Information Overload:

The Search
for Meaning in a
Postmodern World
Mark D. Anthony, Sr.
Tf7here is the Life IJJe hCllJe lost in living?
U::7here is the J}Jisdolll JJJe have lost in klloJJ;/edge?
If::7here is the klloJ);/edge IJJe have lost il7 iliforlllatioll?
- T.8. Eliot: Choruses from "The Rock"
Do you have information overload? Would you
know it if you saw it?
In a famous study, French economist Georges
Anderla broke humanity's knowledge into units.
He estimated that by AD 1500,
humanity had amassed two units
of knowledge. Within 250 years,
totallmowledge had doubled; the
next doubling took only 150 years,
and the next, only 50 years. The
one after that took only ten years,
so that by 1960 humanity had
gathered 32 units of knowledge.
The next doublings took seven
and then six years, taking us to
128 units in 1973, the year of
Anderla's study. Since then, the
rate of doubling has continued
to increase ever more rapidly so that today, with
the advent of the information revolution, human
Imowledge is estimated to be doubling every eighteen
months and it is predicted that it will double every
four months by the year 2010.
1
Looking at it another way, according to the
FranklinCovey learning center
2
, in 1900, people were
exposed to 1,000 new pieces of information every
six months. By 1960, people were facing that same
amount of information every week. Today, we are
exposed to 1,000 new pieces of information every
single hour!
26 the COUNSEL of CHALCEDON
Yet, while data and information have grown
exponentially as we have moved from an industrial
to an information based society, our capacity for
assiJl1ilating it has remained relatively static. So
we find ourselves, according to futurist John
Naisbitt, "drowning in information but starved for
knowledge.'" In other words, we live in a world
drowning in data, but starved for meaning. It is a
postmodern world.
\\le use the term "postmodernism" to refer to the
basic worldview that is currently replacing modernism.
Modernism, which began with the European
enlightenment, replaced premodernism. These three
terms are used to divide human history into three eras.
N one of these three eras is represented by any single
worldview: But the numerous worldviews within
each era all have a commonality that is represented by
the terms premodern, modern, or postmodern.
The premodern era, encompassing the dawn
of philosophy up through the enlightenment,
including the renaissance and the
reformation, was characterized by
belief in absolute trutlL. And that
truth was known by revelation,
whether or not the revelation
was Christian in nature. Self was
lmowable, but only in light of
what God, or the gods or spirits,
revealed. The premodern era was
characterized by a strong belief in
the supernatural.
The modern era also believed in
truth, but it no longer believed
truth came from revelation.
Modernists rejected the supernatural and God as
being necessary to know truth or to Imow the good,
though they did not stop expressing any belief in the
supernatural. They merely relegated it to a position
of irrelevancy. Modernism believed in a knowable
self that sees the world rationally. It elevated reason
and empirical science to the heights of meaning,
laying all truth at their doorstep. If something were
scientifically and rationally true, then it was good, and
vice versa. Objective science became the standard
of truth. Language thus had to be rational as well.
\\lords as symbols had to be concretely tied to that
which tlLey signified. By the end of the Modern era,
God was no longer merely transcendent, but had
Iliformatioll Ovedoad: The Search for Meallillg ill a Post modem Tf:7odd
been eliminated from the scene altogether in many
disciplines.
Neither premodernism nor modernism were absolute
worldviews. Though they were the dominant views,
in each era there were dissenting views. Just as the
roots of modernism were seen in the Renaissance, the
roots of postmodernism were already on the scene
during the modern era. Romanticism had first rejected
pure reason in the late 18
d
, century and the order and
absoluteness promised by modernism was under strong
attack by the 19
th
and early 20d> centuries. Artists and
writers saw an unraveling of order and fragmentation
of objective reality. These artists began to accept
existentialism as their point of reference. In the words
of a representative writer of this era, \'\7illiam Buder
Yeats, "Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold (in
his poem, The Second CominiJ." These artists were not
yet postmodernists, because they did not celebrate
this falling apart. Instead, they lamented it, thinking it
their task as artists to provide meaning
We are left, as Cornelius Van Til once said, attempting
to string together beads with no holes on an infinitely
long string with no ends. We are left with raw data and
information and no relevance or meaning. In the words
of Shakespeare's MacBeth:
Out, Ottt, briif candle!
Life's bllt a walking shado));, a poorplqyer
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And thm is heard no more: it is a tale
Told l?Y an idiot, fitl! of sound and fury,
S ignijjing nothing.
One day, when the gospel covers the earth as the waters
cover the sea, the dominant worldview will be the Bible.
Until then, it is important to identify at any given time
the world system in which we live so that we are able to
avoid loving the things that are in the world and in order
that we can shine the light of Christ into the darkness.
Though we are not postmodernists, we are left with
the fact that we live in a postmodern
where science and rationality had failed.
These artists were known variously
as deconstructionists, romantlc1sts,
modernists, and existentialists. Scientists
were even questioning absolutes by now,
beginning to put forth theories of nature
as being basically non-orderly.
We live in a world
age, just as faithful Christians who were
not modernists lived in the modern age.
While there are still strong elements
of modernism in the world, we have
entered into a new era. Modernism has
passed as the dominant view.
drowning in data,
but starved for
meaning.
From these roots, later in the twentieth
century, full blown postmodernism
arrived sometime in the 70's and 80's.
Unlike modernism, postmodernism does not postulate
a knowable self. It does not see the world as rational
or objective. It sees no truth behind the facts. Words,
rather than signifiers of something are just naked
signifiers. Postmodernism does not lament the loss
of meaning, nor does it look for meaning in artistic
endeavors. It instead celebrates the meaninglessness,
leaving it up to individuals, groups, and cultures to define
d1eir own reality rather than having to submit to some
objective reality. Postmodernism is the idea that we are
no longer supposed to gain meaning from the facts of
the universe, or at least not the meaning that culture has
"canonized" for us. We must reject the meaning that
those with power have assigned to our experience and
let each person find his own meaning. We are no longer
to bring preconceptions to the table. Our only meaning
is to reject meaning, our only presupposition to discard
presuppositions. Postmodernism deconstructs any and
all constructions of worldview.
Thus we live in a world that has learned
to deal with info-glut by relinquishing
all claims to meaning. But the loss of
meaning is not merely the result of
the proliferation of information. It also relates to
fragmentation of community, a driving autonomy and
individualism in all areas of endeavor, and rejection of
God and all forms of authority, especially in relation to
defining truth.
The fragmentation of community is occurring through
increased urbanization and mobility. As people move
from job to job and city to city, they lose their community
context. In one sense, it is community which gives data
and information ultimate meaning. R.J. Boland writes,
" ... perfect information does not exist as an object, and
intelligence does not exist, except as it is embodied
in a human being. Information is not a resource to
be stockpiled as one more factor of production. It is
meaning and can only be achieved through dialogue in
a human community. Information is not a commodity.
It is a skilled human accomplishment."4
the COUNSEL of CHALCEDON 27
Inforll/atioll Overload: Tbe S eal'cb for J'vIeallilig ill a Pastil/adem Tf
7
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Rampant individualism in all areas of human endeavor
can hardly be refuted. It is evident in art and literature of
every genre. Man desires to be autonomous in defining
himself and that which is required of him in life.
Ultimately, though, the loss of meaning is boiled down
to one thing only, a rejection of meaning - a rejection,
ultimately, of God. Man has attempted, autonomously,
to create his own meaning, arriving finally at the
paradoxical conclusion that meaninglessness is the
highest meaning. This is the inevitable outcome of
Godless thinking. Van Til explains it best:
... There are two ways of defending the faith. One
of these begins from man as self-sufficient and
works up to God, while the other begins from
the triune God of the scriptures and relates all
things to him. . .. The traditional ideas of trying to
find some neutral, common ground on which the
believer and unbeliever can stand are based on the
notion that man is autonomous... [yet] Paul says,
all men, knowing God, hold down this knowledge
in unrighteousness .... [This knowledge] is the only
basis man has on which he can stand, to know
himself, to find the facts of his world and learn
how to relate them to one another. Without the
Creator-God-Redeemer of Scripture the universe
would resemble an infinite number of beads with
no holes in any of them, yet which must all be
strung by an infinitely long string.
As consumer marketing reaches new heights of
identifying and marketing to smaller and smaller groups,
even to the individual through targeted postal and
electronic mail, the postmodern culture of the current
world system offers us an ever increasing menu of
choices in media, information, activities, and decisions.
Rather than being the "spice of life," the sheer volume
of variety brought to us by various media becomes
noise. It is a mind-numbing variety, a broth of millions
of bits of data laced with bright and loud messages.
We are awash in the proliferation of television channels,
movies, telephone calls, emails, books, magazines,
newspapers, advertisements, cell phone calls, voice mail
messages, letters, internet news, internet discussion
groups, internet chat, real interpersonal relationships,
radio, etc. And information is not just media related. It
also comes to us in the form of friendships, activities,
and memberships. Anything for which we have to make
room in our minds is information. When we have to
juggle soccer practice with youth group and the grocery
shopping, we're still dealing with information. People
28 (he COUNSEL of CHALCEDON
continually pour information on each other, without
using good judgment, compounding the overload.
So we find ourselves living in an ever more noisy world
where we are being driven apart from each other and
asked to deal with the increasing torrent of information
and activity in our lives as individuals separated from
community and from meaning itself. Those who do
not have Christ will not survive. They will succumb to
the meaninglessness, perhaps even revel in it, as they go
on suppressing the truth in unrighteousness. But what
of Christians? How are they to live in this postmodern
world without being postmodernists? In a postmodern
world, Christians in the 21
st
century can have one of
several responses:
Slfrrender - They can surrender, drowning in the
information, allowing it to be a distraction, robber,
and stress accumulator in their lives.
Addictioll and Cover Up - Some of those who
surrender to information overload also use it
as a shield behind which they either vegetate or
create one or many false personas as they interact
with the virtual world. This can be as benign as
participation in online forums where they suddenly
become theological experts, or as malignant as
immersion in the online pornography culture.
TFithdrt/J}Ja!- They can withdraw from technology,
throwing their televisions out the door and
disconnecting their internet service.
Dominion - Or they can take dominion over
information, as God has commanded.
Stlrrender is the most common response, and many
of those who surrender are not even aware of it.
Their lives are ruled by interruptions. They are like
pinballs bouncing off bumpers, reacting rather than
living. Those who have surrendered are ruled by their
schedules and information sources. They run around
willy nilly, trying to get the kids and themselves to all the
right places at the right times. They ask you to please
wait a minute while they answer their cell phones; they
use call waiting to switch between callers while leaving
you on hold; and they check their email and voice
mail incessantly. Often, wealth and affluence amplify
the problem, offering an even wider menu of choices
in media and adding the tyranny of "stuffitis" to the
picture. The challenges of too much information and
l!iforllJatioli Overload: The Search jodVIeallillg ill a Postmodem 1170rld
activity are replaced by the "right" information and the
"right" activities and having the "right" stuff.
The chaos of surrenderers may be visible to all, or it
may be well hidden. They may give the appearance
of being very organized with all their tools. They may
even really be very organized externally, having the
appearance of governing the information and activities
in their lives. However, the truth is that their lives aren't
within their own control. They are slaves to rather than
masters of their time and information commitments.
They are acting autonomously rather than according
to God's word. Rather than relating everything in
their lives to God and His word as a central anchor
point, they merely try to relate God to each individual
endeavor in their lives. Thus they live fragmented and
compartmentalized lives. Quentin Schultze, professor
of communications arts and sciences at Calvin College,
points out, quoting Vaclav Havel, "'with the loss of
God, man has lost a kind of absolute and universal
system of coordinates, to which he could
the very notion of identity itself.' Cyberspace is one
'place' where people can create so many contradictory
self-identities that they no longer have coherent self
and therefore no possibility for authenticity."6
U7ithdral)!al is the tactic of those Christians who
recognize the danger of surrender and addiction/ cover
up and choose instead to retreat altogether. They exist
somewhere along the continuum between refusal to own
or subscribe to any form of media and abstinence from
consuming any "secular" media. They either throw
their televisions out the door, or they only watch the 700
club, TBN, and Angel Network programming. They
leave their radios off, listening instead to only Christian
tapes and CD's, or they listen exclusively to "Christian"
radio. They often don't even read newspapers or
magazines. These Christians take the "touch not, taste
not" approach to media and information management.
At first glance, it would appear that this group has the
problem licked. They are no longer suffering from
information overload and letting media
and information rule them. But is this always relate anything, chiefly himself.'
As a result we live 'as if we were playing
for a number of different teams at once,
each with different uniforms, and as
though ... we didn't know which one we
ultimately belonged to, which of those
teams was really ours."s These people,
whether they seem externally chaotic or
organized, are fragmented inside, not
understanding how to relate the totality
Dominion is the
only appropriate
Christian response
to the postmodern
world ...
true? First, we must look to all their
other activities. Have they eliminated
their phones? Have they eliminated and
brought under control their participation
in the proliferation of various activities?
Often, they are just as busy, harried,
and hurried as everyone else. They are
of their lives to a single meaning and
purpose, how to bring their lives into subjection to God
through His word.
Addiction and cover tip are often the ultimate destination
of the surrenderers. These people get "hooked" on
cyberspace. They use it either as a tranquilizer or as
a stimulant, spending large amounts of time either
vegging out on mindless games and endless gossip
and news binges, participating in one or more online
communities via chat and discussion forums, or
"creating" and communicating themselves via online
diaries known as blogs (from web logs). They either
relinquish living at all in the vegetative response, or live
one or more inauthentic lives via the anonymous web.
Schultze, again quoting Havel, says "We 'merge with
the anonymous crowd' and 'flow comfortably along
with it down the river of pseudo-life. This is more than
a simple conflict between two identities,' concludes
Havel. 'It is something far worse: it is a challenge to
merely a new flavor of information and
activity slave. Some of them, though,
have truly brought all their activities into
balance and under control and are living simple lives.
Even then, they have not yet fully realized God's intent
for how we are to live in a cyber-culture that grows ever
more pervasive. Retreat is limited dominion. God
requires of us a dominion that presses the claims of
Christ into all of culture. If we withdraw, how will we
be salt and light?
DOll/illiOIl is the only appropriate Christian response to
the postmodern world, just as it has always been the
only appropriate response in every age. Christians are
given by God the work of dominion. This is recognized
by some in the modern evangelical church as the
"Dominion mandate," and by others as the "Cultural
Mandate." But any attempt to bring dominion and
order to our culture and world must begin first and
foremost with issues of self-discipline. In other words,
whatever we do to take dominion over information and
activities must involve self-control and changed habits.
the COUNSEL ofCHALCEDON 29
:---."-
Information Overload: The Search for Meaning ill a PostlJlodem Tf:7orld
Taking dominion over information overload is not a
science, and so I will not pretend to offer a formula
here for doing so. Rather, I am attempting to offer
a strategy, a Biblical principal, for approaching the
problem. While I will refer to some practical ideas here,
I will hold off on discussing most practical tactics. I will
address these in future articles where I will write about
taking dominion and finding meaning in postmodern
culture in specific ways, from time management to
technology management.
In order to take dominion, we must do exactly what
the postmodernist abhors and rejects. We must assign
meaning to information and to our existence. We are
the only group which has true meaning at our disposal.
God has revealed Himself and the meaning that He gives
the world to His people. In fact, we must proclaim and
extend that meaning to the world, influencing, shaping
and building culture. In a world where meaning has
been abandoned, the Gospel must shine forth. This
is our God given duty. And again, this process starts
with each individual and proceeds forth into the world
through the individual's family, church, and vocation,
permeating their community, state, nation, and world.
Thus we see the growth of the Biblical worldview
only through the changed lives of Christians. As more
and more lives are changed, gradually culture itself is
changed and rebuilt. We can only conquer the world
as the Gospel of Christ conquers individual hearts,
growing the Church, pressing the claims of Christ
upon all creation.
Christians, as they submit themselves to the word, will
bring order to each of these areas of influence, in this
order. They will first govern themselves, then their
families, and then their vocations and churches, building
culture as they go. Eventually, when there are enough
self governed people governing enough political,
vocational, philosophical, and aesthetic communities;
then states, nations, and the world will be influenced.
In order to begin obeying God's dominion mandate, we
must start with ourselves. We must bring ourselves in
subjection to the word of God and live by His law. And
we can only do this as we take advantage of the means
of grace He has provided for us. One of the first
things we must do is be sure we are not acting in the
world as individuals. We must not forsake the gathering
together of ourselves in corporate worship. We must
live within the context of God's covenant people, His
visible church. It is there that we find the community
30 (he COUNSEL of CHALCEDON
within which to contextualize information. And it is
there - as we participate in the means of grace, sitting
under the faithful preaching of the word and partaking
of the sacraments rightly administered - that we gain
the only meaning that can bring order to chaos.
Rather than looking for meaning in the floods of
information that confront us, we find meaning in the
community of believers, in God's word, and in God
Himself. Rather than trying to figure out how to relate
God to all the divergent activities and interests in our
lives, we begin to relate our lives to God. We start with
meaning first, rather than information and activity, and
we suddenly find that, through the renewing of our
minds in Christ, we begin to make sense of the world
and its information. We no longer search for meaning
in the information and activities. As God's covenant
people, meaning has found us. We merely have to
embrace that meaning and relate all the other facts of
the world to it. "Ultimately all the facts of the universe
are either what they are because of their relation to the
system of truth set forth in Scripture or they are not.
In every discussion about every fact, therefore, it is the
two principles, that of the believer in Scripture and
that of the non-Christian, that stand over against one
another," writes Van Til.7 Or, as Abraham Kuyper put
it, "there is not one square inch of the entire creation
about which Jesus Christ does not cry out, 'This is mine,
this belongs to me."'8 Because the earth is the Lord's,
and the fullness thereof, therefore all the facts that exist
are created by and redeemed by Christ, from whom, to
whom, and through whom are all things.
Being confronted and subdued by true meaning in
Christ, we find, as John Calvin wrote, "Nearly all the
wisdom we possess, that is to say, true and sound
wisdom, consists of two parts: the lmowledge of God
and of ourselves."9 In our quest to take dominion
over information, we must begin with knowledge of
God, but before we venture forth, there is additional
understanding we must acquire. Not only must we
understand God and His revelation about Himself, we
must also understand His revelation about ourselves. We
must understand who, according to God, man is - who
we are. In this context, we learn about our sinfulness
and the sin-principal against which all Christians do
battle. We also learn that we are created to work, to
have a vocational calling in Christ. We must know
what God has placed us on earth to be and what He
has placed us on earth to do before we can understand
what activity and information is appropriate. Only then
Illformatioll Overload: The Search for Mealling in a Post modem H
7
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can we begin to eliminate clutter from our agendas and
info-glut from our routines. We do this by applying
God's word, His law-word, to every area of life.
In order to understand ourselves by God's standard, we
must begin with humility. True knowledge of ourselves
- true meaning about ourselves - demands this. Once
we have been subdued by true meaning in and about
Christ, we see ourselves as sinners. We come to we
realize that, even on that day of our lives when we've
lived as righteously as we will ever live on this earth, our
righteousness is still like filthy rags compared with the
righteousness of Christ. Even on that very best day we
will ever live, we still need the righteousness of Christ
in order to be accepted by God, since only perfect
righteousness will satisfy Him. In fact, we realize that
even on that most righteous day of our lives, the only
thing good about what we've done is still beyond our
doing. It derives its goodness from God's grace and not
our actions. Clothed with the proper humility, we will
go forth carefully, understanding that
If we have started with humility, we easily conclude,
as we must, that we cannot not know everything. We
cannot consume all information. Google, the most
popular search site on the internet at the time of this
writing, currently indexes just over three billion web
pages. How much time would it take to even count
to three billion, much less to read the information on
three billion pages or attempt to assimilate it? No, if we
have gained a right knowledge of ourselves, we will not
feel that we need to nor indeed can know everything, or
even a very small portion of everything.
All we really need to know is how to go about locating
knowledge when and if we need to know it rather
than attempting to accumulate all the information that
comes our way. At that point when we actually need the
information, then we can go to the internet, or a real
live expert, and find it. We can find out as much of it as
we actually need for the moment. We can remember it
for as long as we need to for the present need, and then
promptly forget it if we won't need the
we are fallible, that we cannot assume
to play with fire without getting burned.
We will guard our hearts.
Not only must we depend on Christ's
righteousness to bring any good into
our lives, but we must realize that He
has purchased our very lives. He lived
the righteous life we could not, and He
also died on the cross to propitiate the
... "our lives become
database produc-
tions that deliver
knowledge in the future. But we won't
be able to begin making decisions about
what we need to know until we have
learned who we are in Christ and what is
His calling is for our lives. When we are
operating within that calling, with minds
renewed by our reading His word and
hearing it faithfully preached, then we
can see what information is important
to us and what is not.
whatever informa-
tion is called for in a
given context./I
wrath of God against our sin. Thus He
purchased us for His own possession. We are not our
own. As a result, we are not to go forth into the world
seeking to do that which pleases us. We must instead
learn God's vocational calling for our lives, what it is
that God has created us to do. We all share common
vocations. While young, we may rely on the fact that
we are called by God to be children and students.
Women are called to be help-meets, mothers, and home
executives. Men are called to be husbands, providers,
shepherds, and fathers. But beyond our common
vocations, we receive by God's providence our specific
vocations. We may be preachers, teachers, lawyers,
bus drivers, or business owners. At each stage of our
lives, we must apply our dominion over information
in the context of these callings. If we do not know
who we are in Christ and what he has called us to do
in this world in our common and specific vocations, we
will forever be plagued by indecision and information
overload, often being led to "paralysis by analysis."
In order to take dominion over ourselves and thus over
our interaction with information and activities, we must
apply the standard of God's perfect law to our lives and
our interactions. We must bring all the commandments
to bear on the problem. So, as we interact with the flow
of data and activities in our lives, we cannot surrender or
let it consume us for then we have made unto ourselves
gods, and the law tells us we must have no other god
but God. If we devote too much of ourselves and our
time to the flow of data, then data has become our idol.
We must also not become addicted to the noise, or use
it to cover up our attempts to become all things to all
people, shapeshifters recreating ourselves at whim. As
Schultze writes, when we do this, "our lives become
database productions that deliver whatever information
is called for in a given context." Instead God's law
requires us to, as Schultze points out, "know who we
are, to present that known self to others, and to avoid
persona-building activities."l0 Why? Because to do
the COUNSEL ofCHALCEDON 31
llIjomJation Overload: The Search jorlvIealling ill a PostJJlodem lf70rld
otherwise is to bear false witness as well as to make
ourselves over in our own image, rather than in God's
image, thus violating the first commandment as well as
the second. We must limit our input to that which is
sincere and to those things that are useful to our calling
and roles in life. We must not commit adultery via sterile
means such as the internet and we must not covet as the
result of advertising and other media images.
If the law of God is being applied, then what, in a more
descriptive sense, does a life of God given meaning
look like in the postmodern cyber culture?
In a word, it looks quiet.
As God exhorts us in Psalm 46:10, Be still, and kllOIJJ that I
am God: I Ivill be exalted among the heathet7, I Ivill be exalted in
the earth. The still or quiet life is a life of rest, grounded
in God's sovereignty. God rested and is resting because
He created perfectly. As Rushdoony wrote, "not a hair
nor an atom can go astray or afield in His predestined
work of creation, redemption, and re-creation. God's
rest is thus an expression of His sovereignty and of the
absoluteness of His government. Man cannot govern
absolutely any aspect of his life or world, but he can
rest in the fact that his God and Savior does govern
absolutely and rests in His government. Only widl such
a faith and with such a God can man rest."l1
Thus, God tells us in Psalm 107:25-30:
For He spoke and raised /tp a stom!) IJJil1tl, U7hich lifted
ttp the }vaves of the sea. ThV' rose tip to the heavens,
thry }vent dOlJJn to the depths; Their sottllllelted aJJJqJ in
their misery. Thry reeled and staggered like a dmnkeJl
man, And Ivere at their IVits' end. Then thry cried to the
LORD in their trouble, And He brought thelJl Otlt of
their distresses. He cat/sed the storm to be still, So that the
)vaves of the sea }vere hushed. Then thry }JJere glad became
thry )vere qtliet; So He gNided them to their desired havetl.
As one begins to attempt to quiet his life, he sees that
God has indeed, as He declares in Ecclesiastes 3:1,
appointed a time for everything, including A time to
be silent, and a time to speak (Bccl. 3:7b). Kevin l'vIiller
writes, "it is important to recognize that information
must not only be managed, but also dethroned."12 In
dethroning information, we can employ many tactics
while simultaneously restoring important disciplines to
our lives.
3 2 the COUNSEL of CHALCEDON
The quiet life isn't obtained by backing off, or letting go.
It isn't a passive quietness, but an active quietness. It is
obtained by work The quiet life is contemplative. It
is a life of reflection and prayer. It is a life of thinking
and sustained concentration. Quiet living allows, no
requires, us to listen more than we talk A noisy person
doesn't listen because no one can ever say much to
them. As Schultze says on his web site, "our lives today
are technologically rich and relation ally poor." Another
way he puts it is, "Lacking wisdom, we are becoming
'technologically rich' and 'communication poor."'13
The quiet life is sincere. It is introspective. It knows
itself and thus communicates itself honestly to others.
What you see is mostly what you get. The quiet life is
not full of surprises. It has learned to plan ahead for
what can be anticipated and for the unanticipated.
But how does one begin to implement the quiet life?
One of the more obvious ways is to obey God's
commandment regarding Sabbath rest. JVfJl son, do /lot
forget II!) teaching, Btlt let yo/f1' heart keep 11!) commandments;
For length of dq)'S and years of life, And peace thV' Ivill add to
YON. (prov. 3:1-2) One whole day in seven, we should
come aside from the world and its whirlwind and be
still and know that He is God. Kevin Miller writes:
At least one day a week, we must rest from
gathering information just as the ancient Israelites
rested from gathering wood. We must still our
racing minds and rest our information-soaked
souls. By so doing, we declare that humans cannot
live by information alone, but by every word that
proceeds from the mouth of God.
14
In addition to this, Schultze writes, we can pick out
certain pieces of information such as emails and set
them aside for further contemplation. We can schedule
time just for this purpose. We might even set alarms on
our cell phones, PDA's, or watches to call "us out of our
busyness into solitude. We can also consume less news,
giving us more time to consider the meaning and impact
of particular news stories."15 Shultze continues:
Amidst all our messaging willi friends and
colleagues, we will sometimes hear whispers of
pain, doubt, and fear. If we can teach ourselves to
pick up on this evidence of people's needs, we can
then pursue the kind of dialogue in person or on
llie telephone that enables us to empathize.
16
InforlJlatioli Overload: The Search forlYleallillg ill a Postmodem /T7orld
These "whispers of pain" are not only encountered
in messaging. We also see them in other personal
transactions when we are often too busy or hurried
to stop and focus on the person's need. Busyness
often makes us feel more important at the expense of
the needs of others. Another tactic in seeking to live
quieter lives is that of the media fast. We hear again
from Kevin Miller:
In Tabletalk (November 2000), commentator
Ken Myers wisely writes: " ... we should regularly
practice media fasts: days or weeks during
which we reduce the flood of information we
receive to the merest tricHe. Not only will such
a practice enable us to set our knowledge in
perspective, it also will help us recognize the
love/hate relationship we have with information
overload. We say we are frustrated by having
so much to respond to, but we still carry cell-
phones everywhere and check our e-mail every 10
minutes. It makes us feel important to be so busy.
Media fasts should help us become more honest
about our motivations."
If we read at all during a media fast, we limit
ourselves to something that nourishes the soul
- slowly, meditatively.
In the presence of God, we really must lose our
insecurity about knowing everything, our anxiety
about not being able to keep up. In God's presence,
we develop the peaceful spirit that is of such
value in his sight, the quiet wisdom that orders
knowledge. Jack Trout, in The POIver 0/ Simplicity,
quotes a scholar from George Mason University
that today, " ... the comparative advantage shifts
from those with information glut to those with
ordered knowledge, from those who can process
vast amounts of throughput to those who can
explain what is worth knowing, and why." 17
The life that is lived without taking dominion looks
noisy and chaotic. It is characterized by noise in terms
of stimulus as well as response. It is a noisy life in the
midst of a noisy world. The life lived taking dominion
looks quiet. Ids a life that has discovered the relationship
between community and meaning. It has discovered
that meaning is given by God, not information. To put
it another way, in examining ourselves on this issue, the
life of dominion feels quiet. ThOll Ivilt keep hi/lJ ill peifect
peace, JJJhose mind is sfc!yed on thee: becallse he tn/steth in thee.
(Is. 26:3) It produces no chaos or noise on its own and
has learned how to still the waters of the noise around
it. How quiet does your life feel?
The endless ()Ide 0/ idea alld actioll,
Endless invention, eJldless experilllent,
Brillgs kllo)JJledge 0/ motiol2, bllt Ilot of stil!!1ess;
KIlOlvledge 0/ speech, bllt Ilot of silence;
Kllo)J;/edge 0/ }vords, alld ignorance 0/ the JT
7
0rd.
All 0111' knOlv!edge brings liS nearer to 0111' ignorance,
AI! 0111' igllorance btillgs tiS marer to death,
Bllt neamess to death 110 Ilea reI' to GOD.
Wbere is the Life JJJe have lost in living?
U7bere is tbe }JJisdolJJ IJJe have lost in klloJJJledge?
JT7here is the klloJJJledge IJJe have lost ill informatioll?
The O'des 0/ Heaven in tl}Jenty cel1tmies
Bling liS fartherfrom GOD alld nearer to tbe Dust.
- T.S. Eliot: Choruses from "The Rock"
Mark Anthony is the RPCUS mission worker for River
Valley Reformed Presbyterian l'vlission in Russellville,
Arkansas. He is also managing editor of the COl/lise! of
Cha!cedoll and The Nell) SOllthern RelJieJJJ. He
lives in Dardanelle, Arkansas with Meri, his wife of 16 years, and
their two children, Catherine (8) and David (6).
(Endnotes)
1 Georges Anderla. Iliformatioll ill 1985. Paris, OECD, 1973.
2 \V\V\v.franklincovey.com/ fclearning/index.html
3 Naisbitt,John. hIegatrelids. Warner Books: New York, 1982
Boland, R.J. Ciitica! Isslles ill Ill/orlllatioll S)'StelJ/s Research, R. J.
Boland and R. A. Hirschheim (eds.) , Wile}, Chichester, England,
1987. 377.
5 Schultze, Quentin. "Being Authentic in Webs of Spin." Reforllled
Presb)'teliall lT7itlless. September, 2002.
6 Ibid.
7 Van Til, Cornelius, and Eric H. Sigward. The Jf
7
0rks of Come!illJ
Vati Til, 1895-1987. electronic ed. New York: Labels Army Co.,
1997.
R Kuyper, Abraham. From his Sovereignty address at the opening
of the Free University of Amsterdam, 1880, as quoted by multiple
authors.
9 McNeill, John T., ed. Ca!J;ill: IIlStitlltes of the Ch,istiall Religioll.
Translated by Ford Lewis Battles. Volume XX of the Library of
Christian Classics. Westminster Press, Philadelphia, 1960. 35.
10 Schultze, Ibid.
11 Rushdoony, Rousas John. Lalli alld Society. Volume II of the
Institutes of Biblical La\v. Ross House Books, Vallecito, California.
1986. 48.
12 l'vliller, Kevin. http://w\V\v.christianitytoday.com/le/2001/002/
15.80.html.
13 Schultze. http://\V\V\v.calvin.edu/
H Miller. Ibid.
15 Schultze. "Being Authentic in Webs of Spin."
16 Ibid.
17 l'vliller. Ibid.
the COUNSEL of CHALCEDON 33