As a five-year-old, I knew very little about media. Most of my life consisted of playing outside with my neighborhood best friend until our moms called us inside for dinner. I didn’t watch the news and didn’t think it mattered – until September 2001.
My mother talked on the phone with my dad in hushed tones as rushed towards the big box T.V. in her bedroom. As she clicked the chunky silver button, the TV made that familiar twanging noise as the screen slowly flickered on. I saw images of two very tall buildings, with an airplane running into one. I knew that flames were not a good thing, but it was the look on my mom’s face that told me something was wrong. I still remember the anxious whispers between my parents as my dad packed for his next business trip.
At age eight, I waited for our dial-up computer to turn on so I could email my friends and my mom could check the news. At age thirteen, I remember my youth group leaders talking about something called Facebook. At age eighteen, I got my first smartphone and had the ability for the first time to upload a picture in real time. At age twenty-two, most information about the world, my friends, and even myself is carried within digital devices and communicated through the internet and social media. This is the mediated reality.
Though changes in technology offer us more ways to gain knowledge and keep updated, there is a certain aspect about it that should be unsettling. Mediated reality mixed with marketing tactics, media bias, and objectification of personhood leads to a disembodied view of the self and the world.
Scripture clearly teaches that our reality and identity should be found in the real person of Jesus Christ. “The Word became flesh.” (John 1:14) This truth of the Incarnation should transform the way we communicate, create, relate, commune, and exist. The fullest depth of what is real is found in the person of Christ and the embodied gospel. We should be wary of any communications tactic that disembodies, cheapens, or objectifies.
Paul is even wary of communicating through a letter rather than an in-person interaction. Throughout his letters, Paul communicates that he awaits the day he can be present with each congregation in person.
We are all media creators. Mediated reality is dangerous, and as media creators, we must be aware of its bias to draw its consumers into disembodied identities based in a false reality. The way we create media, whether blog posts, Instagram pictures, or videos, we must always aim to invite people into the embodied reality of the gospel and urge them to lean into relationships with those around them. The church finds its fulfillment in the localized physical gathering of embodied believers communing with an incarnate Christ. May our media creation, personal relationships, and ministry content always be a current that pulls people into honest and authentic embodiment and community.
