It is the glory of God to conceal things, but the glory of kings is to search things out.

Proverbs 25:2

So here I am back to writing directly to my iPhone. Don’t worry, there’s no problem with my computer (an Apple MacBook Air). It’s Rebekah’s laptop that’s on the Fritz, so she’s using mine.

Her Dell, which has been acting out ever since she retired from WFPC, believes in its heart of hearts – or at least in its CPU, or settings, or something – that it is still connected to the WFPC network drive, and that WFPC controls its inner working.

The computer has started “losing” documents, making files disappear, and taking unsanctioned breaks where it either does nothing, offers “the white screen of death”, or shuts itself down completely. We suspect it is “quiet-quitting.” So we had to let it go.

Meanwhile, I have purchased another MacBook for Rebekah (arriving by Friday), so hopefully she won’t be jerked around so much by her tech anymore.

For now she’s working at home late into the night to catch up. And yes, for those of you who thought preachers only work Sunday mornings, ministry is absolutely not a part-time job!

This is a long-form odyssey:

I remember our first computer, back around 1987. We purchased a classic Apple IIe and it cost – with my “Apple for the teacher” discount – somewhere north of $3,000. Rebekah was hunched over the keyboard, frustrated with the infernal machine’s lack of cooperation, when a little hand touched her on the shoulder: “Don’t worry Mama,”Andrew (five) said; “it just takes some people longer than others.”

This is our issue with technology. Eventually we figured it out… but then they changed it all. We figured it out again. Then they changed it some more.

Sometimes I wish the Silicone Valley folk would just leave well enough alone!

All we want to do is process a few words. And use the Internet. And work with our photographs. So why do they shove a bagful of gremlins inside every time they sell a new one?

I guess it’s like the scriptures say, “It is the glory of God to conceal things, but the glory of kings is to search things out.”

And, while we are certainly not gods, it turns out we’re not really kings all that much either….

Sigh. – Derek