“Digital media has played its hand, and by almost all quantifiable measures its primary effect has been to perpetuate despair in the human soul.” p. 181 Drop the mic…McCracken and Mesa nailed it. We are pawns in this game and we continue to make one poor choice after another. Scrolling Ourselves to Death is a masterful thesis on the struggle our culture has willingly embraced. Think about it…how’d you even find this post?! We have to ask the Lord to help us untrain our hearts from chasing after the wind in favor of a much more worthy pursuit…abiding in Him.
I highlighted several things…probably most of the book…while reading and have posted those notes below.
- One of Postman’s key points about television as a medium, for example, is even more astute and important when applied to today’s internet-shaped world. Postman argued that above all else, television’s function is to gather an audience that can be sold to advertisers. TV exists as an efficient instrument for the advancement of corporate profits by delivering huge audiences of captive eyeballs. Here’s how Postman put it in a C-SPAN interview in 1988: “In the past, audiences were gathered for specific reasons—to hear speeches or even to see specific events— but television doesn’t do that. Its job is to gather an audience, and it doesn’t really much care what it uses as the means to gather an audience.” p. 19
- This book makes the case that as Christians seek to wisely navigate our present—and future— media environment, we would do well to hear and heed Postman’s clarion call. We look to Postman not as an all-encompassing explainer of everything or an all-knowing guide for the future but as a provocative voice that prompts necessary thinking and constructive conversations—not just for the sake of our own scrolling souls but also for the sake of our lost neighbors. The church mustn’t stand by as scores of people scroll their way into oblivion, distracting themselves to death and clicking their way to corruption. We must step in and speak truth that gives life, redirecting glazed-over eyes and lifting hunched-down faces to behold the one who is infinitely more satisfying than whatever fleeting amusements flash across our screens. p. 21
- The trade-off we all make in the digital era is not merely between substantive and trivial discourse. It’s between sobriety and addiction. While TV addicts have existed since television’s inception, the technology wasn’t addictive enough or constantly accessible enough to become dependence-forming. It’s easy to think smartphones are just an extension of TV technology, but even though the phone in your pocket looks like a tiny TV, it’s actually something far more nefarious. Your phone is a digital syringe. It’s a gateway to lifelong, brain-altering, relationshipdestroying addiction. p. 28
- Ultimately, the call isn’t to abandon technology but to bring it under Christ’s lordship. We need to recognize that while technology will continue to change and evolve, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever” (Heb. 13:8). In him we have enduring hope, unshakable truth, and eternal life—the things we crave that our secular age and its technologies can’t supply. By keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus, we can boldly and creatively use technology for his glory and for the good of his church. p. 49
- God works generationally. I am not self-made, and you are not self-made. To remind ourselves of this, it might be good for us to start each day on our knees with a rehearsal of Psalm 100:3: Know that the Lord, he is God! It is he who made us, and we are his. As we put off illusions of selfmaking, we put on worship and gratitude and praise. p. 60
- Post-truth culture is financially lucrative for media corporations and pundits across the political spectrum who capitalize on polarizing rhetoric. Both liberal and conservative media outlets have benefited from controlling media narratives to fragment audiences and create angry tribes eager to click on more, watch more, and read more, all to reinforce their fears and antagonism toward “the other side.” When the news industry is incentivized primarily by corporate profits, and little by what’s in the public interest, we shouldn’t be surprised that communicating truth becomes less important than storytelling: framing what’s newsworthy, and how the news is reported, in terms of reinforcing established narratives. Accurate, nuanced reporting doesn’t get clicks. Narrative-fueling “news” does. In a landscape like this, truth disintegrates into political spectacle and rabid polarization. p. 75
- Navigating Post-Truth Culture with Wisdom The post-truth culture has all the hallmarks of the church’s three-headed foe—the world, the flesh, and the devil. Post-truth discourse fits the pattern of this world as it draws Christians away from the Father’s love (Rom. 12:2; 1 John 2:15– 17). The mean-spirited, often vicious rhetoric that proliferates online gratifies the cravings of the flesh (Eph. 2:3) and breeds habits antithetical to the fruit of the Spirit in Galatians 5:22–23. Anyone who conforms to the post-truth script plays into the hands of the devil—a liar and the father of lies (John 8:44). But what to do? The forces are so big, the issues so complex, that the problem feels like a giant killer octopus: impossible to evade, much less overpower. And we can expect things to worsen as generative AI floods the information ecosystem with convincingly fabricated content—spreading misinformation and undermining expertise (e.g., deepfakes)—that exacerbates the epistemological crisis and further erodes trust in traditional sources of truth. And who knows what will come after the post-truth era? Maybe the chaos, grief, and loneliness will lead people to recognize the need for transcendent sources of truth. Or maybe the post-truth world will become so normalized that the label will grow antiquated, since “truth” will have become a relic of a bygone era. Even if we don’t know where contemporary culture will go from here, do not lose hope. Christians follow Jesus, who embodies truth and calls us to be people of the truth. As Paul says, “Having put away falsehood, let each one of you speak the truth with his neighbor, for we are members one of another” (Eph. 4:25). Lean into this gospel reality so you always cling to the truth, testify to it daily, and shun the post-truth theatrics around us. God gave us Scripture to keep us rooted in timeless truth. Rather than taking the Old and New Testaments for granted, cultivate habits of biblical literacy, feeding regularly on the words of God (Matt. 4:4). The Bible is the ultimate test of truth and check against falsehood. The more steeped we are in God’s wisdom revealed in Scripture, the more discerning we’ll be as we navigate a post-truth world. Yet we are whole people, not brains on sticks. Our actions and choices are not solely based on careful, solitary deliberation. The post-truth crisis has taught us that Enlightenment rationalism doesn’t fully capture our nature as embodied, relational creatures: “Belonging is stronger than facts.”29 People still live falsely even while “knowing” the truth—because we are powerfully catechized by the company we keep (1 Cor. 15:33). Thus we need healthy communities that will nurture us to treasure what is true, including people from church, close friends, neighbors, and family. As a key part of your formative community, keep company with trusted teachers from the past, reading old books, leaning on ancient Christian voices to give us perspective on the untested present. Build a reading diet that isn’t imbalanced toward the “new” but includes healthy doses of the “old.” Cherish perspectives that have been tested by time and have endured as resonant insights over decades, centuries, and millennia. Finally, slow down. When processing and sharing information, speed is often the enemy of truth (“time-tested” is a phrase for a reason). Truth vetted across time is generally more reliable. Part of our struggle with truth in the social media era is the high premium on speed; information is shared and goes viral before its veracity is fully tested, before the facts are known and understood. Even trustworthy journalists and experts can stumble here. But hear what Proverbs 2:3–5 says about the pursuit of wisdom: Indeed, if you call out for insight and cry aloud for understanding, and if you look for it as for silver and search for it as for hidden treasure, then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God. (NIV) According to Proverbs, having wisdom is thinking and living in line with how things actually are— the truth—which takes time and work. Christians can mitigate the epistemic effects of a sped-up world by intentionally slowing down, asking questions, investigating sources, and doing research rather than taking claims at face value.30 And many of us need to step away from particular social media platforms, for a season or even for good. It may sound radical, but this could be the remedy we need to stay true to Christ in a world gone mad. p. 76
- Many have noticed that TikTok, for example, seems to be a platform of choice for those deconstructing their faith.8 It’s hard to ignore the fact that TikTok privileges short bursts of information and rewards attention-catching content that elicits strong emotions like anger. Seasonableness asks whether such a medium is appropriate for serious conversations about faith and doubt. Christians struggling to answer deep questions should consider how face-toface conversations, thoughtful books, and other resources are more naturally conducive to slow, meaningful thinking. p. 87
- Television, Postman argued, fosters incoherence. By receiving an array of images, programs, commercials, and news items detached from larger contexts, explanations, or analysis, the sort of mind cultivated by TV was less attentive, less reflective, less able to connect the dots. Postman also argued that “the telegraphic person values speed, not introspection.”12 As a technology, the internet has exacerbated all these tendencies. Postman was already observing shorter attention spans and eroded capacities for logic in the TV-shaped world of the 1980s. These troubling trends have grown considerably worse in the world shaped by scrolling feeds and social media. p. 111
- Consider how frequently and rapidly in the course of any twenty-minute period we shift our attention from one thing to another. We scroll through various apps and task-switch constantly from one browser window to another. We read and try to reply to emails having nothing to do with each other. We usually have multiple screens on, with countless apps open, and our attention constantly toggles between it all. It’s no wonder our capacity to think coherently is severely atrophied. p. 113
- The hurried impatience of the scrolling world is a big part of why reflective, careful thinking is on the decline. Fast, ephemeral technology naturally conditions us to be fast, ephemeral thinkers. A thought comes into our mind briefly, but then something else grabs our attention and our thoughts go in a different direction, and so forth. Our thinking is as all over the place as our Facebook feeds; our thoughts come and go too fast to be truly considered on a substantive level. To be effective evangelists and apologists in a fast-thinking world like this, we need to model a slower, more reflective mode of thinking through important topics. Instead of making arguments about God or theology via back-and-forths on social media or in YouTube comments sections, we should nudge people toward the importance of slower, more deliberate, more focused thinking about topics of eternal significance. p. 115
- We must present Jesus as he is, which is anything but trivial. He is the serpent-crushing seed of the woman (Gen. 3:15). He is the Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, and Prince of Peace (Isa. 9:6). He is the virgin-born (Matt. 1:20–23), storm-breaking (Mark 4:35–39), broken-body–mending (Luke 17:11–19), wave-walking (John 6:16–21), grave-defeating (20:1–29), reigning King (Eph. 2:6). He is the light of the world (John 8:12), the “I am” (8:58), the only door (10:7), the good shepherd (10:11), the resurrection and the life (11:25), and the vine (15:1). He is the image of the invisible God, by whom and for whom the universe was made and sustained (Col. 1:15–17). He is worshiped by angels (Heb. 1:6, 8). He is the slain Lamb of God (Rev. 5:6), the returning bridegroom (19:6–9), the King of kings and Lord of lords (19:16), the Alpha and Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end (22:13). p. 125
- In a culture devoid of a grand meaningful story and turning to inadequate, ultimately dehumanizing stories, it is the Christian’s task to tell the better story.25 Tell the best story. Tell the Bible’s story of creation, fall, redemption, and consummation. Tell in the pulpits the good news of Jesus’s perfect life, substitutionary death, and bodily resurrection. Rehearse that story in the sacraments. Catechize your children into that story. Heavily stock a church library with the great theological minds who exposit that story. Embody that story by living a life marked by grace and love in the context of real flesh-and-blood, first-name-basis communities. Furthermore, we must clearly communicate our Christian worldview as a worldview, a Christcentered vision that makes sense of all reality. Christianity scratches humanity’s deepest existential itches for relationship, freedom, mystery, beauty, awe, hope, and more. It is a coherent system of truth robust enough to inspire the Aquinases and Alvin Plantingas of philosophy, the Dostoyevskys and Marilynne Robinsons of literature, the Blackstones and Wilberforces of statecraft, the Frederick Douglasses and Lee Jong-raks of human rights, the Francis Bacons and George Washington Carvers of science, the Bachs and Handels of music, the Van Goghs and Rembrandts of painting, the Bonhoeffers and Sophie Scholls of fighting tyranny, the Lewises and Tolkiens of creating fantasy, the Pascals and John Lennoxes of mathematics, and more. p. 128
- Postman notes, “The computer and its information cannot answer any of the fundamental questions we need to address to make our lives more meaningful and more humane. It is a magnificent toy that distracts us from facing what we most need to confront: spiritual emptiness.” p. 129
- Postman argued that “history is of value only to someone who takes seriously the notion that there are patterns in the past which may provide the present with nourishing traditions.”13 As believers, we certainly believe this is the case. God calls us to remember the past. This includes first and foremost Scripture, which recounts the words and ways of God from creation to consummation and forms our biblical worldview. But it also applies to the Christian past, from the end of the New Testament age to yesterday. The digital age has made our memories sluggish. We must retrain ourselves to be what the eighteenth-century Anglican evangelical Ambrose Serle called “Christian remembrancers,” reminding ourselves regularly of biblical truths and their implications for our lives. p. 139
- The digital age is certainly characterized by “the great cataract of nonsense.” We need to resist the tyranny of the present, which is the warp and woof of the internet, by cultivating habits that help us remember the stories that matter most. We need to find ways to practice the spiritual discipline of Christian remembering. Here are a few suggestions for how you might do that: For your regular devotional time, read from a physical Bible and incorporate creeds, confessions, liturgies, and older hymns into your prayer life.16 Supplement your Scripture reading with edifying biographies of faithful Christian leaders. Consider following C. S. Lewis’s suggestion to read one old book for every new book—or, “if that is too much for you, you should at least read one old one to every three new ones.”17 Listen to podcasts or audiobooks focusing on church history during your daily commute, while exercising, or when doing chores around your home. Lean into the historical continuity of Christianity. At church when you hear Scripture preached, take the Lord’s Supper, watch someone get baptized, greet one another, take up tithes and offerings, and engage in other worship practices, self-consciously remind yourself that believers have been doing these things for two millennia—and are doing them still today, all over the world. Your story is part of a much larger story, and your pursuit of godliness can be shaped by the example of saints from bygone days. p. 141
- As a society, we’ve replaced the demand for entertainment with an appetite for distraction, and nowhere do we see this trend more clearly than in online videos. p. 148
- We were made by the Word for the word (John 1:1–3; 2 Tim. 3:16–17). There is a nonnegotiability to the medium through which God has chosen to reveal himself to mankind. Writing is special. This view resonates with evangelical Protestants, holding as we do to the Reformation principle of sola Scriptura. Postman acknowledged this fact, crediting Protestant love of the Bible for the historically high literacy in colonial America. p. 150
- With all the energy we devote to keeping up with the goings-on of the world, we might neglect the people we can love and the problems we can address in our own backyards. For Christians called to love our neighbors and tangibly pursue mercy and justice, this is the crux of what’s wrong with an imbalanced information-action ratio. p. 165
- Christians can model a different mode of living in an overinformed, underactivated world. It’s a mode that isn’t numb or ambivalent to the countless problems that plague our world but realistic about our limited scope and where we can best be used. It’s a mode that leads to calmer minds, more focused souls, and more engaged bodies. It’s a mode that syncs up with how we were created and resists the digital era’s many temptations toward godlike limitlessness. p. 169
- What the world needs from Christians is for them to embrace the tangible missions God commanded them to do and that are all still needed: (1) tend the garden (Gen. 2:15); (2) be fruitful and multiply (1:28); and (3) go tell all nations the gospel (Matt. 28:19). p. 173
- Digital media has played its hand, and by almost all quantifiable measures its primary effect has been to perpetuate despair in the human soul. p. 181
- Highlight What was the most successful culture-and-world-changing strategy in human history? It was the embodied speaking and healing-by-laying-on-of-hands that Christ, his disciples, and apostles practiced. That won’t change. Do you want to imitate Christ? Do you have a voice that can speak? Do you have hands that can help? Do you have the will to put the phone down? Get going. The people who need the Christ within you are within earshot. You can probably see them from where you’re sitting. p. 181
- What is the problem that this new technology solves? What new problems do we create by solving this problem? Page 190 | Highlight When “church” is reduced to staring at a screen, the mirror simply reflects our preferences and proclivities. But gathering together shatters the mirror and helps us see beyond the abyss of self and out onto the expansive horizon of communal life in God’s kingdom. And when we look there long enough, we discover its life-giving power. Gathering is good for us. p. 184
- Technopoly exists when a culture no longer simply uses the tools it develops but rather is being ideologically shaped by them, unawares. p. 200
- Highlight Whether we’re amusing ourselves to death, scrolling ourselves to death, or harming ourselves in some other future way we can’t presently imagine, the source of true life will remain the same. As Simon Peter answered Jesus, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life” (John 6:68). Our Christian task was, is, and will remain—until the Lord’s return—to point the dying to the Lord and giver of life. p. 209
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