THE LAST THINGS.
A recent poll found that 40% of Britons have not read a book in the last year. “The literary era has come to an end,” Philip Roth prophesied in 2000. “The evidence is the culture, the evidence is the society, the evidence is the screen.” Roth believed that the habit of mind that literature required was bound to disappear. People would no longer have the concentration or the isolation needed to read novels.
What is true for reading, is also true for ‘religion’. To use the above line: “People no longer have the concentration or the isolation needed to reflect on matters eternal.” The great apostle Paul, the author of many letters, still utterly relevant after 2,000 years, owed his learning through reading and memorizing large sections of the Hebrew Bible, and also knowing and appreciating the then contemporary authors, including the great Greek authors Homer and Plato – See Acts 19, describing his appearance in Athens, Greece. That’s why he urged in his letter to believers in Thessalonica – 1 Thessalonians 5: 21 – to “Test all things. Hold fast to what is good.”
That truth, ‘to test all things’, applies to us even more now, than to the communicants in that city in Asia Minor. It applies especially to today, in times of change, spiritual turmoil, and immense advances, both technical and philosophical. Scripture constantly urges us to be openminded, to see developments always in the light of the coming new world, the place Christ-followers see as their final destination. Yes: The Last Things!
To ‘test the last things’ means being a reader, means being tolerant and wise, means being able to discern, means being well-rounded and versed in contemporary thinking. It especially implies having a thorough understanding of Scriptural thinking, and Christ-centred knowledge, now both lacking.
When Paul addressed the recent converts to Christianity, he urged them to not just swallow his Christ-centered words, but to probe their veracity in the light of what is happening all around them, especially in a time when the aim of the Roman authorities was to proclaim the Roman Emperor as God.
Nothing new.
Today we are faced with the same aim: we see ‘economic growth’ as the overriding goal of our civilization, in spite of ecological agony and meteorological disasters. Affirming the assessments of experts in the fields of ‘nature’ studies is the required ‘Christian’ duty also for theologians as it concerns God’s Holy Creation, even though the Trump administration has forbidden the mention and publication of these studies. It is essential for all of us to read and to absorb the study of THE LAST THINGS, the significance of which appears more and more in today’s scenarios.
My outlook.
I see my life from the perspective of the future. By this I mean that I am ruled not by the past, but by what the Bible projects as “The New Earth to Come”, a state where ‘righteousness’ rules, righteousness also in regards to ecological conditions, defined by their laws.
Today we experience the backlash of our past actions: the bill for our riotous living is due, and the amount we owe is beyond our ability to repay. We can deny this condition – and we do – but that only aggravates the problem. The Western World is facing its final Reckoning, which the late James Lovelock defined as “The Revenge of Gaia”, a Christian concept.
Christians confess that God fashioned the earth and then donated it to us to develop it, reflecting his intentions. However, we followed a different path and today face the consequences of the LAST THINGS. According to Kübler-Ross, we now in the stage of denial, even though the signs of our demise are crystal clear.
Two Immediate Threats.
Climate Change, now out of control, is well known, while AI, Artificial Intelligence, is increasingly being recognized as having the immediate potential to destroy all that lives and moves and has a being. It is developing so fast that those in the know fear that it threatens to be ‘better’ than humans at everything, at which point it is basically going to run the whole show, making us humans superfluous.
I see these developments as the full implementation of the “Tower of Babel” concept: The LORD said, “If as one people speaking the same language, they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. (Genesis 11:7). God will not tolerate this.
Today we again speak the same language, and, indeed, everything has become possible, including the destruction of the entire world. We, right now, are experiencing THE LAST THINGS: we better prepare ourselves. Because our generation has lost ‘religion’, has lost the God/Creator concept, the surprise will be total. That’s why– see Revelation 11: 15 – the future guarantees that:
“The kingdom of the world has become
the kingdom of our Lord and of his Messiah,
and he will reign for ever and ever.”
REJOICE!