Growing up in the Modern World

[wwjd_kilden]

Well, it's up to the generation that grew up like that to teach the next generation to manage (at least some time) without technology... granted we do so ourselves :p

I am happy to have technology.... imagine me trying to apply for jobs on the other side of the country... just fining out about the jobs in the first place would take forever if I didn't have internet :p

 

[JohnDB]

Well, it's up to the generation that grew up like that to teach the next generation to manage (at least some time) without technology... granted we do so ourselves :tongue

I am happy to have technology.... imagine me trying to apply for jobs on the other side of the country... just fining out about the jobs in the first place would take forever if I didn't have internet :tongue

This is something that has been rolling around in my head for a while now...ever since I began my travels and non-profit organization.

As travel I see, meet, and get to know so many people from around the world. (Soon to take another trip)

We in America are rich way beyond the norm in so many ways. Our access to medical care, our access to electronic technology...even electricity itself as well as water and the relative price of groceries compared to others around the world.

We have and have access to so much.

But Jesus' words have really haunted me.

"A Man's life does not consist of his possessions".

So...where going to the doc because of a sinus infection here is a small thing to us...some drugs and maybe a shot. We can go almost 24 hrs a day to an affordable clinic if we don't go to the ER.
No big deal.
That ain't the same everywhere else. Even getting in a car and going anywhere is a big deal in a lot of places.
But Christ thinks and worries about them just as much or more than us who have so much.
So what does a person's life consist of?
(I have no real solid easy sound bite answers)

I know that we, in advanced nations, must use the things that are available to us that we can afford to make a life here. Not much choice in it. Gotta have shelter...our probably doesn't leak when it rains. Gotta have heat or AC for severe temperatures. Gotta have a car to get to work. Gotta have a cell phone to keep connected to friends.
But I think often of a lady living across the street from the Baptist Church sedgee. (Dorm room apartments)
She had a 20amp service for her house... surrounded by chickens. A half size garden hose for water. Not really proper walls of brick or boards but a collection of bricks, rotten boards, and tin...and a TV and a satellite dish. A fence to keep the chickens from getting away. Her daughter (no daddy) was a PHD in genetic engineering for crops and just starting her career.
And both of them Christians.
Living in that hovel...happy as clams. So glad to meet the Americans who came to work on things. (The daughter spoke great English...mom didn't)

They brought us lunch one day to show us their gratitude that they made from scratch...it was good too.
For them a huge expense. For us...not even anything special except that they made it. (They had some friends help of course from a local church)

I don't think that they ever lost what us kids had as our bicycle gang rode through the neighborhood and we left the gang behind to become adults.

Low tech food. Low tech life. But together they are a powerful force. Reaching for the"American dream".
I wish I could explain how that it's not all its cracked up to be. They have it good.
They really don't need what little I have as I spend and give too much to have much. (I'm low middle class). But by comparison I'm really rich in money . I have a 20yo truck and a 20yo car...a junky apartment in a junky part of town so I can give what I wish and travel for missions. I have used clothing and junky furniture. And I still feel overly rich.

What does a person's life consist of?

I want more of whatever it is... because where I'm happy enough...
I'm not sure I'm where I should be. I want more...not more stuff...but just more freedom, more free time, more....

 

[for_his_glory]

Technology in the 50's, 60's and early 70's was the black and white TV we had as Dad would never buy a color TV. As kids growing up in that era we had imaginations as we played outside as we never had much for toys in my family. Hide & Seek, red rover, softball in the back yard with a home made bat, playing in the woods and when I got older American Bandstand on the front porch as Mom taught us how to Jitterbug. Those were the best days of my life.

 

[Christ_empowered]

I only know this stuff from listening to my parents, but...it seems that there were stronger community and family bonds a generation or so back. My mom grew up poor, which was a problem, but even there...she was able to climb out of poverty, thanks to scholarships and such. Many people these days are stuck...upward mobility in the US is less and less a reality for many of us.

My dad grew up going to church at least 2x weekly, surrounded by family, private Christian schools connected with the church he and his family attended, all that. Basically, it was a part of an urban area that was dominated by 2nd and 3rd generation immigrants and their version of "The American Dream." These days...

...my dad's generation married outside the "in-group." The older generation is passing away (many already have). My generation is scattered throughout the US. Some of my dad's generation have left behind the Reform Church for non-denominational churches w/ a Pentecostal flair. The kids often don't go to the private schools or the college affiliated with the church, although some do.

Its crazy. In Sociology, they have this term..."anomie," means normless-ness. Because family and community bonds are weaker, many are now growing up and living in a state of anomie, with everything that goes with it (suicide, drug abuse, crime, deviant behavior in general). Even many of us who don't live in straight up anomic conditions live with less-than-optimal community and family bonds, and it seems to be getting worse, not better. There's a book on this...Bowling Alone...maybe its been updated (?).

 

[Mike]

Well, it's up to the generation that grew up like that to teach the next generation to manage (at least some time) without technology... granted we do so ourselves :tongue

I am happy to have technology.... imagine me trying to apply for jobs on the other side of the country... just fining out about the jobs in the first place would take forever if I didn't have internet :tongue

This is all very true. While I am happy to have grown up before all this connectivity embedded itself in our culture, I've embraced it as an adult. I'm a techie in a number of ways today, even more so than our teenage kids.

I depend upon powerschool and emailing our kids' teachers to be on top of what they are doing, but such technology would have crushed me as a kid. Somehow I got into college, and that's where I got serious about school. Through high school, I was a mess. I literally changed my report cards, replacing D's with B's by erasing them and using a ribbon type writer to press on the B's. I did that for years! That would NEVER fly in today's world with everything electronic. Yes, that right there is a big reason I'm happy I grew up then and not now.