News > North America

Montreal UBF (Canada)

Octorber 16, 2012

The Gospel Signal in a Flood of Information

“For you have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God." - 1Peter 1:23 -

We praise and thank the Lord for blessing our September 2012 Bible Academy and raising young leaders who reflect God’s word deeply on issues of the modern world. Thank God for bringing over 20 attendants including 2 new students. We live in a technological age. The media age affects human life in ways that are most often passively accepted. How did we get here? B. Marcel gave us a history of how societies progressed from an oral to a scribal, to a printing and now to an image tradition of communication. Understanding the world through images has resulted in loss of the ability to deal with prepositional thought, lack of contemplation or introspection which results in lack of life meaning. As a consequence boredom is a huge problem in modern life. In Matthew 5:8-10 Jesus was tempted by the devil through a visual image of worldly glory but Jesus commanded the devil to go away and quoted Deuteronomy 6:13 “Worship the Lord and serve him only.” B. Marcel pointed out to the fact that visual media appeals to us because it offers the experience of wonder and creativity, the meaning of stories and an escape from our eternal fate, yet the whole experience is not real.

S. Andrew continued the presentation by showing examples of just how much information our technological society floods us with and the difficulty of coping with so much information. Man is a receptor-transmitter of truth and love not just information. Jesus calls us away from information to truth through his words. “Jesus answered, ‘You say that I am a king. In fact, the reason that I was born and came into the world is to testify to the truth. Everyone on the side of truth listens to me.” (Jn 18:37) The wave of technology is strong because it is driven by rationality (the power of the mind), artificiality (creating vivid new virtual experiences), and the law of self-augmentation. That is, technical progress is irreversible and any new technology makes others possible. People can become slaves of technology but Jesus sets people free. For example when the disciples saw the splendor and technology of the Jerusalem temple they were entranced but how did Jesus respond? “’Do you see these things?’ he asked. ‘I tell you the truth, not one stone here will be left on another: everyone will be thrown down.’” (Mt 24:2) We learned that Jesus wants us to use technology with clear purpose. We need to seek truth not information, we need to use technology to build Christian community creatively and evangelize the world. We must reject any apathy and be change makers influencing techno-culture for God`s purpose and glory.

Finally b. Nicolas gave us a 5-minute message based on 1 Peter 1:23-25. He said that human glory only lasts a short time like “the flowers of the field”. Since we can’t live forever, we have to choose a way of life now. The media tries to fill this role by telling us what is popular, giving a picture of endless opportunities, offering to find truth in ourselves, ancient mysteries etc.  This way of life fails because it ends in death. 

On the other hand when we accept the promise of God we can see and live by what is imperishable, the living and enduring word of God. Thank God for blessing our academy and growing b. Nicolas and b. Marcel as godly men and truth seekers in our generation.