God, Country, and Hegemony

I’m going to be honest: I used to hate my country. Maybe I was just angsty, or maybe I was just frustrated with the many flaws I saw in the system, or maybe I was just exhausted by all the people around me who seemed to be so in love with a place that I didn’t feel the same way about. But regardless, I honestly despised the United States, and I was quite vocal about it. I dreamed of one day moving to Europe (or Canada) and living among much more decent people in a much more decent place. I didn’t think there was any country on earth worse than the U.S.

But then I started to learn more about the world, and I realized a few things.

First of all, I am extremely privileged to be a U.S. citizen, and I benefit greatly from having been born here. Religious freedom, the right to vote, and the ability to become what I want to become are privileges I took for granted growing up, but they are not equally available to everyone. Many countries don’t offer their citizens the rights and freedom that I’m afforded, and I’ve learned to be thankful for that.

And while the U.S. does have its flaws, it’s also responsible for some pretty incredible things, and it deserves credit for them. The U.S. created democracy and proved to the world that it can be a viable—though certainly not perfect—way to govern a country. It is the birthplace of the separation between church and state, a concept that has made the world a much better place when put into practice. Its economy has created space for companies to form, grow, and create things that have revolutionized human life as we know it. When it is at its best, the United States can be a place of acceptance, innovation, and change that moves the world in the right direction.

I’ve also realized that my country needs people to love it well. It’s far too easy to criticize and cast hate the way I used to, but it’s just as easy to fall into the trap of uncritically believing that everything the U.S. does is great, even going so far as claiming that the country has some special relationship with God (which it doesn’t). But what the United States really needs is people who love it well, who recognize its shortcomings and care enough to work to change them instead of ignoring them or just simply pointing a finger. Without those kinds of people, the country is doomed to fall into division and decay. And if I won’t love my country the way it needs me to, who will?

The biggest thing I’ve realized is that the United States isn’t particularly special one way or another. Is it the democratic utopia that patriotic nationalism makes it out to be? No. But is the ultimate source of evil in the world, as I used to believe? Of course not. It’s a country, one among many, and it happens to be mine. Seeing the U.S. as just a country and nothing more has helped me put its history, its actions, and its current state into perspective, allowing me to let go of my feelings of hate towards it in the process.

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I think Christians in the United States are in an especially difficult place when it comes to how we choose to relate to our country. On the one hand, we know that our loyalty does not ultimately lie with any earthly entity but with God alone. On the other hand, we are called to engage with the world and the culture around us as a part of living out the life of faith. And so we’re compelled to participate in the life and the processes of our nation. But there’s a balance to it that we miss out on far too often.

Because the institutions of this world exist for one reason: to perpetuate themselves. This is true for corporations, organizations, religions, colleges, and yes, even governments. Governmental institutions thrive when their citizens follow them blindly, so they use means like culture and education to create a hegemony of patriotism and nationalism that they then instill in every citizen that they possibly can.

And this hegemony is powerful. It tries to mix itself up with faith to the point that we followers of Christ can’t tell biblical principles from American cultural norms. It tries to convince us that patriotism is objectively good and that anything seemingly against the well-being of the country is morally evil. It tries to establish a relationship between God and country that is so close and so powerful that we end up worshipping the wrong one without even realizing it.

At least part of my former hatred towards my country was rooted in this hegemony and the utter control it had over the people around me growing up. I’m not trying to speak ill of them at all. They were well-meaning, Christ-loving people who had simply fallen into the trap of American hegemony. Once I recognized the system of lies that the people around me had bought into, I used hatred as a defense mechanism. It worked for a while, but I eventually realized that my approach had its own pitfalls.

Now that I don’t have hatred to hide behind, I sometimes feel myself being drawn into the trap of hegemony myself. I get a little too invested in my preferred political candidate, eventually granting them the position of savior, one that can only rightfully be held by Jesus. I condone acts of violence on the condition that they’re carried out for the security of my country, completely ignoring the fact that the people in other places are created in the image of God just as much as I am. I hear the phrase “America first” and think, “Why shouldn’t we put our own country first?” In the process, I lose sight of God’s concern for all people, not just those who share my citizenship.

There is a way to love one’s country without worshipping it. But it’s not easy, and I certainly haven’t mastered it. I think the only way to truly overcome the hegemony is to be completely devoted to Jesus Christ, resisting all temptations to put anything above him, even something as noble as one’s love of country.

Because the truth is that the United States isn’t our eternal destination; it’s heaven. And the American flag is not the symbol we pledge our allegiance to; it’s the cross. And The Star Spangled Banner isn’t the anthem of our souls; it’s Amazing Grace. The powers that be would convince us that we should love our country above all else, and our Christian response should be a resounding, “No.” We love our country, but we reject the hegemony. We love our country, but we love Jesus infinitely more.

Legion: Hope and a Challenge for the Superhero Genre

Note: This is the mandatory Christian “I really like this thing, but I don’t necessarily recommend it” warning. Legion is rated TV-MA. If that’s not your thing, I would recommend watching something else. Or waiting until VidAngel inevitably releases a censored version. Your call.

The entertainment industry is absolutely saturated with superhero content right now. Ever since the success of Iron Man, studios and networks have been desperately trying to get a piece of the valuable market that the genre has created. And while this trend has resulted in some serious commercial success, many critics and fans are starting to question whether or not the rush to put out so much content has resulted in a drop-off in the quality of films and TV shows based on superhero properties. Can the studios continue to put out adaptations that are creative and engaging? Has the entire genre stagnated, accepting its fate of simply telling the same story over and over with different masks (or capes or suits)?

If you’re looking for a source of hope in the superhero genre, you need look no further than Legion, a new show from FX based on the character of the same name from the X-Men comic book universe. The show debuted in January and finished its eight-episode arc a couple of weeks ago, garnering praise from critics and fans all along the way. It may not have had the widest audience, ending its first season run with under a million viewers, but those who watched Legion were absolutely enthralled, myself included.

Legion tells the story of David, a young man who is haunted by voices inside of his head that are interpreted by those around him as symptoms of schizophrenia. The season as a whole follows a chronological narrative arc, but nearly every episode includes jumps in time, exploring David’s childhood, his attempts at living a normal life, and his time in a mental hospital. When we first meet David, he is in the custody of D3, a government agency dedicated to protecting the nation against mutants, members of a new stage in human evolution who are born with superpowers. And this is our first indication that David’s struggle may stem from something other than mental illness. This is only confirmed when a team of rogue mutants emerges onto the scene showing a clear interest in him.

“There’s always a fight.”

What people seem to love about the show is just how different it is from any other superhero film or TV show that we’ve seen in the recent boom. It was developed and showrun by Noah Hawley, the creator of another beloved FX show Fargo. His approach to storytelling and character development carries over well from the small-town crime genre to the superhero genre and shows that not all superhero stories have to play out in the typical way.

A superhero story, especially an origin story like this one, usually follows a pretty straightforward script. The hero somehow attains superpowers, explores them for a bit, and then uses them to defeat a bad guy and save the world. That is not David’s story at all. In fact, most of Legion’s conflict is internal, not external.

Like the viewer, David does not understand his abilities or know their extent. Sure, he’s a telepath and can move objects with his mind, but how far can that go? Much of the season centers around David and those around him questioning his abilities, his history, and even his motivations. All of this is played out in his mind rather than the external world, and it makes for compelling TV.

That is not to say that the show is all dialogue. As Kerry, a brawl-loving mutant who comes to David’s aid, notes, “There’s always a fight.” Each episode features stunts and action scenes, and much of the choreography is quite innovative. Due to the nature of David’s powers and the fact that many of the fights take place inside his mind, the show’s creators are able to play with elements like physics and even silence as a part of creating tension within action scenes. The fights in Legion drew me in both narratively and emotionally in a way that I haven’t been by a fight sequence in a long time.

“This only works if it’s not about me.”

And even though David is the protagonist, he is supported by an incredible cast of characters and actors. In the season finale, David says, “This only works if it’s not about me.” Of course, he’s referring to his mission, but it also serves as self-referential commentary on the show itself. The fourth episode (aptly named “Chapter Four”) barely features David at all and instead focuses on the characters around him, including the ways that his presence has impacted their lives. Of particular note is Aubrey Plaza’s portrayal of Lenny, which starts off slowly but really begins to take center stage about halfway through.

Legion’s success ultimately stems from the bold choices it makes to break out of superhero mold. Yes, the writing, directing, and editing are each incredible in their own right. But when it comes down to it, Legion is still a superhero TV show, and what it does best is serve as an example to those creating superhero content that they can do better. Comic books have shown us that superhero stories can be as varied as the characters themselves, and Legion follows in that legacy. Here’s to hoping that other players in the genre follow suit.

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The first season of Legion is available for streaming on the FX website or app and will be released on Blu-ray and DVD later this year. A ten-episode second season, which will focus less on David's internal struggle and more on the question of the coexistence between humans and mutants, is slated to be released in February 2018.

Apple and Professionals

Last week, Apple did something very out-of-character: They admitted that they had made a mistake. In an ultra-exclusive meeting between top Apple executives and a handful of top technology reporters, Apple discussed their relationship with professionals, their struggles with the design of the Mac Pro, and the future of their professional offerings. Though it was an intimate event, the coverage of this meeting exploded, and both fanboys and haters alike saw in the coverage what they wanted to see. But we’ll get to that.

First, it’s important to note what Apple actually said. Craig Federighi, Apple’s senior vice president of software engineering, spoke about why the Mac Pro, which was released with much fanfare and praise three years ago, hasn’t been updated since its launch. It’s a very technical issue, but in basic terms, Apple made some design choices based on the direction they believe the professional computing industry was going, and they were dead wrong. They created a beautiful, professional computer that simply did not fit with the form factor of graphic processing units that have been released in the past few years.

So now that we know the problem, the question becomes, “What next?” Phil Schiller, senior vice president of worldwide marketing at Apple, voiced the best answer the company has to offer right now. They’ve decided to completely re-think the Mac Pro and create something new that meets the needs of their professional users. But there’s a catch: The redesigned Mac Pro will not see the light of day this year.

And of course, that is very disappointing news for the many professionals who want to use Apple products but have become impatient with the company’s delayed product update cycle. The current Mac Pro is simply unsuited for the most demanding computing tasks in cutting-edge fields such as virtual reality and software development, and this has led some to give up on Apple and switch to Windows or to create their own Mac computers (dubbed “Hackintoshes”). It looks like those who have stuck with Apple this long are simply going to have to wait a while longer.

In the meantime, Apple has decided to make some minor speed upgrades to the current Mac Pro lineup without increasing the price. And they claim that a large number of professional users are actually beginning to adopt high-end iMacs as their computing machines of choice. Created to be a consumer-friendly all-in-one, the iMac has grown to become a powerhouse and one of Apple’s most enticing Mac offerings. (I personally use a Retina 5K iMac for video and photo editing at my job in church media.) Time will tell if these temporary solutions will be enough to hold professional users over until the new Mac Pro is unveiled.

This is a surprising and unprecedented move for Apple. It shows a level of transparency and humility that we’ve never seen from the company before, and it can be interpreted many different ways. In response to the announcement, some praised Apple for their honesty and expressed excitement over the re-thought Mac Pro. Others criticized Apple for their blunder and for announcing a product so long before its release just to save face. Ultimately, how one understands this announcement depends on one’s feelings about Apple as a whole, but I’d like to offer a few of my thoughts on the matter.

I think that this was a good move on Apple’s part in the long run. Embarrassing? Yes. But ultimately in their best interest. The lack of updates to the Mac Pro and the company’s refusal to offer any explanation before this week have given professionals the idea that they are no longer a priority for Apple. Finally choosing to communicate with this group will hopefully reassure them.

Their fear is understandable. Once known as a line of computers for designers and editors, the Mac has really gone mainstream over recent years, growing in its market share and in its public presence. And with this growth came a shift in the Mac’s user base. According to Apple, only 30% of Mac users fall under the “professional” category, which means that 70% of their customers are simply who consumers who don’t need the latest processors and most powerful GPUs.

And yet, Apple is still producing and developing the Mac Pro. Last year, they released a new generation of the MacBook Pro overhauled with a Touch Bar. They’re putting out iMacs that are powerful enough to appeal to at least some professional users. They continue to develop professional software that is used to create beautiful things on Macs every single day. And now, they are reaching out their professional users with honesty, transparency, and humility.

Is Apple a perfect company? Not at all. They’ve made some serious mistakes over the years, the Mac Pro debacle included. Sometimes it’s hard to tell whether they’re trying to appeal to consumers or professionals. And they haven’t always been the best at communicating with their customers. But the events of last week make one thing perfectly clear: Apple cares about its professional users. And I believe they have something big in store for us if we’re only willing to wait.

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I was barely able to scratch the surface of this issue in this post. If you’d like to read full coverage of Apple’s meeting last week, John Gruber was one of the reporters in the room and did an excellent in-depth writeup. Walt Mossberg and Nilay Patel of The Verge offered their commentary on the matter in the most recent episode of Ctrl-Walt-Delete. And for the perspective of a professional who chose to give up on the Mac, check out Owen Williams’s Medium post about his reasons for switching to Windows.

I’d like to know what you think of all this Apple news. Do you think this was a good move for Apple? Are you hopeful for the company’s future, or do you think they’ve got it all wrong? Let me know in the comments or on social media.

Return, Resurrection, and Hope

The following is adapted from a sermon I wrote from 1 Thessalonians 4.13-18 for my Preaching II class. In a recent meeting, my professor helpfully pointed out to me—and I agree with him—that my skills lie more in writing than in public speaking, and he encouraged me to give exegetical blogging a try. So instead of a twenty-minute video of me trying to seem confident behind a pulpit, I present an abridged version of my manuscript. If you’re interested in reading the full sermon text, it’s available here. And if you just really want to hear the sermon preached, there is a video of me preaching it available here.

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No theologian throughout history has reached a broader audience than Charles Schulz. Schulz was the author of Peanuts, arguably the greatest comic strip of all time. And between the panels of Snoopy’s great adventures and Charlie Brown’s failed attempts to kick that ever-elusive football, he inserted some theological musings that were quite insightful. On April 13, 1965, Schulz published this strip portraying a conversation between Lucy and her brother Linus:

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Charles Schulz understood the assuring power of sound theology, and so did the apostle Paul. Much of his life, ministry, and writing were dedicated to it, and that included his first letter to the Thessalonians (the oldest preserved Christian writing, by the way). The letter is chock full of deep theological reflections on various issues. And this is understandable given the circumstances surrounding the writing of the letter. Paul had recently founded the church at Thessalonica but had almost immediately been forced to flee the city, and despite his best efforts, he was unable to return to his beloved young church start.

And so he did the next best thing: He got out a pen, wrote a letter to the church, and sent his right-hand man Timothy to deliver the letter and to check on them. And in 1 Thessalonians 4.13-18, Paul had this to say to the new believers at Thessalonica:

But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers and sisters, about those who have died, so that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have died. For this we declare to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will by no means precede those who have died. For the Lord himself, with a cry of command, with the archangel’s call and with the sound of God’s trumpet, will descend from heaven, and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up in the clouds together with them to meet the Lord in the air; and so we will be with the Lord forever. Therefore encourage one another with these words.

Based on what we read in the text and what we know from the historical context, it seems that that the Thessalonian church was facing three main problems. The most salient issue was that members of the community were dying, some possibly as a result of persecution. The Thessalonians also seemed confused about the return of Christ, knowing that Paul had taught them it would come soon and wondering why it hadn’t happened yet. And finally, the church was facing the problem of resocialization, learning to live out their newly-found Christian faith in a culture that was radically different from—and even hostile to—Christianity. This problem was made even more difficult by the fact that they had lost their spiritual mentor, Paul, so quickly after coming to the faith.

And so all of this confusion, about theological issues, the loss of members within their community, and trying to live out their newfound faith in a pagan context, had a drastic result: The Thessalonian Christians lost their hope.

Does any of this sound familiar? Because it should. We have a lot in common with those Thessalonians. We face loss in our own lives and communities; death is a reality in all times and places. We certainly don’t know what to think of the return of Christ, if we even bother to think about it at all. And we live in a secular culture that is constantly in conflict with the faith that we’re seeking to live out.

Like the Thessalonians, we face the temptation to lose our hope in the face of the reality around us. But Paul wrote to the church to renew their hope, and his letter persists until today in order to offer us hope as well. In this passage, Paul highlights three main sources of hope that Christians at all times and in all places can claim.
 

source one: the return of Christ

The first source of hope is one that Paul’s original audience was all too aware of and that we all too often ignore, but one that is far too often misunderstood in either case. That is the return of Christ. It is clear from this text and from the New Testament witness as a whole that the return of Jesus is a basic tenant of the Christian faith.

This belief in Jesus’ return is rooted in the words of Jesus himself. In John 14.3, Jesus tells his disciples, “And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also.” And Christians have claimed that promise ever since. From 1 Thessalonians, the earliest extant Christian writing, to Revelation, the last book in our canon, we see the return of Christ come up again and again. Different texts use different metaphors, of course, and they all ultimately fall short of the reality. But regardless of which metaphor one might prefer, we can say without a shadow of a doubt that the return of Christ is coming.

And how could this not give us hope? Jesus, the God who chose to take on the form of a man and live among us, the God who died an innocent death and then overcame death by rising back up from it, the God who ascended into heaven and now sits at the right hand of the Father, is coming back to earth one day, and he’s coming back for us. When he returns, he will make all things new and set everything right. Nothing we will experience in this life, no matter how disappointing or hurtful, can overshadow the fact that we are awaiting the greatest homecoming of all time, and that is something worth hoping in.

For two thousand years, followers of Jesus have been saying that Jesus is coming soon. And of course, this has required us to sort of redefine what we mean when we say “soon.” By “soon,” we don’t mean that Jesus is definitely coming within the next year. We don’t mean that we can pinpoint on a calendar when exactly he’s coming. We don’t even necessarily mean that he’s coming within our lifetimes. What we mean is that Jesus could come at any moment, and this fact has a deep impact on our lives. And so we live with Jesus’ return as a reality in our lives even though we know it hasn’t quite happened yet.

And isn’t that what hope is, really? It’s choosing to live into the reality of something that hasn’t happened yet because one believes that it will. Theologians call this living in a place of “already and not yet.” It’s choosing to believe that your loved one will be healed even before the doctor confirms that the treatment has had its effect. It’s choosing to believe that you’ll be able to make ends meet while the bills are piling up and the paychecks just aren’t coming. It’s choosing to believe that things can and will one day be better than they are now, not because of anything that we do, but because God is working in and through history, and one day, he is going to break into history in a new way and make everything right. That’s the hope that the return of Christ offers us, and we can each live into that hope today.
 

source two: the resurrection of the saints

But Paul didn’t stop there. He had more hope to offer the Thessalonians, and his letter has more hope to offer us today. You see, the Thessalonians were really worried about the fact that some of their church members had passed away after becoming Christians. These deaths shook the church to its core. The Thessalonians were waiting for Jesus to return, and they had been taught that he was coming soon. This led them to fear that their fellow believers who had passed away would somehow miss out on Jesus’ return because they had already died.

And so Paul offered them a second source of hope: the resurrection of the saints. The Bible teaches us that every person who puts their faith in Christ will one day be bodily resurrected in order to meet with him. And Paul especially was adamant that those he taught understand that their resurrection was coming because he knew how important it was for living the Christian life, especially when it comes to maintaining Christian hope.

If we want to know what our resurrection will be like, we need only look to Jesus. He’s our example and precursor. 1 Corinthians 15 goes so far as to call him “the first fruits of those who have died.” And in the final chapters of the book of John, we get some really interesting details about what Jesus’ resurrection body was like. It’s clearly different from his pre-resurrection body in some ways, as we can gather from the fact that Mary Magdalene, one of his most devoted followers, doesn’t recognize him at first. But there’s also some continuity between Jesus’ bodies because he shows Thomas his pierced hands and side. And we know that Jesus’ body was physical because John portrays him eating food. All of this indicates that we aren’t trying to escape these physical bodies that we’re in; we’re simply waiting for God to transform them.

Now these are just tidbits of insight, and they’re really not the primary concern of John or Paul. And they shouldn’t be our main concern, either. Ultimately, we can’t know how it’s all going to work. We can simply let the mysteries of God be mysteries. And we can just trust in the fact that the resurrection is promised, and that one day, God will fulfill his promise of bringing back to life every person who has followed him and then died.

This had to be reassuring to the Thessalonians, who no longer had to worry about their loved ones missing out on Christ’s return, and it should be reassuring to us as well. We don’t have to fret about our loved ones who have gone on before us. God’s got them taken care of. And we don’t have to worry about what happens to our bodies either, whether they’re threatened by disease or some external power or just the natural wear and tear that comes with time. The resurrection makes all of these things ultimately irrelevant, and it gives us hope for the new life that we’ll experience after the resurrection.
 

source three: our eternal end

And that brings us to the final source of hope we see in this passage: our eternal end. It’s pretty great that Jesus is going to come back and resurrect all of his followers into new life, but it’s even better to know that he won’t be done with us even then. Jesus won’t return and resurrect his followers for no reason. There’s a purpose behind it. Jesus is coming back and bringing his followers back to life so that we can share in eternal life with him.

I’ve found that Christians like to spend a lot of time thinking about what heaven will be like. The Bible offers us some metaphors, some attempts by our feeble human minds to describe this amazing place that’s so far beyond our comprehension. We like to talk about the streets of gold, the pearly gates, and the layers of precious stones. We like to think about the rows and rows of mansions that we’re promised. I once had a conversation with a friend who mused about what the food would be like. They claimed that it would taste just as good as it does here, but it wouldn’t have any calories.

To be honest, I don’t know what our eternal home is going to be like. I don’t think we have any way of knowing the details. And really, I don’t think they’re all that important. Because I know who’s going to be there, and to me, that’s what matters.

I know that Jesus is going to be there. I’ll get an opportunity to meet the one who gave his life for me, the one died and rose again, the one who saved me from my the eternal punishment I so deserve. I’ll get to sit with him and thank him for all that he’s done for me, not just for salvation, but for my calling, for my family, for this amazing life that he’s given me. I’ll have time to list it all.

And the Father and the Holy Spirit, too. They’ll be there. Maybe I’ll get a chance to get them together with Jesus and we can finally hash out this whole trinity thing. But then again, once I get into their presence, I doubt those sorts of questions will really matter to me all that much.

And Paul. He’ll be there. And all the other great minds of the Christian faith, like Augustine, Luther, Brunner, and Lewis. And Charles Schulz. I’d love to get a few minutes to chat with him about some things.

And my great-grandmother. She’ll be there. She passed away last month at the age of 93 after living an incredible life. She lived long enough to meet her great-great-grandchildren. Well, some of them, at least. My sister had a baby last week, and my great-grandmother didn’t live quite long enough to meet little Trenton. It’s a shame. But I know that one day, I’ll have the honor of introducing Trenton to his great-great-grandmother, and he’ll get to hear all of the stories that I got to hear from her growing up, and we’ll all get to share in that together.

Yeah, I know who’ll be there.

And I think that’s our greatest source of hope. As followers of Jesus, we get to spend eternity in the most amazing company that there ever was or ever will be. We’ll get to spend eternity with our savior. That would be enough, but there’s more. We’ll get to spend eternity with our brothers and sisters in Christ. And we’ll get to spend eternity with our loved ones who have gone on before us. What more could those Thessalonians have wanted to hear from Paul? What more could we possibly ask for?

I don’t know a lot of things. I don’t know what this life has in store for me or for you. I don’t know when Jesus is coming back or how exactly the resurrection is going to work. But I know that he’s coming back. I know that he’ll resurrect his followers when he does. And I know what my eternal end is. And that gives me hope. I pray that today, you’ll allow it to give you hope as well, and that together, we’ll follow Paul’s command to the Thessalonians at the end of our passage: Let us encourage one another with these words. Amen.

I Made My Apple Watch Work for Me with This One Change

One of the most beloved features of watchOS 3 is the app dock, a screen that's accessible with the push of a button and shows you a list of your most-used watch apps. I use the dock every day and can't imagine my watch without it. Most commonly, I use it to start workouts and pull up my rewards cards at coffee shops. But I realized recently that I've been using the feature incorrectly all along, and I made one simple change that increased the usefulness of not only dock, but my Apple Watch as a whole.

My problem was rooted in the way that the dock screen first appears when it's summoned. Back when I was first setting up my watch after upgrading to watchOS 3, I didn't understand how the dock would appear. I imagined that the apps would be shown in an ordered list from left to right, so I added the apps I use most and ordered them based on frequency of use. I thought that this meant I could push the dock button and immediately see a list of my selected apps, with the ones I use the most appearing first and being most easily accessible. Makes sense, right?

Unfortunately, this isn't the way the dock works. Rather than displaying the list of apps starting from the left, the dock starts all the way on the right, showing the app most recently opened on the Watch. While I appreciate having access to my most recent app (usually Activity), the placement of the recent app seems unintuitive. Why not place it to the left of the dock so that I can still access my most-used apps? But that's not how Apple decided to set it up. So instead, I decided to change my approach to the dock altogether.

It was a simple change, really. I opened up the Watch app on my iPhone, went to my dock settings, and reversed the order of the apps. Now, my most commonly-used apps appear on the right side of the dock, next to my most recently-used app. This gives me much quicker access to the apps I use the most and saves me precious seconds of fumbling around my app list while I'm on the treadmill or in line to pay for coffee. It may seem unintuitive (because it is), but once you understand how Apple has set up the dock in watchOS 3, you can game the system to work best for you and save time. After all, isn't that the whole point of the feature in the first place?

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Thank you for reading my tip for making the Apple Watch app dock work best for you. Do you have a tip for setting yourself up for success with the Apple Watch? I'd love to hear it! Tell me about it in the comments below, or tweet it to me (@devondundee).

Want more technology tips or need some tech support? Check out my Tech Support page and reach out if you feel so inclined. Thanks for reading, and I'll see you next time!