Beloved,
“If you are watching us on livestream, thank you for coming!”
Those were the very words uttered during the announcements at the church we visited last Sunday morning. The sentence was revealing, and yet I wonder if anyone among the hundreds of people in the room even thought twice about it. We’ve grown accustomed to “attending” meetings through a screen, and so it doesn’t strike us as strange that we can now come without coming. According to my dictionary, coming means “to travel toward or into a place.” But now you can supposed come without physically traveling anywhere as your disembodied existence is conveniently ushered into a distant place through a phone or laptop.
This kind greeting to those watching the worship service via livestream demonstrated the way technology can subtly shape our view of reality and our bodies. That is a truth many have pointed out, particularly with reference to the widespread proliferation of the sexual revolution. Whether we are talking about homosexuality or transgenderism, we are talking about ideologies that disparage and deny the physical body (Nancy Pearcey’s Love Thy Body demonstrates this excellently). “Your body might be clearly designed to sexually complement the body of the opposite sex or have certain chromosomes and sexual organs, but it is just a body! If your heart tells you otherwise, then follow your heart.”
What does internet technology have to do with this kind of disparagement of the body? Everything! For in the words of Samuel James, the web is a “disembodied electronic environment” that subtly leads us to espouse “a worldview of disembodiment.” In his excellent book, Digital Liturgies: Rediscovering Christian Wisdom in an Online Age, James demonstrates that internet technology is not a neutral tool, but a tool designed to shape us in profound ways, regardless of its content. He writes, “The internet, which dominates our lives as the primary medium through which we encounter most of the world, is an entirely disembodied habitat. Consequently, the internet trains our consciences to think of ourselves and the world in disembodied ways.” That is why you can now “come” without your physical body going anywhere.
But actually you can’t, especially when it comes to public worship. For you can’t come to something public while you remain in private. You can’t assemble with the church to embrace Christ’s people in fellowship and to embrace Christ in word and sacrament through a “disembodied electronic environment.” Worship on the present earth and in the new earth is and must be an embodied experience. That is true of private worship, family worship, or public worship. Worship requires the body, and when it comes to public worship it requires bodily coming (for how else can you honestly come?). We don’t assemble for worship as disembodied people connected through a shared server. We assemble for worship as embodied people connected through a shared Christ. We praise. We hear. We partake. We pray. We encourage. We embrace. And none of it can be done apart from our flesh-and-blood physicality.
James’s book is not a call to become a Luddite. Neither is this email. Both are calls for us to navigate the complexities of internet technologies with sober-minded care lest our view of reality be shaped in an unbiblical direction. A biblical anthropology will not allow us to come without our bodies. Whether we believe livestream is an acceptable tool in public worship or not, we need to be clear that the person live-streaming is not coming. They are remaining at home (perhaps for a legitimate reason). To say otherwise is to begin to subtly deny the beautiful significance of our God-given bodies.
Simply put, there is no coming without coming.
Yours in Christ,
Pastor Nick
