Last week I unplugged for a few days with my extended family. We rented out a rustic log cabin – on Fernandina Beach in Florida.

While spending time with relatives in our untraditional abode I really tried to unplug myself from my iPhone. It was a struggle.

The first couple of days at the beach I found it impossible to not worry about email, Facebook, Twitter and the many balls in the air I had going at the church.

It really wasn’t until the day before I headed I home when I really began to swim away from my phone, only to dive right back in as soon as I shook the sand from my flip-flops.

Do you ever struggle with unplugging? Our phones, jobs, and social media profiles make it nearly impossible to truly break free from the connections which clutter our minds.

I wonder though if unplugging is all it’s cracked up to be. I think we are actually created to be plugged in. Sometimes we just get our cords attached to the wrong outlets.

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This is my old laptop. It served me well for about 5 years before I moved on to my current MacBook. I moved on to the MacBook when my PC could no longer keep any type of charge.

I’ve read laptops tend to have a better battery life if you charge them fully, unplug them, and use them unplugged until the battery is drained. The battery tends to last longer when it’s accustomed to being unplugged.

That’s not how I typically used my laptop. Whether in my living room, in my office, or sitting underneath the covers, I just left the thing plugged in almost all the time.

This worked fine when I was at home near a charger. But the point of a laptop is to be able to take it anywhere.

The more my laptop got used to being plugged in, the more it became dependent on having a constant charge for its power source. The battery life began to shrink and shrink until the laptop could not run more than 5 minutes without a plug.

My laptop became unable to exist on its own battery life and completely dependent on an outside power source.

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Remain in me, and I in you. Just as a branch is unable to produce fruit by itself unless it remains on the vine, so neither can you unless you remain in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. The one who remains in Me and I in him produces much fruit, because you can do nothing without me. (John 15:4-5)

As Christians, sometimes we’re tempted do things on our own. We feel like we can coast. We think we can get by on one spirtual charge per week without reading the Bible everyday or without being regular members of a church.

But Jesus teaches us we’re the opposite of laptops. Our spiritual batteries are always strongest when we stay constantly connected. We cannot produce fruit if we are more attached to Vine than we are to the vine.

There will always be other outlets we try to gain our power from. We seek gratification and approval and energy from technology, work, and media.

These are just false power sources. They drain us more than anything else. Instead of charging our spirits we are weakened by the constant desire to please others.

The best thing we can do is become so attached to the Lord we can’t function if we’re not plugged in.

There’s nothing wrong with staying plugged in. Just make sure you’re plugged in to the right power source.

What power sources do you have trouble unplugging from? How can you stay plugged into God throughout your day?