For all of my lambasting of Big Tech, you'd think I'd just stay where I'm at looking over it all atop a better platform. A couple of days ago, I was driven by the idea of making 2022 a year of less tech. Instead of investing my energy into software and hardware that'll be old by next week (not unlike my bachelor's degree), I would rather use my resources toward something that lasts, namely the eternal.

This really irritates me about tech: I know a lot of things, a lot of things that are inapplicable sans a DeLorean gunning for 88 mph. It amuses me that for all the Microsoft products I once supported, I've jumped off the ride before it reached Windows 11 and just don't see myself ever using Microsoft again, whether with a SAS, an office package or an OS.

For those couple of days, I went back to Google and Microsoft with the mindset that by embracing Big Tech, there would be less tech in my life; I would simply not have to think about anything, but let the West Coast think for me. This did not last long. The gnawing feeling that everything I was doing was being cataloged consumed me! How would I be left to think of other matters while I'm being tracked as a prey?

Frankly, I got tired real quick of their leftist politics being shoved in my face. There's a bunch of lemmings with faces pressed against that glass box in Mountain View, CA. It just ain't me! I used to be accommodating toward folks' crazy ideas, but I'm growing with the idea that I'm just not gonna pay much mind to 'em and the crazy things they say these days. Folks are lost and it ain't nothin' new: for all the innovation and advancement we buy into believing about our culture, words written in Romans 1 some 2,000 years ago are just as applicable today:

They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served something created instead of the Creator, who is praised forever. Amen.

Romans 1:25, HCSB

There's a lot of fear in our world today. It's like folks cannot see they are already predestined to die. Instead, they set up their little fiefdoms and act as if they were gods while ignoring their own mortality. I'm not too worried about that moment I gotta punch out; it's ever so close at hand! The day it will be has always been:

Your eyes saw me when I was formless; all my days were written in Your book and planned before a single one of them began.

Psalm 139:16, HCSB

Instead, how I yearn toward adopting Philippians 4:4-8:

Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! Let your graciousness be known to everyone. The Lord is near. Don’t worry about anything, but in everything, through prayer and petition with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses every thought, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.

Finally brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable—if there is any moral excellence and if there is any praise—dwell on these things. Do what you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, and the God of peace will be with you.

Philippians 4:4-8, HCSB

The question is, how am I predestined to live? That's really key. How often did I not live as if eternity is not at my very door! And it truly is! I did not live like one chosen before the foundation of the world. And once I remember again, it shapes me as I try to express how THANKFUL I am that God chose me. Ephesians 1 is chockful of content.

For He chose us in Him, before the foundation of the world, to be holy and blameless in His sight. In love, He predestined us to be adopted through Jesus Christ for Himself, according to His favor and will, to the praise of His glorious grace that He favored us with in the Beloved.

We have redemption in Him through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace that He lavished on us with all wisdom and understanding. He made known to us the mystery of His will, according to His good pleasure that He planned in Him for the administration of the days of fulfillment—to bring everything together in the Messiah, both things in heaven and things on earth in Him.

We have also received an inheritance in Him, predestined according to the purpose of the One who works out everything in agreement with the decision of His will, so that we who had already put our hope in the Messiah might bring praise to His glory.

When you heard the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and when you believed in Him, you were also sealed with the promised Holy Spirit. He is the down payment of our inheritance, for the redemption of the possession, to the praise of His glory.

Ephesians 1:4-14, HCSB

Death is my friend who knocks at the door. If it is to be that I will live to my parents' ages when they died, I've got 22 years remaining. I may die before I post these words, but let me err in abundance with what seems to be loads of time remaining. But, is it a lot? I can remember things clearly when I was 21 and everything that happened thereafter. It was 1999 approaching 2000 with all the Y2K fear therein. In a rapid cascade all those years have passed, informing me how the next 22 years toward 2043 into 2044 will be.

I know I need reminding of this for I'll walk in circles through the weeded labyrinth of human frailties. I ascribe importance to things that have little weight and catch myself ignorant to the eternal. This, too, shall change for the rest of the year, into 2022...and beyond 2044.