A Systematic Search

We have Google at our fingertips.
We have the ability to search for anything and everything whenever we choose.
We have access to huge amounts of data any time need it.
In minutes, we have our answer.

It was not always that way.
There was a time when you had to get out of your chair to get a dictionary.
There was a time when you had to go to the library to do research.
There was a time when you had to physically, systematically search for answers.

That time was not so long ago.

I thought of this as my daughters and I were watching a movie.
We wondered about the age of the actor in the main role.
My husband had his guesses.
I had mine.

Immediately we were able to find the information on our phone.
We not only found out his age, we found out his height as well.
We read who he married and what his collection of work happened to be.
His whole life was literally in our hands in a matter of minutes.

Not so during my high school and college years.
Information was able to be found but it required a lot of searching.
Information was able to be known but you had to know where to look.
Nothing was instantaneous; research took time and effort.

I despised using a dictionary.
I always heard my mother’s go-to statement.
Mom, how do you spell…?
Before I could even get the question out of my mouth I heard her reply.

Did you look it up?

I knew those words were coming but I never wanted to hear them.
It would have been so easy if she could have just told me the spelling of the word.
I would have written it down and that would be that.
But you won’t learn anything, she would repeatedly tell me.

But I would get done faster and could go outside, or play my records, or dream a bit.
Instead, I had to get the dictionary and look it up myself.
I often told her that dictionaries were not set up correctly.
I know that she thought I was making excuses.

I meant it.
You had to know how to spell the word in order to find the word.
Xylophone with an X?
Pneumonia with a P?

All of those trails and errors in my search were teaching me.
All of those attempts to sound out a word in order to find it in the dictionary helped me.
All of those words in that large book intrigued me.
Now all these years later, I thoroughly enjoy putting words together to tell a story.

Who knew?

Research was another thing all together.
Libraries did not have computers.
Instead they had card catalogs.
Card catalogs were a large wooden cabinet with many drawers.

The drawers had little cards in a metal slot.
On the cards were letters of the alphabet.
In those particular drawers, information about the books was found on 3 x 5 sized cards.
The cards had a coding system that enabled you to find the books on the library shelf.

It’s been a long time since most libraries were filled with card catalogs — drawers upon drawers of paper cards with information about books. But now, the final toll of the old-fashioned reference system’s death knell has rung for good: The library cooperative that printed and provided catalog cards has officially called it quits on the old-fashioned technology. Print library catalogs served a useful purpose for more than 100 years, making resources easy to find within the walls of the physical library….Now, with comprehensive, cloud-based catalogs…available to libraries, there’s just no need for cards any longer. (Smithsonian Magazine, October 5, 2015, online edition)

The end of an era.
I would have been so happy about that as a young girl or as a college student.
I am a bit wistful about it now.
I think that children today are missing out on a valuable exercise in thought processing.

Yes, it was tedious.
Yes, it was time consuming.
However, there was something about the methodology of the search that was beneficial.
There was something about the organization of thought that aided learning.

We may have more information at our fingertips today but at what price.
We are a people who seem to know a little about a lot of minutia.
We rarely take the time to delve into a subject to really know it for ourselves.
It is always about the speed at which we can find something; knowing it only on the surface.

There is something lost when the search is easy.
There is something rewarding when the acquisition of information takes you awhile.
The information is yours; it is deeply embedded in your mind.
You worked hard to find it; there is a sense of accomplishment as you put the puzzle together.

The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and discipline. (Proverbs 1:7)

Technology is a wondrous thing.
I don’t think it has to be either/or.
There is value in the process of learning to search for answers that take time.
There is value in trial and error and value in the frustration of hitting a brick wall.

When we hold a Bible in our hands or read it on an e-reader, the answers are there for us.
It is valuable to search for what God says about a thing.
It is precious to discover for yourself the reason you are here.
It is necessary to know the way of salvation and the Savior who died on the cross and rose again.

You will seek Me and find Me when you seek Me with all your heart. (Jeremiah 29:13)

There is something about a systematic search that is beneficial.
God can be found in His Word.
God can be known in the Person of His Son, Jesus.
Your search in God’s Word will never be futile.

If you seek Him, you will find Him.
Start searching for yourself.
Open His Word and dive in.
Your eternity depends on it.

Did you look it up?
Begin today.