I admit it, I’m a total sucker for the Reality Distortion Field. Who would have thought that a little aluminium box, just 9.5″x7.3″, could have captivated my heart to the extent that it has. I find myself scheming ways to cobble together enough money, how to get one on the cheap. Maybe this is what it feels like to be mentally ill? Yes, of course I’m talking about the iPad 2.

The stupid thing is that I know it can’t make me happy. Far from it. The very fact that I’ve imbued it with such mythical properties means that the reality is guaranteed to be a let down. It may be a better way to casually browse the internet (which in itself is far from certain) but it will still be the same old internet – promising so much and yet delivering so little. I still won’t be productive or fulfilled. I’ll still be the person wishing I was publishing all this cool stuff instead of simply reading about it. In the end the iPad is just a really expensive equivalent to the new pen or the Moleskine.

Even if I wasn’t disappointed with my purchase, iPads don’t last forever. Huh, come to think of it, I won’t last forever. But let’s suppose medical science stumbles upon the secrets of eternal life next year (spoiler: it won’t), does that make the iPad a good investment? Of course not: give it six months and there’ll be a new, even more gorgeous version just around the corner, and you can bet your life my heart will be after that one too. All I have to do is think about how much disdain I hold right now for the first generation iPad and I’ll have a good feel for how far the magic will have worn off.

Jonathan Edwards, the preacher from 18th century New England, had a good understanding of how the fleeting nature of life drastically undermines the wisdom of resting our happiness on gadgets and other possessions. In his essay “The Sin and Folly of Depending on Future Time“, he writes this:

“It is most evident, that if the enjoyments of this world be of such a nature that they are not to be depended on for one day more, they are not worth the setting of our hearts upon them, or the placing of our happiness in them. We may rejoice in the enjoyments of the world, but not in such a manner as to place the rest of our souls in them.”

To live as though a lump of metal and glass has the power to make me happy, when I might die this very night and have to give an account to my creator, is simply daft. It’s one of the oldest mistakes in the book: bowing down and worshipping something that’s been made by human hands in a factory somewhere in China, instead of worshipping the one who made us, the one who made Steve Jobs.

As a Christian, that’s what makes iDol worship especially ridiculous. I know that I’m already rich beyond my wildest dreams, spiritually speaking – in Christ are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge, says the apostle Paul – and it’s a treasure that will never perish, spoil or fade, never be superseded by Heavenly Treasure v2.0. I have the treasure of a relationship with the creator of the universe, something which gives me a sense of worth way less superficial than being a member of the Apple Owners Geek Club.

Now if only my heart would catch up with that.