To say that the world is in a mess right now is an
understatement.
A review of recent headlines bears this out.
But is this necessarily a new development?
No.
For example, millions of people died in the last world war.
The best estimates put the number of dead somewhere between
50 million and 80 million.
During that same period genocide was attempted.
Members of one race tried to completely kill off another.
New and fearsome technology led to weapons capable of killing
thousands in a single stroke.
Today, others are developing similar weapons and threaten us
with them.
Turn the clock further back and we confront a time when
disease threatened to wipe out a continent.
The Black Death is thought to have killed 30 to 60 percent of
Europe’s population.
People did not understand what was happening to them.
Some misinterpreted the disease as a punishment from God.
Many lashed out at against their neighbors.
They searched for possible heretics and the like which resulted
in many unnecessary deaths.
History reminds us time and again that bad things have happened
and can do so again.
There are two major difference between past calamities and
present ones.
First, technology has made it possible for us to learn about
them almost the moment they happen.
Second, those using this technology may try to influence how
we should think and feel about them.
All catastrophes, modern as well as ancient, do have
something in common.
In Mere Christianity, C.
S. Lewis put it this way: “All that we call human history--money, poverty,
ambition, war, prostitution, classes, empires, slavery--[is] the long terrible
story of man trying to find something other than God which will make him
happy.”
Lewis also stated: “History isn't just the story of bad
people doing bad things. It's quite as much a story of people trying to do good
things but somehow something goes wrong.”
From the very beginning, God offered mankind a choice.
Choose Him and life, or, choose their own way and the
consequences.
In the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve made the wrong choice.
Collectively speaking, we have been making the wrong choice
ever since.
Deuteronomy 30:19 (NET) - Today I invoke heaven and earth as a witness
against you that I have set life and death, blessing and curse, before you.
Therefore choose life so that you and your descendants may live!
We still have a choice.
Let us choose life.
Let us choose life even when others choose otherwise.
Blessings,
Jim Pokorny
The Other Brother Jim
Look for me at http://otherbrotherjim.blogspot.com/ on
Friday, October 13, 2017.
I’ll be back here on Friday, October
20, 2017
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