{"id":180,"date":"2014-04-04T01:51:00","date_gmt":"2014-04-04T01:51:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/beta.dminlgp.com\/?p=180"},"modified":"2014-08-11T22:11:39","modified_gmt":"2014-08-11T22:11:39","slug":"demolition-derbies-and-the-divine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/demolition-derbies-and-the-divine\/","title":{"rendered":"Demolition Derbies and The Divine"},"content":{"rendered":"

I love family traditions.\u00a0\u00a0 Some of our traditions include, attending Ringling Bros. Barnum and Bailey Circus, watching fireworks on the 4th<\/sup> of July and going to our family cabin each summer.\u00a0 However, one tradition stands out as our favorite is, \u201cThe Buck Demolition Derby\u201d<\/strong>. Each year, around the \u00a04th<\/sup> of July weekend, a local motor sports venue named \u201cThe Buck\u201d holds a crazy out of this world demolition derby located smack dab in the middle of Amish country.\u00a0 To say this event is a melting pot of cultures would be an understatement.\u00a0 It\u2019s kind of like, 21st<\/sup> century white collar suburbanite meets 19th<\/sup> century Amish agricultural person over cars smashing.\u00a0 In our first trip to \u201cThe Buck\u201d, we began noticing some interesting patterns.\u00a0 First, the demolition derby was the hang out for young Amish teens to pick up another from the opposite sex.\u00a0 Very interesting!\u00a0 Second, though Amish are not allowed to drive cars for normal usage on the roads, somehow they were allowed to drive for the purpose of smashing<\/strong> into one another (Demolition Derby).\u00a0 Third, and most bizarre, was the young Amish teenagers who had confiscated cell phones.\u00a0 Not technically allowed by the Amish community, these young people would hang out under the grandstands trying to conceal there talking on the phone.<\/p>\n

\"image\"<\/p>\n

This past week while reading New Media by Lisa Gitelman and Geoffrey B. Pingree I was struck by the authors unpacking of competing meanings of the telephone in Amish Country.\u00a0 More specifically I was intrigued by how Amish individuals or clans would interpret the telephone as a sinful network or a divine service.\u00a0 While reading the following three insights emerged.<\/p>\n

Three Key Insights<\/strong><\/p>\n

The position of a phone\u2026<\/strong>\u00a0 Most Amish families in 2014 have telephones.\u00a0 Yet, the century old tension between a sinful network and a divine service is still evident.\u00a0 Though these families have phones, they typically have them installed in the barn, rather than their homes.\u00a0 From this position, Amish who typically rely on farming as the family business use simplistic capitalistic terms to justify the divine.\u00a0 A phone hooked to the house, would be considered\u2026 \u201cDevil Wires\u201d, but a phone run to the barn is just good business.<\/p>\n

Divine service\u2026<\/strong>\u00a0 Technologies of our present day are allowing us to experience God like attributes.\u00a0 What I mean by this statement is, technology frees us in some ways from our limited capacities.\u00a0 The light bulb freed us from only seeing in the day.\u00a0 The airplane freed us from being geographically bound.\u00a0 The internet freed us from only learning through what was assessable to us.\u00a0 Now all is assessable.\u00a0 Facebook delivered us from only knowing about a few things going on in a couple friends\u2019 lives at the same time.\u00a0 Each of these technologies is allowing us to experience God like characteristics.\u00a0 Some we can handle and others at times we may not.<\/p>\n

Facebook and beyond\u2026\u00a0 <\/strong>If it hasn\u2019t been said yet, please let me say it.\u00a0 Something will replace Facebook shortly.\u00a0 It will be profound, more integrated and problem unnerving for some.\u00a0 Yet, when this new medium comes onto the market, will we react with extremism?\u00a0 Either an extremism which says, \u201cIt\u2019s the devil\u201d or simply adopt the medium as the \u201cnew divine\u201d?\u00a0 Too often we simply adopt blindly, making the new medium what we worship.<\/p>\n

An Amish Phone Booth Located by The Barn\u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n

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As I read the pages of New Media by Gitelman and Pingree, my heart craves a new understanding of formation in the digital age.\u00a0 One that understands culture, embraces technology, and operates from a deep sustainable position of formation<\/strong>.\u00a0 This position would allow the modern day leader to be deeply formed, using the \u201cdivine service\u201d for relationship and influence, while at the same time not being consumed by the unlimited effects of this God like attribute.\u00a0 How have you been using new technologies?<\/strong>\u00a0 Is it in your house, the barn or better yet under the grand stand?<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I love family traditions.\u00a0\u00a0 Some of our traditions include, attending Ringling Bros. Barnum and Bailey Circus, watching fireworks on the 4th of July and going to our family cabin each summer.\u00a0 However, one tradition stands out as our favorite is, \u201cThe Buck Demolition Derby\u201d. Each year, around the \u00a04th of July weekend, a local motor […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[2,76],"class_list":["post-180","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-dminlgp","tag-gitelmanpingree","cohort-lgp3"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=180"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1498,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180\/revisions\/1498"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=180"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=180"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=180"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}