This post will also be published in The Vermilion Standard.

Scientists are currently working on Artificial Intelligence with an intensive curiosity.  The Mount Everest of robotics and computer programming, artificial life is the challenge of creating a machine that is self-aware, has emotions, and experiences love.  This sounds like an interesting and noble goal but it comes with profound ethical questions that must be reflected upon in advance of this exploration – at least that is what should happen and yet, like most scientific curiosities, ethics take a back shelf to the curiosity of possibility.

We, the potential creators, users, and consumers of technology and artificial intelligence, need to ask ourselves the following questions: “Is it ethical to create something to love if we have no intention, or follow through, to love it in return?  Is it okay to create something to feel the emotion of attachment, commitment, sacrifice and undying affection, if in return, we respond with consumer distance and perishable affection?”

This is an ethical question for our new emerging age.  The fact is, if we create a machine that could feel this way with some sort of self-aware consciousness and then abandon it with impunity once the novelty of the experience is over, it would be as cruel as it would be inevitable, given our human selfish tendencies.

Whether this technological advancement is a possibility or not is still up for debate but it does lead to another discussion.  It causes us to consider our creator and the fact that God created us with the ability to love in an expression of our free will.  In fact, we are created to love God, others, and creation and live in unbroken relationship between these three realities – a reality we are all guilty of falling short of.
Our creator created us to love but, unlike the potential creators of artificial life, God did so with the ability, intention, and follow-through to love us and stay committed to us – demonstrated by sending Jesus, His One and Only Son to save and rescue us.

John 3:16 says: “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”

God is not a consumer God who created us in disposable fashion.  Rather, God created us as free human beings to live forever with him, even entering our existence (Jesus Christ), demonstrating his love for us and rescuing humanity from sin and death.

I want you to know that God loves you.  I want you to know that God has not abandoned you.  I want you to know that in Jesus Christ, abundant and eternal life is possible.  In Jesus Christ, you can know real life…not just artificial life.

This post will also be published in The Vermilion Standard.

I want to introduce two new phrases into your vocabulary.  The first is “infinite complexity.”  This phrase refers to the complexity of our natural world and its seemingly infinite complex nature.  Whether it is the complexity of the macro or the micro, our natural world is intricately complex.  It seems that the more we understand the universe in its immense size and structure, the more infinitely complex it appears.  Additionally, the more we understand about the micro nature of the human body, biology, DNA, etc., the more infinitely complex it appears.  Our world bears the traits of seemingly infinite complexity that heralds an infinitely complex creator.

The second phrase is “infinite complacency” referring to humanity’s seemingly infinite desire for complacency.   We don’t like change!  People who say they like change typically like change in areas they don’t mind changing, but when change strikes something they love or desire, they definitely do not welcome it.  Humanity, in different degrees, doesn’t like change.  The challenge with this universal trait is that we can become complacent.

Consider the act of buying a used vehicle.  There are things you will instantly notice that you will want to change.  For example, a knob that doesn’t work, a speaker that is intermittent, etc.  The very things that you, as the new vehicle owner, can’t stand and demand your immediate attention are the very things that someone else was comfortable with and grew complacent about.

This reality extends to all life.  It extends to our physical health, our emotional wellbeing, our marriages, our families, our careers, and, yes, even our spiritual lives.

We are all tempted to get stuck in the infinite complacency of life and the routines that, although they may be unhealthy, unfruitful, and unproductive, we continue nonetheless because we are inherently complacent.

I want to challenge you out of the infinite complacency of life that you have been drawn into.  I want to encourage you out of the ruts that years of regularity have formed and create healthy disturbances, rocking yourself out of unhealthy complacency.

Consider the unique skill of getting unstuck from the snow in a Canadian winter.   The skilled and controlled rocking of a vehicle creates the disturbance needed to help release it from snow’s icy grip.  The same is true of life, we need to take time and consider our situation, recognize we may be stuck and slowly and steadily rock ourselves out of that complacency.

To do this, I want to suggest that you consider reflecting on your life and asking the following questions:

1. If you were to look at your family, marriage, health, emotional state, spiritual life, etc. from the perspective of an outsider, what would you see? 
2. If you had a friend whose life looked exactly like yours, what advice would you give them?  Should you consider taking your own advice?
3. If you were to change one thing about your family, health, emotional state, spiritual life, what would it be?
4. Do you live life with purpose, meaning, and freedom?  Are you trapped by guilt, shame, or other people’s perceptions?

Then, consider one small thing that you can do to begin to rock yourself free.  Begin small and move yourself out of the grasp of complacency that may have you trapped.

This process is helpful in all areas of your life, but it is especially beneficial in your spiritual life.  When you consider your life’s purpose, your relationship with God, and your life, where are you?  Are you stuck in complacency or are you moving towards vibrancy?

There is a story in the Bible of Jesus meeting a woman at a well (where ancient people would go daily for water) who was stuck in complacency (John 4).  The woman’s life was a shameful mess and Jesus met her at a well and offered her a way out of her complacent shameful life.  Jesus offered the woman what he offers all who meet him, living water—forgiveness, freedom, and a relationship with God through Christ Jesus by faith.

Today, I want to challenge you out of your infinite complacency and into a vibrant relationship with an infinitely complex God through His Son Jesus Christ.  This is living water from a well that will never run dry.  This is the infinite vibrancy out of the infinite complacency that you may be stuck in.
This is Jesus’ invitation to you – vibrancy is possible!

When we serve food to the poor but don’t eat with them, we miss the point. 

Too often, we see our acts of charity as a task to be accomplished rather than an opportunity to open ourselves to others.  Scripture calls us to love the poor, the outcast, and the forgotten.  However, the love spoken of is not a love filled with acts of charity void of true hospitality.  Rather, they are acts of love filled with shared life, acted through shared bread.   To give food without fellowship is to short-change God’s desire and the act of pure love.

Consider Jesus, the Son of God, who touched lepers, cared for prostitutes and shared his life with others who were ostracized by society.  Jesus was a friend of sinners and in the context of His day, this title was seen with negative connotations and accusations.  God calls us to care for the least of these as we would care for Jesus himself (Matthew 25).  We are not called to care and love as a task of interruption to be reluctantly accomplished but as a growing lifestyle of open hospitality and enacted love.

We are called to be a generous people, caring for the poor and outcast.  We are called to scandalously love all with open arms and big hearts.  These acts of shared life are not simply acts we do but acts bursting forth from who we are.  We are called to be people who are friends of sinners, friends of the poor, and friends of the forgotten in such a way that we share life with them.  In fact, Scripture (Matthew 25) calls us to treat the “least of these” as we would Jesus himself; this reality implies that we would show true hospitality and shared life rather than simply the isolated offer of food or clothing.

Too often our acts of charity can become twisted acts of power.   Charity is important but if it solely serves to remind us of what we have to be grateful for or to relieve the guilt of what we have, it seductively serves to gather power rather than relinquish it.  True acts of love relinquish power and accept others in need as our equals.  We love because God first loved us (1 John 4:19).  Our love should resemble a humble relinquishing of power through generous charity, wrapped in shared hospitality.

When we serve food to the poor and don’t eat with them, we miss the point.  Let’s generously help others in need, but let’s do so with shared life in the way Jesus did and commanded us to follow.