Technology is not Dead

So,

I know that I am behind the curve, but I have found that the technological advances in our world have crept into my life. I have been a long time Facebook user, almost since the beginning, utilize blog reading as a source of "research", have a smart phone that organizes and helps make my life easier and now I am starting my own blog. Even in these times, I feel that I am pretty balanced in my approach and that they don't run my life. If they ever got to the point where they did run my life, Marla would not allow me to be like that for long. She already is telling me that I can't be "the guy who is on my phone all the time" and tells me that I update my status too much. So, we keep it in the moderate category of use.

But, I have to say that these advances really have helped me in my job as a Youth Director. The ability to look things up when I get lost or a planned event goes wrong and have move on the fly, or just texting students for event announcements. All of those things have become normal and expected, and I like it. There has been a lot of discussion at my church going around about how much technology is hurting our students and that their communication skills are being hindered, and I have to ask myself, is that truth or is it because the people saying those thing are behind the technological curve and don't know how to keep up.

Despite these new techies norms, I still find that my favorite way to communicate is face to face and make the most time in my schedule for interpersonal communication. I am the guy who still gets out of my office and walk down the hall to ask a question rather than just emailing it or using the intercom on the phone system. I guess that is another way that I stay balanced with my tech use.

So, what do we think? Is technology meant to be used in a balanced way or should we really invest more time and energy in keeping up because it is the future of what we say, do and even think? How does it affect what job your in, whether ministry, education, so on?