Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - Distracting Ourselves to Death | Historical Books | Isaiah 44:6-23

Episode Date: December 10, 2025

Are you distracted by your phone? Where is most of your screen time spent? Do you idolize your phone? In today's episode, Jensen shares how Isaiah 44:6-23 encourages you to turn your eyes away from your phone and up towards God. Read the Bible with us in 2026! This year, we’re exploring the Gospels—Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Download your reading plan now. Your support makes TMBT possible. Ten Minute Bible Talks is a crowd-funded project. Join the TMBTeam to reach more people with the Bible. Give now. Like this content? Make sure to leave us a rating and share it so that others can find it, too. Use #asktmbt to connect with us, ask questions, and suggest topics. We'd love to hear from you! To learn more, visit our website and follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter @TenMinuteBibleTalks. Don't forget to subscribe to the TMBT Newsletter here. Passages: Isaiah 44:6-23

Welcome to 10-minute Bible Talks, where we connect the Bible to your life. And the time it takes to get to work. I'm Jensen Holt McNair. If you walked into an airport, a grocery store, a train station, a doctor's office, a middle school, a church, a gym, or a mall, you would see one thing. Besides obviously people, in every single place. People going on walks, people waiting for a train, plane, bus, people playing with their kids, sitting on a bench, hearing a sermon, learning algebra, watching a television show. more often than not, they all have something in common. A shining beacon of information, entertainment, and distraction in the palm of their hand.

The smartphone. Right now, I'd guess, at least 95% of you are listening to me right now from your smartphone. And you know what? That's great. Smartphones have the ability to connect people from all over the world, to allow you to learn about God, to read scripture, listen to worship music at any moment in time. There are obviously positives to this advancement in technology, for sure. But my guess is that the majority of your screen time, the majority of time you are pulled back into the numbing gaze of your phone.

It probably isn't to fill you up with biblical teaching. It probably isn't even mostly to do the amazing practical things that your smartphone can do, like be a calculator, give you directions, let your mom know you're headed home, tell you the weather or let you know how much money you have left in your bank account? No, I'd guess the majority of the time that you spend on your phone is on apps like TikTok, Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook, substack, Safari, Chrome, Netflix, email, games, or the news. See, the people who designed the small rectangular devices in our pockets, who created their technology, who made the apps that populate our home screens,

they have an agenda. They want to make money. And the way they make money is not by selling phones or apps, but by selling you, your time. Your attention is being sold to advertisers, which means the small rectangular device in your pocket is powered by some of the smartest people in the world, whose primary aim is to keep you locked in on your phone in their apps for as long as they possibly can. Have you ever opened your phone to check a message? And then 30 minutes or two hours later realized that you got sucked in. Hopped on social media to check a notification and then burned an hour watching funny videos. Checked your email and ended up shopping for Christmas decor because it's on sale today only. See, it's sneaky. It's highly motivated. And it is

incredibly good at what it is designed to do. Capture your attention. and sell it to the highest bidder. We all have 24 hours every day. I have 24 hours every day. And until very recently, my average daily screen time was five to six hours a day. I'm like only awake for a max of 15 hours a day.

That means a third of my day or more was spent looking at my phone. Again, it's not that everything I'm looking at is evil or horrible. It's that when I'm looking at my phone, I'm not looking at what is right in front of me. I'm distracting myself from reality, from my work, from the person across from me, from rest, from my husband, from my kids, from God. See, we've become so distracted, pulled away from the present by the pings on our phone,

that we miss out on connecting with our real lives happening in front of us. We miss out on connecting with God. In Isaiah 44, Isaiah gives a portion of this chapter to confronting the idolatry, that is plaguing the world he lives in. In his day and age, that idolatry took the shape of physical idols, fashioned out of wood and metals that would have represented gods. And those gods would have been believed to be in control of things like the sun, fertility, rain, war, things that made their life run that ruled the economy and stability of his current time. People worshipping, giving their lives over to things that felt incredibly important, incredibly normal,

in their context. Now, I think if Isaiah were to write this portion of scripture in our time, he would easily swap the imagery of carved idols with smartphones. Let's dive into this passage and see if Isaiah's words can speak into our context. Isaiah begins with three verses setting the stage, declaring the supremacy of God as the only God. He says, thus says the Lord, the King of Israel, and his Redeemer, the Lord of hosts, I am the first and I am the last. Besides me, there is no God. He finishes these verses declaring, is there a God besides me? There is no rock. I know not any. So here we have this declaration, a reminder of who God is. He is outside of time, creator of all things, king of Israel, Redeemer.

In the middle verse, he reminds them that none is like him. He apportioned, he upholds, people, he sets the world and all that is in it into motion. And then, right after this proclamation of God's supremacy, his majesty, there's none like him, he turns to examine the ways of those who foolishly create and worship idols. He gives multiple examples, but the one of the carpenter is what we're going to focus on today. He helps us visualize this carpenter who chooses a tree. He He lets it grow. The rain nourishes it as it grows stronger. And then he cuts it down. Some of the tree he puts into the fire to warm his house, to bake his bread. And some of it, he fashions into a god and worships. He makes it an idol and falls down before it.

Isaiah wants us to truly see the folly of what is happening here. So he repeats the premise again in verse 16 and 17. half of it, the tree, half of it he burns in the fire. Over the half he eats meat. He roasts it and is satisfied. Also he warms himself and says, ah, I am warm. I have seen the fire. And the rest of it, he makes into a god, his idol and falls down to it and worships it. He prays to it and says, Deliver me for you are my God. And Isaiah finishes by passing judgment on the folly of this man's ways. No one considers, nor is there knowledge or discernment to say, half of it, I burned in the fire, I also baked bread on its coals, I roasted meat and have eaten, and shall I make the rest of it an abomination, shall I fall down before a block of wood? He feeds on ashes. A diluted heart has led him astray,

and he cannot deliver himself or say, is there not a lie in my right hand? No one considers, no one has discernment to recognize the folly to recognize that they are falling down before a block of wood, wood that only grew because the true God watered it and caused it to grow. Those who fall before blocks of wood, they feed on ashes. They have deluded hearts that lead them astray. Tell them the block of wood is worthy of worship, good for eating, for feeding the soul. He cannot deliver himself. He cannot say, is there not a lie in my right hand? I wonder if this is true for you and me. Is there not a lie in my right hand? A shiny screen that tells me it can offer me comfort. It can offer me acceptance that if I give myself over to it, it can give me validation, make me feel worthy as I see

likes, messages, praise from others. It promises connection. It promises to distract me from boredom, from pain, from discomfort, from awkward social situations. It promises to deliver me into a world joy and fun and entertainment, but it's all a lie. See, smartphone use is linked to increased rates and anxiety and depression. Smartphone use disconnects us from the people in front of us rather than connecting us. It keeps us from engaging, speaking to, loving, caring for, even seeing the human beings right before us. Rather than giving us things of value, it distracts us from the true giver of life. Our idolatrous love of that small rectangular box in our pocket has us blind.

We cannot see the lie. We give our lives over to it. We cannot see the folly of worshipping and fawning over an image rather than the creator. We've not woken up to the fact that the thing we seek comfort from has no power to deliver us. With our eyes locked on our screens, We feed our soul on ashes and images when we were created to feast on the beauty, the majesty, and the glory of God. But the idea of calling out the lie, of turning off the phone, of removing the app, stepping away from social media, seems insane. I couldn't. What if I'm needed? What if I need it? See, my home church is going through a sermon series on experiencing God. And each week we're learning about a spiritual practice or discipline that could help us to experience God.

And one week was on digital sobriety. Each day, we were guided through turning off notifications, then making our phones gray scale, then removing entertainment apps, and finally, deleting email and internet browsers from our phones. It was painful to do. Truly, I felt pained. My phone, a source of entertainment distraction, comfort being stripped of its abilities. The small rectangular screen in my pocket was exposed for what it was. A tool to be used when needed, but not a master, not an idol to be worshipped, a God to give my life over to.

Turns out when you only use your phone as a tool for whether to text your husband that you're headed home to catch up with a friend intentionally or get directions, you get hours of your life back. You start to notice all the times you would have turned to your phone rather than sit on the floor and play hot wheels with your kids. You recognize the ways that God has blessed you, that He's growing you, that he's present. You free up five hours of your day, that you can give over to serving, to loving, to intentionally meeting with God. It is painful to admit that you've given your life over to a lie, an idol,

a God who cannot deliver on its promises. It is painful to strip it from your life, but when it is replaced with a giver of true life, it's worth it. So Isaiah, he doesn't stop here. He ends with that reminder, a reminder from the Lord to his people as they fight to follow him

and not the idols of their day. Remember these things, O Jacob, and Israel, for you are my servant. I formed you. You are my servant. O Israel, you will not be forgotten by me. I have blotted out your transgressions like a cloud and your sins like mist. Return to me for I have redeemed you. Sing, oh heavens, for the Lord has done it. Shout, O depths of the earth, break forth into singing, oh mountains, oh forest, and every tree in it.

For the Lord has redeemed Jacob and will be glorified in Israel. Remember these things. Remember me. Remember who I am. Remember what I have done. Remember that I love you, that I alone have the power to redeem you, I have made you new again. Remember that the trees you are tempted to worship will one day break forth in singing and worship me as the one true God. There's no one compared to me. I do not lie. I will deliver all my promises in me. You can find life, comfort, joy, flourishing. I have redeemed you. I will be glorified. That's what God is saying to you today. Don't trade another moment you could spend experiencing the glory and redemption of God for the folly of idolatry. Give your life, your time, your eyes, your hands, your attention

to the one true God who is worthy of it all.