Are people getting dumber? Are smartphones to blame?

I hope you’re not reading this article on your smartphone. New research shows conclusively that IQ scores have been declining in recent years. Social scientists focused on nearly four hundred thousand people aged eighteen to ninety who completed questions from an open-source intelligence test. Across the thirteen-year study period, they found that cognitive scores declined over time.

This decline began well before AI was commonly available and prior to the pandemic. But it aligns with the time smartphone use began to rise. 

One analyst thinks the switch from reading in print to consuming content on smartphones has led to the degradation of intellect. “Print requires us to make a logical case for a subject,” he noted. “You can’t just assert things in the way you can on TikTok or on YouTube.”

He adds, “Print privileges a whole way of thinking and a whole way of processing the world that is logical, that is more rational, that is more dense information, that is more intellectually challenging.”

“We are God’s fellow workers”

Apart from reading content in print, I’m not sure what we can do about this trend. In fact, much of the day’s news, however we consume it, can make us feel impotent. 

From Iran to AI to abortion to the cyclospora epidemic, it seems there is little we can do except pray. Of course, praying is the most powerful thing we can do. As the famed missionary Hudson Taylor observed, “It is possible to move men, through God, by prayer alone.”

But there is more we can do in addition to prayer than we might think.

There are some things the Creator of the vast universe does that we cannot do. Miraculous interventions in the physical world are an obvious example, from destroying the walls of Jericho to healing a lame man beside the Beautiful Gate (Acts 3) to liberating believers from prison (cf. Acts 12, 16). Convicting sinners of their sins is a clear example in the spiritual realm as well (cf. John 16:8).

But there are some things we can do that God does not do. 

For example, Paul asks, “How are they to hear without someone preaching?” (Romans 10:14). While the risen Christ spoke directly to Paul on the Damascus road, across the rest of the book of Acts, God uses people to evangelize people. His word always accomplishes his purpose (Isaiah 55:11), but we are called to declare it to the culture (cf. Acts 1:8).

When I wait for God to do what I am called to do, I am frustrated by his lack of response. And when I try to do what only he can do, I am frustrated by my lack of results.

I found a solution to this quandary some years ago in the work of the theologian Fisher Humphreys. In his seminary textbook Thinking About God, he offers this simple formula: As I work, God works. As I do what I can do, God then does what only he can do.

Paul describes Timothy as “God’s coworker in the gospel of Christ” (1 Thessalonians 3:2). He says of himself and his readers, “We are God’s fellow workers” (1 Corinthians 3:9; cf. 2 Corinthians 6:1).

As we work, God works. But there’s a caveat.

“You are the body of Christ”

The living Lord Jesus lives now in us. He is not only sitting at the right hand of the Father, where he intercedes for us, but by the miracle of the Trinity, he is also living in us by his Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 3:16).

As he lives in us, he works through us. This is why Paul taught, “You are the body of Christ and individually members of it” (1 Corinthians 12:27). The apostle described us as God’s hands and feet, eyes and ears. Then he listed various spiritual gifts by which we serve our Lord (vv. 28–30). He offered similar lists in Romans 12 and Ephesians 4.

Jesus demonstrated each of these gifts during his earthly ministry, with the exception of tongues and the interpretation of tongues. They were given after his ascension and were presumably not needed by Jesus as he communed intimately with his Father.

But the rest of the gifts were means by which he did his ministry in the world. Now they are the means by which he continues this ministry through us.

The key to partnering with God

As a result, knowing and operating in our spiritual gifts is vital to fulfilling our kingdom assignment. Unlike Jesus, none of us have all the gifts, but we each have some. (To take our online spiritual gifts analysis, go here.)

And when we work in these gifts, we continue Jesus’ ministry through us.

But we should take note: It is not that we use these gifts for God, but that his Spirit uses them through us. These are “spiritual” gifts, gifts of the Spirit to be utilized by the Spirit in his omniscience and omnipotence. As a result, being “filled” with the Spirit is key to being used by the Spirit as he operates in his gifts through us (Ephesians 5:18).

When we are so yielded to him, Paul’s exclamation of praise can be ours: “To him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever” (Ephesians 3:20–21, my italics).

Think of it: When we are submitted to the Spirit and working in our gifts, we are partnering with the God of the universe to extend his kingdom in our world.

Is there a greater privilege in life?