Yesterday at church my husband’s cellphone fell out of the pocket of his Bible bag and plummeted to the floor. The end result was a completely shattered screen and a non-functional phone. I couldn’t help but notice the significance of what the phone fell from and where he was the time the phone was broken. It seems we all are so glued to our phones these days as well as other technologies. It is with guilty fingers I am typing this blog today. Life seems to stop when one of these devices ceases to work. The first thought “Oh no what am I going to do?”

Now there are certain safety aspects to having a phone. Taking call for my job deems it is a necessity most definitely for me. We cancelled our home phone line because it was rarely used and we have not missed having it. The phone in and of itself is not a bad thing. It is our lack of looking up from the phone to experience the world around us that gets us into trouble.

The question of where does our security lie? Is what has fleeted through my thoughts from the time I heard of the phones demise. The fact that our first reaction so often is panic when our phone doesn’t work is a clue in what our society has put its trust in. Last year on vacation I had to spend half a day taking care of my phone that without warning just up and died on me. There was a need for a call shift as soon as I got home, but still frustrating to waste family time having to take care of a phone. Now the significance of time being even greater as this was the last vacation my father would be with us.

Will our phones save us in a true disaster? No all cell phone service will be caput. Will our stocks and bonds save us? No they can be gone with just a click of a mouse of a hacker’s computer. What about our homes? One tornado or fire…gone.
The fact that Mike’s phone fell from his Bible bag reminds me of how secure the Word of God is. Oh sure the book itself can burn and be destroyed, but nothing can destroy God’s spoken word. It stands forever. He spoke this world into existence. The word actually became flesh to take on the sins of this broken world to give us grace and mercy we are undeserving of.

John 1:1-18 “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. There was a man sent from God whose name was John. He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all might believe. He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light. The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world. He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God. The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth. (John testified concerning him. He cried out, saying, “This is the one I spoke about when I said, ‘He who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me.’”) Out of his fullness we have all received grace in place of grace already given. For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No one has ever seen God, but the one and only Son, who is himself God and is in closest relationship with the Father, has made him known.”

The only thing that lasts is Jesus. The world didn’t recognize Him then and it is obvious it doesn’t recognize Him now. We are too distracted by our “own securities”. What we think is secure. We hold onto what we think is within our own power and control. How much control and power do we have? Can we control how long we have a heart beat? Can we control the weather? Can we control the evil of this world or the evil that is within our own selves? Only Jesus had the power to speak the world into existence, only Jesus could speak and calm the storms, only Jesus could pay the price for our sins (the evil within each man), only Jesus conquered death, only Jesus can give us grace and mercy, only Jesus can bring true hope of eternal life, only Jesus brings true security.

Yes this will sound weird that I am glad my husband’s phone broke in the way it did. The daily reminders of who God is, the truth, and what really matters are priceless. My true security does not rest in the “stuff” from this life.