Part 3: Our Technology...

My first computer was an IBM 286 running some version of DOS. It had WordPerfect 5.1 and Lotus 123. It didn’t have a mouse or even a hard drive.

Some time later we got Macintosh Classic computers with 20 megabyte hard drives (that’s megabytes not gigabytes). We thought we had died and gone to heaven. The Mac back in 1990 had MS Word and Excel. It was the bomb!! Today, I have an original Mac Classic in my office at home. It still boots. I’m tempted to sell it on e-bay or turn it into a fish tank – I can’t decide...

Today, I have a top of the line (at least it was when I bought it last summer) Dell XPS system. I have 1.75 terabytes of hard drive storage that I use for pictures, music, ripped DVDs, spreadsheets, lesson plans, financial records back to 1994, scanned stuff (I scan everything – I hate paper) and even the occasional word document. I have a Wi-Fi network that runs my wife’s laptop, my Linux machine (I really like Linux – watch out Microsoft & Apple), a laser printer, and my photo printer. We have three iPods, two digital cameras, a scanner, several external hard drives, three DVD burners and a network attached storage drive to back everything up. My internet is the fastest available in my area. I can download a 2 gigabyte movie from iTunes in less than 15 minutes. I’m getting exited just talking about it!!

You may ask why I choose to write about our technology in relation to Our World and Our Worth. For me to answer this I need to refer back to scripture.

Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world. Amen.

Jesus gave his disciples two commandments in these verses. The first was for them to teach all nations the gospel and the second was to teach them to keep his commandments. The members of the church back then had two missions:

• Proclaim the gospel (aka. teach all nations)
• Perfect the saints (aka. keep his commandments)

Jesus was talking to 11 guys who had no special abilities or talents. These 11 guys had no idea how to teach everyone in the world. How would you accomplish this?

Back then there was no way to really do this. Paul would get a letter from Corinth that took months to deliver; he would write a letter back, that letter would take months to deliver. The early members of the church didn’t have scriptures as we know them today. There was no bible as we know it. A member in Corinth would have been lucky to have a hand-me-down copy of the book of Mark (Mark is considered the first written gospel). Ultimately, Mormons believe the early church was lost to the world and we were left to the dark ages. Why this falling away occurred is the subject of another blog...

In the early 1800s Joseph Smith was given another commandment in addition to the other two I mentioned before – he was commanded to redeem the dead. Now we have three commandments:

• Proclaim the gospel
• Prefect the saints
• Redeem the dead

Mormons are responsible for teaching everyone who’s living right now, perfecting themselves, and now they have redeem everyone who has ever lived. I won’t get into the process of redeeming the dead other than it occurs in our temples. Back then there was literally no way to accomplish this.

Today, this can be done. We have computers that can track generations of genealogy. We can communicate instantly with anyone in the world. I can download all of conference and listen to it on my iPod from LDS.org. The scriptures have been indexed electronically to teachings of modern prophets. I can check my own ward’s calendar so I know when the next Cub Scout meeting is. It’s amazing.

Today, computers and databases can keep track of billions of records. In fact, most modern home computers could... Today, we can keep the whole church together with LDS.org. If someone in Africa wants to find out about the church they could google Mormons and they would get everything they need.

All of this wonderful technology was inspired and created for the express purpose of us fulfilling the commandments of the Lord to proclaim the gospel, perfect the saints and redeem the dead.

I think it’s just amazing!

I think it’s important to put our technology in its proper place. We have the internet and powerful computers to further the work of the Lord. iTunes is just a nice offshoot of this.