Attention Economy

Give ear and come to me; listen, that you may live. — Isaiah 55:3

Fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. — Hebrews 12:2a

We live in an attention economy. Hucksters and grifters constantly vie for our attention. Attention is money. All publicity is good publicity. The internet and new media channels make the attention economy seem modern. It's not. It's as old as Adam and Eve, the people of Israel, and a distracted Church. For our sake and the sake of the whole world, God wants to capture our attention and trust away from kings and idols. Even his wrath is meant to focus us.

Come Closer

From space, Earth appears as a serene blue marble, reflecting the sunlight. So pleasant and inviting. Come closer, though, to find wars, hurricanes, earthquakes, fires, and mudslides. Social Media. From an arm's length away, we can imagine a neat and tidy world. But come closer to witness complexity: tradeoffs, unintended consequences, winners and losers, oppressors and the oppressed, the secure and the vulnerable, those we help and those we ignore. May we have the courage to let Reality invade our personal space. It's okay to feel discomfort and uncertainty. It's a cost of caring and being more genuinely helpful.

Climate

Relative Humidity requires interpretation. The amount of moisture in saturated (100% relative humidity) warm air is significantly greater than in saturated cold air. We need context. Sweater or swelter? The same is true of Scripture. Paul's efforts to leaven culture in the first century and elevate low-caste people could be misinterpreted with 21st-century eyes as the opposite, an endorsement of structural entitlement. We need to discern the climate.