If I Had a Hammer

For Wilshire Baptist Church

Did your cell phone screech or buzz at 1:20 p.m. on Wednesday? Of course it did, unless it was turned off or in airplane mode, because that was the only way to not receive the test signal of the National Wireless Emergency Alert System. Apparently, everyone with a cell phone in the United States got the same screeching sound and screen message at the same time. Estimates of recipients have been stated simply as hundreds of millions, but one report says that in a country of 332 million people, there are 327 million cell phones. 

That got me daydreaming about what I would do if I had access to that technology and was able to speak to nearly everyone in the nation at the exact same moment – to have everyone’s attention? And to increase the level of intrigue, what would I say if I had that access just once? What would my once-in-a-lifetime message to the entire nation be?

Would I squander the moment with sarcasm, a snarky rant or a stupid joke or pun as seems to be the norm on Facebook and X (Twitter)? Would I say something inspirational to uplift and affirm, or would I issue a grim warning about the direction we seem to be headed? Would the words be all mine, or would I quote Jesus or a famous coach? As the old Pete Seeger folk song “If I had a Hammer” ponders, would it be a message of “danger” and “warning,” or would it be a message of “love to my brothers and my sisters all over this land”?

Thankfully, I don’t have the wherewithal to hack whatever system controls that technology, because A) I’d end up in jail, and B) I just don’t know what I’d say given a one-time opportunity like that.

But that doesn’t mean we don’t have a voice or a platform, and maybe this is where my daydream becomes a nightmare: All day every day we are communicating; some studies indicate we spend as much as 80 percent of our time communicating. That means we’re doing it pretty much constantly whether we realize it or not. It’s in our emails, texts and social media posts. It’s in our meetings at the office and conversations across the counter at the store. It’s in our spoken words and in our silence; in our action and our inaction. We can speak volumes in our body language and even in the way we drive — whether like a good neighbor or that mayhem guy. We also communicate our interests, priorities, beliefs and values by who we choose to associate with. 

So, there’s no pressure in any of that, right? We can just go about our lives as we always do. And maybe instead of me trying to hammer out that one monolithic message I’ll never get to share, I should work on being consistent with all the little messages I’m communicating all the time.