God Doesn’t Text, So Stop Texting Him!

About a week ago we invited our next door neighbors over for dinner.  They have two teenage daughters that regularly baby-sit for us and we thoroughly enjoy the entire family’s company.   Although we had never invited them over as a family, they all have been in our home individually multiple times.  So, this particular night, they come over and we are making small talk: what’s going on at school, the horrific weather this past summer and of course boyfriends.  The girls are so sweet and are generally very attentive to our daughters.  They are, by far, our preferred sitters, or maybe I should say, they WERE our approved sitters.

Let me set this up for you, because quite frankly, you simply had to see it to believe it.  We are all sitting down for dinner and the oldest daughter is in the middle of a text conversation with someone and she quietly chuckles to herself.  She comes to a place where it appears that she is finished and she sets her phone on the table.  We bow our heads and my husband begins the prayer.  No sooner than he could get out “Dear Heavenly Father”, her phone pings in with a text.  No big deal, she is a teenager, right?  Before the short (and I do mean less than 20 words short) prayer was over her phone “pinged” four times.  It was actually quite humorous and we all had a little chuckle.  After all, what are the chances that anyone would get four texts in 20 seconds?  Oh, I was not prepared for what was about to happen next.

Our two sweet teenagers did actually put their phones down to enjoy dinner with us and they apparently (unbeknownst to us) turned their annoying notifications off.  We could still tell that they were texting periodically, which was driving me a little crazy but I just kept my conversation going as if I didn’t even notice it.  Now bear in mind that both of their parent’s were sitting at the dinner table with us.   They both start laughing hysterically and we realize this whole time they have been texting each other.  Are you kidding me?  The parent’s chuckle and say that they do this all the time and then the girls confess to us that they weren’t talking to anyone else this whole time.  Even the “pings” during the prayer were from each other!

I wish that I was making this up, but unfortunately you can’t make this stuff up!  Here’s the deal friends– When you’re at the dinner table, the person sitting with you doesn’t want to sit and stare at the top of your head.  They do not want to hear you laugh at a conversation that they are not privy to.  It’s called courtesy, respect and quite honestly, good ol’ common sense.  Put down your phone at the table and if you’re texting during a prayer, you are NOT praying.  Give me a break.