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A review by potatocampbell
12 Ways Your Phone Is Changing You by Tony Reinke
4.0
'12 Ways Your Phone Is Changing You' by Tony Reinke is an excellent book that frankly I dismissed because of an overly catchy title. I expected a BuzzFeed listicle-esque mishmash of encouragements for Christians to focus on Jesus and fearful warnings against the dangers of new technology. What I read instead was a book that takes an approach of genuine sophistication founded on a wealth of sources both secular and Christian to arrive at a theology of technology that is neither naively optimistic nor prudishly condemning.
Reinke's 12 Ways use a butterfly structure with symmetrical ends and a join at the middle, with the crux being chapters 6 and 7 in which Reinke explores the ways smartphones compromise our ability to love God and love each other. It finishes, like it starts, with a vision for eternity that began in a perfect but incomplete garden without technology and ends in a city with redeemed, purposeful technological marvels.
While Reinke is unflinchingly critical of the shortcomings of modern social media and the infiltration of technology into every waking second, I was refreshed by how often he dwells on the positive impact smartphones have had. Fascinatingly, John Piper is a massive fan of his iPhone and iPad (of course, truly discerning Christians would prefer Android). Recent secular works on the same playing field (Digital Minimalism by Cal Newport and Indistractable by Nir Eyal spring to mind, although there are many more) are less balanced and more powerfully negative in their arguments against the pull of smartphones and social media.
Rather than seeing smartphones as an evil we need to be saved from, Reinke sees them as tools which are only as good as the hands that wield them. The responsibility, and the opportunity, lies with the user.
Reinke's 12 Ways use a butterfly structure with symmetrical ends and a join at the middle, with the crux being chapters 6 and 7 in which Reinke explores the ways smartphones compromise our ability to love God and love each other. It finishes, like it starts, with a vision for eternity that began in a perfect but incomplete garden without technology and ends in a city with redeemed, purposeful technological marvels.
While Reinke is unflinchingly critical of the shortcomings of modern social media and the infiltration of technology into every waking second, I was refreshed by how often he dwells on the positive impact smartphones have had. Fascinatingly, John Piper is a massive fan of his iPhone and iPad (of course, truly discerning Christians would prefer Android). Recent secular works on the same playing field (Digital Minimalism by Cal Newport and Indistractable by Nir Eyal spring to mind, although there are many more) are less balanced and more powerfully negative in their arguments against the pull of smartphones and social media.
Rather than seeing smartphones as an evil we need to be saved from, Reinke sees them as tools which are only as good as the hands that wield them. The responsibility, and the opportunity, lies with the user.