lives of these friends. Wherever the applications need to go, I pray they would go. Pray you would bless us in worship uh tomorrow morning and bless us as we dialogue uh with questions as well. And Lord, we just we just trust you. We trust that you have these friends here for a reason and you accomplish those purposes in their lives. We give you the glory, Jesus, and thank you. Thank you that uh when our world uh seems to be going mad, we remember um that you reign and rule over creation. And uh you're at work, and we know where this ends, and it ends in all things new. Hasten the day, Lord Jesus, until then may we be faithful. We pray in your name and for your glory. Amen.