By Tyler Gorsline

Have you ever reached for your phone, hoping to unwind or feel connected—only to walk away more anxious, less rested, and somehow lonelier than before?

You’re not alone.

Like many of you, I’ve come face-to-face with a hard truth: our devices may promise ease, but they often rob us of presence. They steal our focus, fragment our peace, and dull our sense of the divine.

In our church community in Seattle, we decided to name this tension out loud.

For 28 days, we committed to a digital fast—not just to unplug, but to return to something richer: the presence of Jesus.

We called this journey “Make Room.”

And what we discovered might surprise you.

Why We Had to Start Here

In 2025, our church planned to do a year-long biblical literacy series—walking through the story of Scripture from Genesis to Revelation. Our church is filled with young tech workers from across the globe who are passionate about Jesus. Yet, as we prepared, we realized that all the Bible reading plans and sermons in the world wouldn’t address the root obstacle standing in our way. Before we could receive God’s presence and word, we had to first confront the elephant in the room: we were too digitally distracted and addicted to our phones to be fully present to God. 

Me included.

The Real Price of Our Devices

In Luke 10, Jesus visits the home of two sisters—Mary and Martha. While Mary sits at His feet, fully present, Martha is pulled in every direction. She’s distracted, anxious, and overburdened.

Sound familiar?

Many of us resonate with Martha—not because we don’t love Jesus, but because we’re so distracted we don’t know how to stop. We’re pulled away by texts, feeds, and notifications. We want to be present, but we’re frayed at the edges.

I still remember the day I called out to my toddler anticipating her excitement for “dada.” Instead, she turned around, and stretched her arms towards something else. She wanted to embrace that big, glowing square on the coffee table. She said, “Daddy, iPad,” and broke my heart into a thousand pieces. 

I had created a little monster.

She had learned from me—her father—that a screen might be more worthy of attention than her Father’s love. I had taught her this. I wanted to be available and close to her, but my digital habits told a different story. I outsourced my love to Daniel Tiger (an animated children’s show)  so that I could scroll the gram. My habits formed hers by osmosis.

I’ve heard similar stories from people in our church:

• A grad student falling asleep doom-scrolling TikTok instead of praying as she’d hoped.
  
• A young mom numbing unconsciously with Instagram because it all just feels so overwhelming.
  
• A woman in her 60s whose grown kids came home for the holidays and found themselves sitting on the same couch—together in body but separate in spirit as they silently scrolled through their phones. She told me later, “We were finally in the same room. And yet, we weren’t really there.”

Can you relate?

We don’t hate our lives. We’re just too digitally entangled to fully live them—to enjoy them in 3D.

Tools vs. Devices: Who’s Using Whom?

There’s a difference between a tool and a device—and it matters more than we think.

A tool is something we use with intention. It asks something from us: skill, attention, participation. Think of a garden trowel. A sewing needle. A handwritten letter.

A device, however, is something designed to eliminate effort and offer instant reward—often at the cost of engagement. Think of a Roomba or Instagram Reels.

One forms us through our use. The other forms us by our surrender.

It’s not that your phone is bad—it’s whether your phone shapes your life or you shape your life with your phone.

Many of us started using them to make life easier. But somewhere along the way, they began to shape our habits, our attention spans, and even our relationships. 

We no longer just use our phones—our phones use us.

That’s why Jesus’ words about attention, presence, and remaining hit so hard in this cultural moment. 

Because if we aren’t intentional, we’ll become more like our device than Christ.

Reimagining Devotion in a Distracted Age

We didn’t launch our digital fast to shame people for tech use. But when digital habits started forming us more than the Spirit of God, it was time to make room.

So we challenged each other:

• Could we turn off notifications and reclaim our mornings?
  
• Could we stop scrolling through others’ lives long enough to notice our own?
  
• Could we fix our eyes on Jesus more than our phones?

In just 21 days, our church community reclaimed and recorded at least 660 hours of phone-free presence. But the greater win? 

Seeing people sit across tables, embracing discomfort, opening Bibles, making eye contact, and listening for God’s voice again.

Remaining in the Vine

In John 15, Jesus says: “Remain in me, as I also remain in you… No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine.”

That word remain—“meno” in Greek—means to linger, to endure, to dwell.

Have you ever lingered at a meal you never wanted to end? That’s the kind of staying Jesus invites us into—not performance, not hustle, but presence.

If we’re honest, many of us live as if our peace depends on productivity, our worth depends on being needed, and our rest is a luxury we can’t afford.

But what if presence is the priority?

What if Jesus isn’t asking you to be perfect—but to stay?

From Anxiety to Abiding

The enemy doesn’t always attack with obvious sins. Sometimes he just keeps us busy enough to believe that God feels distant.

Corrie ten Boom once said: “If the devil cannot make us bad, he will make us busy.”

And John Ortberg observed: “The great danger is not that we will renounce our faith. It is that we will become so distracted and rushed and preoccupied that we settle for a mediocre version of it.”

Busyness isn’t the enemy. Jesus lived a full, meaningful life. But unexamined busyness—especially default digital busyness—can easily lead us to anxiety, distraction, and emotional depletion.

We become restless in our scrolling and anxious in our silence. We long for connection, yet scroll in isolation. We numb ourselves when Jesus is trying to nourish us.

My Own Struggle to Remain

Let me be honest with you—I’m not writing this blog from a place of mastery. I preach sermons on presence and still can go home and find myself glued to my phone. 

It’s humbling. And it’s human.

But that’s why this fast wasn’t just for others—it was for me. For my soul. For my marriage. For my ability to hear from God. I needed the Spirit to gently rewire my heart toward presence again. And I’m still on that journey.

If we are honest, the issue isn’t a lack of agreement with the need for greater digital boundaries. It’s just really hard to choose true intimate vulnerability with those we value most. 

The struggle simply compounds—swipe by swipe—to mislead us into believing that life is better apart from God’s offer of true, soul-level peace.

Making Room for Peace

The world may be loud, but Jesus is not silent.

1 Peter 5:7 says:

“Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you. Be alert and of sober mind…”

Sisters, we have an enemy who loves it when we stay stuck in distracted, fragmented rhythms. But we also have a Savior who says: “Come to me… and I will give you rest.”

You don’t have to earn that rest. You simply have to make room for it.

Gentle Practices to Reclaim Your Attention

Here are a few ways we’ve been practicing presence in our community. Consider starting small:

• First Hour / Last Hour Rule: No phone during the first or last hour of your day.
  
• Phone-Free Meals: Put your device to bed when you eat.
  
• Grayscale Mode: Make your phone less entertaining on purpose.
  
• Sabbath from Screens: One day a week, disconnect to reconnect.
  
• Set a Digital Rhythm of Life: Decide what you’ll do with your phone—when, where, and how. 
• Keep track and Celebrate: Use an app like Aro to keep track of how much time you spend away from your phone

This is only just the beginning. There are so many more things we can do upstream to have a rhythm of life that is less distracted downstream.

This isn’t legalism. It’s freedom.

This isn’t about perfection. It’s about making space to be more fully you—and more fully known with Him.

It’s about asking alongside Felicia Wu Song: “What (might happen) if my antenna were always outstretched toward checking in with God as much as I am always checking my smartphone?”

Reflection Practice

If you want to go deeper, try journaling or discussing these prompts with a trusted friend or small group:

• What are you truly hungry for when you reach for your phone?
  
• Where is Jesus inviting you to linger this week?
  
• What might change in your relationships if you were more present?
  
• What’s one small step you can take this week to make room?
  

The Beautiful Transformation

A woman in our community recently shared how stepping away from her device allowed her to reconnect with her daughter—eye to eye, heart to heart. Another said she hadn’t prayed aloud in years because silence made her anxious. But she tried—and God met her there.

Friend, you don’t need to be more impressive.

You don’t need to do more.
You need to make room.

Not just in your schedule—but in your soul.

Because Jesus isn’t shouting. He’s whispering; right here, right now.

“Come sit with me. Remain with me. Let me give you life to the fullest.”

A promise your phone can’t keep.