As the technology age dawned, our social future looked bright. We were promised prosperous times with satisfying jobs, lives of leisure, and flying cars. Yet, more than ever, polls show that society believes we are on the wrong track. Violence, selfishness, and uncertainty has increased depression, despair, and suicide. Something is very wrong. It feels like the end times. How did we digress from the supposedly idyllic 1950s to the apocalyptic 2010s? Allow me to generalise.
1) Baby Boomers spent their kid’s inheritance by artificially inflating house and share prices, without training their children.
2) Generation X indulged in unsustainable levels of debt to try and match their parents assets, while ignoring their children.
3) Generation Y declared a pox on preceding generations while railing against the corrupt system. (e.g London riots).
Generational greed has brewed a toxic cocktail. We have stolen a sustainable economic and social future from our kids and grandkids, so we can gratify our desires. While stimulating ourselves with sex and power, we have failed to live or impart wisdom. Soon, Gen Z will justify euthanasia. At one level, can we blame them? Our system has failed. As Karl Marx correctly predicted, capitalism will implode because of itself. No form of government can solve the corruption of our hearts.
In these days, the words of Paul seem apt: Live soberly, righteously in this present world.
How should we live in the present world?
1. Live light
Avoid debt as much as possible. Our footprint on this world will not be measured by toys or carbon impact, it will be measured by our love for God and love for others. Value relationships more than assets. Let’s reject the greed of previous generations and be content with God’s goodness. We may have a richer life by renting, reducing expenses, working less, and spending time with others.
2. Love well
The antithesis of greed is love. We do not love well. Token tax-deductible charitable donations may sooth our conscience, but they fall far short of the example of the good Samaritan. Loving well will cause us to temper our desires and think of others. It will force us to make righteous life decisions that benefit not just our relatives, neighbours, and community, but also future generations.
3. Long for the Lord
More than ever, let me encourage you that this world is not our home. Let it go and embrace the eternal wisdom that comes from Jesus Christ. As we long for the Lord, our lives will be a greater witness for Christ than any words we could ever preach. True wisdom will change our thinking. It is truly a liberating future.
About Jeremy Crooks
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I’m not trying to be rude but that picture is really disturbing. Maybe that’s your point, but is that really necessary?
Yeah… the pic is a bit much for me too. :/
Good post, though… :)
Inappropriate picture. Please remove, it is offensive and embarrassing to have that picture on a Christian blog.
get rid of the picture please, it’s not approriate to have R rated violence on a Christian site.
Will someone (Jason!) please either remove this inappropriate and offensive picture or else remove the post. Thank-you for your help with this matter.
Thanks for your feedback on the image. I have removed it. My intention was to highlight the tragic ends of the self-centred life. No offense was meant.
Without trying to be macabre, I believe society glosses over the reality of death. For me, contrasting death with the hope of eternal life, is one way that God’s grace shines all the more brightly.
I see your point, Jeremy, but thank you for removing that pic for us. Appreciate it! =)
I was confronted, but not offended by the picture in this post. Maybe the fact that I kill and eat my own food has “seared” me.
I thought the image was in context with the blog.I presume it was not a real picture, but fake blood and wound. What was it that offended? Was it the blood and wound, was it that such an act had been perpetrated on a pretty girl, or was it the ruined tablecloth?
I can’t imagine that anybody who seeks entertainment by way of cinema, DVD or television shows would be unfamiliar with such images. If your mind is like mine, the scene in the OT where the concubine is cut into 12 pieces and sent to different parts of the country as a warning was far more arresting than this sanitised image. My questions are genuine, help me understand your objections.
Good questions. =) I can’t speak for the others, but here’s some of my thoughts…
I think I found the picture disturbing personally because I and several people close to me have a history of cutting. That kind of picture for people with self-harm history can be severely triggering. I was concerned for the impact it might have on others with similar problems.
Also I think that although a lot of movies display the same kind of violence, they are not as confronting (IMO) as a picture that allows your mind to fully take in every detail. In movies (especially ones you know are violent), you are prepared and a lot of the time the actual act of violence is fast and not fully clear or dwelt on (unless the rating is fairly high). On a Christian website you aren’t prepared for a lifelike picture of a violent death which may or may not be real. A lot of the desensitization towards movies comes from the knowledge that it is a movie (paid actors, movie CGI, make-up, ect). They are fake essentially.
That said, I think a lot of Christians like to view Bible stories through Sunday School lenses. There are a great deal of “graphic” stories in Scripture, but very rarely do we like to bring them up or preach on them in much of that detail – even the cross. We prefer to think of it all in some fake airy-fairy way much like a lot of us prefer to pretend we’re perfect than let the world see our weaknesses.
I don’t think we should dwell on images of death. It would be disturbing if we called the picture in question ‘art’ and hung it on our walls.
On the other side of the equation, we seem to censor the impact of how our ‘generational system’ is killing itself.
I found this link in today’s paper.
https://www.news.com.au/money/property/sydneys-dense-housing-a-threat-to-fertility-rates-warns-joel-kotkin/story-e6frfmd0-1226135327168
Our greed has pushed up house prices to the point where the current generation cannot afford a home in which to have kids.
David,
I pull up infocus on our home computer often when my children are in the same room. That kind of graphic imagery is not something I want my children to see. I had no warning that it was going to be there. You have a warning via ratings with movies that violence is going to be there and you can either fast forward it or choose not to watch it. I’m not sure that that type of picture is appropriate for a Christian website. Yes, there is violence in scripture but words on a printed page are much different than a visual picture. That being said, I doubt very much that I could kill my own food and eat it. :)
Cristy, my question was directed toward the more vehement opposers of the picture. However I do get your point, I had not thought of that angle.