In case there is technology in Heaven, I’ve put in a request with God to be a computer expert when I get there. My functioning blog is evidence of God’s grace instead of my technological prowess. The latest instance that epitomizes my lack of skill was the discovery that my computer had not installed Windows updates since October 2012.

That equals 18 months, or approximately 547 days, of sheer oblivion.

After I conquered the arduous task of pinpointing why updates had stopped running, I corrected the problem. In one evening my computer installed 116 updates designed to help it run more efficiently and to protect it from malicious software. (In my defense, I didn’t neglect everything. My anti-virus software was, and still is, current.)

This situation caused me to think about not neglecting spiritual updates. In a day when lies and philosophies are infiltrating the church, it is crucial for Christians to be biblically literate. If we know what the Bible teaches, we can discern when someone is teaching false doctrine, which is happening more frequently. The Bible addresses this issue in 2 Timothy 4:3-4.

For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths.

Many of us don’t want to turn away deliberately, but if we don’t pay attention, then we may unknowingly accept false doctrine as truth. False doctrine is not always an obvious threat and may disguise itself in books, sermons, and movies that appear Christian. Yet when we examine the true message of these works, we see something different from what the Bible teaches.

Like the computer user who fails to update her computer and puts it at risk, disregarding God’s word can minimize our effectiveness and cause us to miss knowledge that will protect us from the deception of false doctrine.