But all is not lost. I realized today that I have hundreds of iPods of a sort, and that I buy about four of these every week or two. They are called MyBooks, or you might call them “myPods.” Yes, I buy books, and more books, and more again. And I confess to being easily tempted. Already this week I purchased three—two by Christian theologian Meredith Kline (Images of the Spirit, and God, Heaven, and Har Magedon: A Covenantal Tale of Cosmos and Telos) and one by Jon D. Levenson, Professor of Jewish Studies at Harvard (Resurrection and the Restoration of Israel: The Ultimate Victory of the God of Life). Do I need these books? What a horrid question! How dare you! Actually, I don’t need them, but I sure do want them, for there are few things that more deeply benefit, entertain, and empower me than fine books by persons whose elegance of mind enthralls me.

So what is to be learned from all of this? First, it is not wrong to be entertained or to delight in gadgets. God created an enjoyable world, and as Kohelet says, “Here is what I have seen to be good and fitting: to eat, to drink and enjoy oneself in all one’s labor in which he toils under the sun during the few years of his life which God has given him; for this is his reward” (5:18). But I fear we live in the most entertained generation ever, and many of us can say with Hamlet: “O God, God, How weary, stale flat, and unprofitable seem to me all the uses of this world.”

Second, besides being entertained, we need to be edified, to be built up, and we need to experience again and again the joy of building up others. With that in mind, I counsel all of us to buy—or to borrow from the library or a friend—good books and devote hours each week to good reading. And while you’re at it, don’t forget to make time to read the Book of Books, for there is no mind as elegant as the mind of God.