By: David Wickert
A few months ago I was encouraged to write a blog post about the live streaming process at Holy Cross (something I’ve been heavily involved with since the start of the pandemic). Specifically, I was encouraged to write how I had seen the Holy Spirit at work through our live stream during this pandemic. I’m telling you this both to give some context about this post and also to say I had a difficult time figuring out what to write. Plus, everybody knows a good blog post is at least 1,000 words long and now I’m almost halfway there.
“Initially, I thought I could connect live streaming to the invention of the printing press.”
It was going to be great! The printing press tore down gatekeepers in the church and revolutionized the spread of the gospel by expanding its reach to everyday people. I’m not a historian, but I think it could be argued that the printing press helped spur the Enlightenment. In a likewise manner, the live streaming of our services would help revolutionize the world towards a re-Enlightenment. That’s not what this blog is about (admittedly, that would have been pretty pompous and pretentious).
So without further ado, “The Scorpion and the Frog.” I know what you’re thinking, “What the heck does this have to do with live streaming?” And to that I say, “It’s my blog and I can do what I want!” In all seriousness though, this is going somewhere (I think).
I’m sure many of you are familiar with the fable of “The Scorpion and the Frog,” but if not, this next part is for you. There once was a scorpion and a frog. The scorpion wanted to cross the river, but not being able to swim, it could not cross it on its own. So, the scorpion, when encountering the frog along the riverbank, asks for a ride across. The frog is hesitant because it does not want to be stung. The scorpion assures the frog it won’t sting, as a sting (when crossing the river) would cause them both to drown. So, the frog agrees to carry the scorpion across the river. Midway through their journey across the river, the scorpion stings the frog and they both drown. However, just before they drown the frog is able to ask the scorpion why it stung. The scorpion replies, “I couldn’t help it, it’s in my nature.”
I think when children are told this fable they often empathize with the frog. Maybe that’s who we want them to empathize with. After all, isn’t the scorpion the bad guy in this story? Perhaps the lesson for a child hearing this fable for the first time could be summarized like this, “When someone shows you who they are (through their actions) believe them.”
“Now that I’m older, I find myself empathizing more with the scorpion.”
The scorpion didn’t have bad intentions; all it wanted to do was to cross the river. However, it underestimated aspects of its own nature. Those which it could not transcend.
After the Last Supper (Matthew 26), Jesus heads to the Garden of Gethsemane to pray. He asks James and John (the two sons of Zebedee) and Peter to keep watch while he goes to pray. The late hour, bellies full, and probably slightly inebriated, the disciples have a tough time staying awake. Jesus, returning from praying and finding his disciples asleep, tells Peter (40b, 41),
“So, could you not watch with me one hour? Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.”
Jesus then goes to pray and returns from praying two more times. Each time he returns, he finds his disciples asleep. Shortly after returning the third time, Judas arrives on the scene with the Roman soldiers to arrest Jesus.
How guilty must the disciples have felt? Had they stayed awake maybe they could have seen Judas coming and escaped? The disciples didn’t have bad intentions; they didn’t want to fall asleep. However, in their humanness, they couldn’t transcend aspects of their (of our) nature (the flesh) and fell asleep.
If you’re one of the handful of people still reading this, I hope you’re not a fact checker because I’m about to make a bold statement that I can’t necessarily factually back up. Since the advent of the Internet, it has never been easier to fall into temptation. Avenues for our sinful natures have never been broader. The Internet itself, of course, is inanimate. In our idealized machinations I think we see it as a tool for connecting people. However, in reality, I think the Internet has profoundly disconnected us.
Reality has played out something more like a scorpion’s inability to sting a frog or the disciples’ inability to fall asleep. The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak. Whether it be…
- pornography
- social media profiles becoming shrines to our own glory
- unchecked hurtful language directed towards our neighbors
The internet is a gateway for our sinful natures. I don’t say this to cast stones because yours truly has found himself in all its entrapments. However, I do say it to question what role we (the church) have in live streaming on a medium (the Internet) I’m not entirely sure our sinful natures can handle. Not that live streaming our services is somehow condoning sinful behavior on the web, but maybe more realistically, is live streaming our services passively adding to the disconnection? It would be unintentional, but are we incentivizing people to never come back to church? I’m not sure you nor I have answers to these questions, at least not yet. And what about pride? I think it would be very easy for our production to become just that, a production. A production to measure ourselves against our peers.
In the Parable of the Sower (Luke 8), the sower sows his seed with reckless abandon. He sows along a path, the rock, thorns, and finally the good soil. Why would the sower sow seed where he knew it wouldn’t grow? The disciples don’t ask Jesus this question, but I think if Jesus were to answer he would say because there is fertile soil to be found even along the path, rocks, and thorns.
“The internet may be a rocky, thorny place, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t fertile soil out there somewhere.”
So, I’m still not quite sure how the Holy Spirit’s been at work through our live stream. Perhaps you the viewer would be better at answering that question. However, on the nature of live streaming, I do know this: the live stream must remain God’s work through the Spirit and not our own. Man, was that not a lot of words just to come to a simple conclusion? We must remember, though, the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak. For the moment this becomes something anything other than God’s work is the moment we’ll start to drown. It’s also my prayer for any online worshiper out there that you not only be strengthened and preserved by the live stream during these days of isolation, but that you also be spurred to join us in person again as soon as you can.
