John 4:7 When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?” (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.)

Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

Doing “computer stuff” can easily become pretty nonspiritual. In fact, being an expert of a completely man made object that has man made rules and is arguably one of the most advanced inventions of mankind to date can seem to be a stark contrast over a woman with a bucket and a long rope. After all, with computers the well can be VERY deep and some people don’t have very long ropes. If I’m not careful the fact that my words are carried by light and my tools are the most advanced humans have yet to create may go to my head. There’s another simple fact that I enjoy reminding myself of. No matter how much techno hydration I can pull out of my little laptop Jesus still has the “living water”. Nothing I do on my computer will ever finish the job. When Jesus is the solution we will never thirst again.

So whatever tool you have mastered in your trade I implore you not to be like the builders of the famous tower of Babel. Please don’t be too proud of your abilities nor especially your tools. Recognize them as just another bucket and rope. Compared to the life (living water) and light of the Spirit of God manifest on earth my computer is just another bucket and rope. So mastering my computer and missing the voice of God will result in the same futile end as Babel’s tower. Hearing God’s voice must be more important than keeping up with our email. It must be. Even if it is so much easier to say than to do.

I got to thinking the other day. Is it possible that watching shows like my very favorite 24 could wreak havoc on my discernment? It may be possible.

What made me realize it is when I correctly predicted the explosion that killed off Jonas whatever his name was. The placement of actors in the scene, and the dialog that resulted in the placement, was just short of overlaying text that would say: “that vehicle is about to explode.”

However, in real life, things don’t work that way. We don’t get mediocre writing and thinly stretched plot lines. Life, by definition, is a plausible plot line. Barring the supernatural acts of God that we know happen, but can’t usually put our fingers on, life does not artificially create drama, it simply is.

So what happens to our ability to discern the reality of a real situation after watching too much TV? I dunno, but let me just suggest that we remain students of real life, and leave the TV dramas as an opportunity to step back and hear a story. In that fictional world where Jack Bauer might be able to precisely render an opponent unconscious with a flick of his left pinkey finger and Ensign Ricky will certainly not return from that away mission, there is very little that resembles the much less predictable developments of the real world. So watcher beware.

“…as the happiness or real good of men consists in right action, and right action cannot be produced without right opinion, it behoves us, above all things in this world, to take care that our opinions of things be according to the nature of things. The foundation of all virtue and happiness is thinking rightly.” – Benjamin Franklin