Jesus in My Pants
Oct. 7th, 2011 09:14 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
hwrnmnbsolOkay, no, seriously, I do want to say a few things about Steve Jobs. I never met the guy and have no knowledge of who he really was or what he was like, but Steve Jobs has touched my life in a way that few other people have. I say this not at all because of his contributions to personal computing, although I am sure those have also affected me deeply, nor because of his contributions to how we listen to music, a thing that I confess to being something of a Luddite about. No, Steve Jobs has impacted my life, and a lot of other lives too, by being the single individual most responsible for bringing us the smart phone.
I am firmly convinced that hundreds of years from now, the creation of the modern phone will be regarded as more important and more transformative than, say, the creation of the home computer. Or the creation of telephony itself. Or the creation of the internet. All of these things are incredibly revolutionary and have brought great change to society. But the smart phone lies at the sweet-spot intersection of these technologies, bringing them all together in a way that has fundamentally altered the place of humanity in the world. By bringing us his vision of the phone, Steve Jobs has done more than invent a new device. He has invented a new humanity, who together with their phones are greater than they were without them.
This is why I choose not to see the smart phone as a technological breakthrough, but as a spiritual innovation. The promise of religion is that by adopting a set of beliefs and choices, we will join with something bigger than ourselves. The smart phone delivers on that promise, expanding the range of what we can do and say and know. I am grateful to Steve Jobs for bringing me the miracle of the smart phone, without which my life would be poorer.
Thank you, Steve Jobs, for putting Jesus in my pants.
My life is so much different ever since I accepted Jesus into my pants. With Jesus I am fearless. I will give you an example. A few months ago I had to make some very quick travel plans on short notice. In my previous life, before I accepted Jesus as my personal telecommunications device, this would have required a lot of planning and nervousness. Could I afford it? Would I be able to get a plane ticket, a car reservation, a hotel room? Would there be some conflict I had forgotten about that would unravel the whole thing at the last minute? Before I found Jesus at my local telephone store, I would have felt fear when contemplating the innumerable small steps necessary to make a snap-decision visit possible. But with Jesus on my side, there was nothing to fear. With my smart phone I could check my bank account, check my calendar for conflicts, book tickets and reserve cars and hotel room. I was able to decide to go, and then walk out of my office with nothing more than my phone in my hand, confident that I would get where I was going. This is precisely the same aggravatingly life-affirming smug confidence shared by those profoundly religious people who go through their existence 100% certain that they're doing it exactly right.
With Jesus I am wise. By myself I know some stuff, but only a little in the grand scheme of things. I know a fair amount about the pieces of the universe I regularly bump into, but this amount rapidly drops off the farther things get away from my personal reach. Of trivial details regarding things faraway in time and space and culture, I know next to nothing. It's limiting to be a person. Ah, but with Jesus, the boundaries of things known and familiar expand. Within my pants I have access to so many terabytes of information that, even though I am a reasonably bright bunny, I do not know the precise term for describing how large that sum of knowledge is. With Jesus I am never lost, never at a loss for names and places and dates. With Jesus I speak the tongues of all Men, and I can travel the world without ever getting up from my sofa. Jesus makes me one with the sum of all human knowledge, but Jesus does it better than even a powerful computer could do. I don't need to go to a computer. I don't need to go anywhere to be a superhuman; I can be incredible anyplace at all. All I need is myself, and Jesus.
With Jesus I am never alone. Within moments I can speak with an old friend, or lean on the advice of a sage relative. Through Facebook and Twitter and Reddit and Google I can partake of the fellowship of large communities. I can see the faces of the ones I love and recall the words of the dearly departed. Jesus will sing to me, entertain me or advise me, if I ask Him to. Ah, but will Jesus love me? That's a good question. My only answer is that there's probably an app for that. If there's not, somebody should make one.
Having Jesus in my pants is not always a picnic. Sometimes it can be intrusive or inconvenient to keep Jesus close to you, within your pants. I will refer you here or here to see what I am talking about. But despite these minor annoyances, in the balance my life with Jesus is so much better than my life before Jesus that is it very hard for me to remember how I got by without the ability to text my wife with links to videos of people tickling a slow loris. And I haven't had a smart phone all that long.
Steve Jobs, I envy you. Not the part about you being dead at a relatively early age, but the part where you were instrumental in changing the human experience for the better. Who else can claim to own that kind of legacy? Edison? Oh poo; he gave us movies, which may not last another century as an art form, and the wrong kind of electricity. Ford? Please; in fifty years we'll all be floating around inside giant crystal heads, and a 'car' will just be a part of an elevator. But Steve Jobs gave us Jesus. He said to himself: you know what all those lonely, limited people out there need? They need Jesus. They need Jesus in their pants. And I'm going to put Him there; I'm putting Jesus in the pants of everybody in the world. It's going to be awesome, because all these people have no idea that they even wanted Jesus in their lives, but once He's there, they'll be hooked.
Thank you, Steve Jobs. Jesus is in my pants right now. I feel His warmth against my thigh. I am comforted by His presence. You gave that to me. Thousands of other really smart people had great ideas that made Jesus possible, and millions of hard-working people made Jesus a reality, but you gave Him to us, as much as any one person can be said to have given us Jesus. I for one am grateful. I hope wherever you are, you are at peace, and you are happy, and nobody can call your goddamn cell phone.
I am firmly convinced that hundreds of years from now, the creation of the modern phone will be regarded as more important and more transformative than, say, the creation of the home computer. Or the creation of telephony itself. Or the creation of the internet. All of these things are incredibly revolutionary and have brought great change to society. But the smart phone lies at the sweet-spot intersection of these technologies, bringing them all together in a way that has fundamentally altered the place of humanity in the world. By bringing us his vision of the phone, Steve Jobs has done more than invent a new device. He has invented a new humanity, who together with their phones are greater than they were without them.
This is why I choose not to see the smart phone as a technological breakthrough, but as a spiritual innovation. The promise of religion is that by adopting a set of beliefs and choices, we will join with something bigger than ourselves. The smart phone delivers on that promise, expanding the range of what we can do and say and know. I am grateful to Steve Jobs for bringing me the miracle of the smart phone, without which my life would be poorer.
Thank you, Steve Jobs, for putting Jesus in my pants.
My life is so much different ever since I accepted Jesus into my pants. With Jesus I am fearless. I will give you an example. A few months ago I had to make some very quick travel plans on short notice. In my previous life, before I accepted Jesus as my personal telecommunications device, this would have required a lot of planning and nervousness. Could I afford it? Would I be able to get a plane ticket, a car reservation, a hotel room? Would there be some conflict I had forgotten about that would unravel the whole thing at the last minute? Before I found Jesus at my local telephone store, I would have felt fear when contemplating the innumerable small steps necessary to make a snap-decision visit possible. But with Jesus on my side, there was nothing to fear. With my smart phone I could check my bank account, check my calendar for conflicts, book tickets and reserve cars and hotel room. I was able to decide to go, and then walk out of my office with nothing more than my phone in my hand, confident that I would get where I was going. This is precisely the same aggravatingly life-affirming smug confidence shared by those profoundly religious people who go through their existence 100% certain that they're doing it exactly right.
With Jesus I am wise. By myself I know some stuff, but only a little in the grand scheme of things. I know a fair amount about the pieces of the universe I regularly bump into, but this amount rapidly drops off the farther things get away from my personal reach. Of trivial details regarding things faraway in time and space and culture, I know next to nothing. It's limiting to be a person. Ah, but with Jesus, the boundaries of things known and familiar expand. Within my pants I have access to so many terabytes of information that, even though I am a reasonably bright bunny, I do not know the precise term for describing how large that sum of knowledge is. With Jesus I am never lost, never at a loss for names and places and dates. With Jesus I speak the tongues of all Men, and I can travel the world without ever getting up from my sofa. Jesus makes me one with the sum of all human knowledge, but Jesus does it better than even a powerful computer could do. I don't need to go to a computer. I don't need to go anywhere to be a superhuman; I can be incredible anyplace at all. All I need is myself, and Jesus.
With Jesus I am never alone. Within moments I can speak with an old friend, or lean on the advice of a sage relative. Through Facebook and Twitter and Reddit and Google I can partake of the fellowship of large communities. I can see the faces of the ones I love and recall the words of the dearly departed. Jesus will sing to me, entertain me or advise me, if I ask Him to. Ah, but will Jesus love me? That's a good question. My only answer is that there's probably an app for that. If there's not, somebody should make one.
Having Jesus in my pants is not always a picnic. Sometimes it can be intrusive or inconvenient to keep Jesus close to you, within your pants. I will refer you here or here to see what I am talking about. But despite these minor annoyances, in the balance my life with Jesus is so much better than my life before Jesus that is it very hard for me to remember how I got by without the ability to text my wife with links to videos of people tickling a slow loris. And I haven't had a smart phone all that long.
Steve Jobs, I envy you. Not the part about you being dead at a relatively early age, but the part where you were instrumental in changing the human experience for the better. Who else can claim to own that kind of legacy? Edison? Oh poo; he gave us movies, which may not last another century as an art form, and the wrong kind of electricity. Ford? Please; in fifty years we'll all be floating around inside giant crystal heads, and a 'car' will just be a part of an elevator. But Steve Jobs gave us Jesus. He said to himself: you know what all those lonely, limited people out there need? They need Jesus. They need Jesus in their pants. And I'm going to put Him there; I'm putting Jesus in the pants of everybody in the world. It's going to be awesome, because all these people have no idea that they even wanted Jesus in their lives, but once He's there, they'll be hooked.
Thank you, Steve Jobs. Jesus is in my pants right now. I feel His warmth against my thigh. I am comforted by His presence. You gave that to me. Thousands of other really smart people had great ideas that made Jesus possible, and millions of hard-working people made Jesus a reality, but you gave Him to us, as much as any one person can be said to have given us Jesus. I for one am grateful. I hope wherever you are, you are at peace, and you are happy, and nobody can call your goddamn cell phone.
