Recently I had a small taste of becoming involuntarily unplugged for a time.  I didn’t take an extended trip to Antarctica or a trip to the wilds of Africa.  No, I was at home, at work, at play, just doing all the normal things of everyday life.  What happened was, the hard drive on the laptop decided it was time to lay down its burden and let itself be recycled.  Fortunately, it let me know in advance that it’s time was coming, so I was able to make proper arrangements in advance to get important files passed on to the next generation.  It was a small and insignificant inconvenience for a time, but it allowed me to step back, unplug from the grid, and realize there is still life beyond the bits, bytes, and Al Gore’s internet. 

But you don’t have to wait for a hardware failure to return to this realization.  It’s really very simple.  Try one or more the following:

  • Shut off the TV, your PC, your phone, your video game, your _____ (fill in the blank).
  • Go outside, close your eyes and listen.  What do you hear, birds singing, the wind blowing, kids playing?  If all you can hear is traffic sounds, horns blowing, machinery, etc. try a small trip somewhere else and try it again.
  • Take a long drink of cool refreshing water on a hot day, and feel revived.
  • Take a long walk someplace where you cannot see or hear anything made by the hands of man.
  • Camp out some night under the stars.  That’s right, no tent.  Just you and the canopy of the heavens.
  • Make up your own creative way to just unplug, get away, and experience being alive and enjoying God’s creation.

Mark Farner, from the 70’s rock band Grand Funk, must have experienced some of this based on lyrics from “I Can Feel Him in the Morning” from the Survival album:

I can feel him in in the morning

I can feel him in the evening too

I can hear him in the morning telling me what I’ve got to do

Got to make a new world

Ought to make the old one right

I can see him in the morning

I can see him in the stars at night

 

“The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands.  Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge.  There is no speech or language where there voice is not heard.  Their voice goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world.” Psalm 19:1-4.

 

See you at the ramp.