The Golden Years

One of my newer books that I enjoy is Everyman's Talmud. My friend Nick had it in his library and he uses it frequently in his teachings, so I thought I would pick a copy up. Basically it’s a collection of the Jewish laws and their interpretations by Rabbis. It is just like a theology book, but it is Jewish so it has a different feel.

Anyways, I was reading about the Jews understanding of the Messiah. The introduction to the section talked about how for Jews, the glory years are ahead. In the same way that in our culture we are always talking about how great it was “back in the day,” Jewish people (at least in first century Israel) were looking forward to the future.

This lead me to think, shouldn’t this be the way that we think as Christians? Aren’t we supposed to be looking forward towards the prize that awaits us? Why do we always want life to be like it was 15 or 50 years ago? Well let’s be honest, culture in America is definitely less Christian that it was 15 or 50 years ago. So for some reason American Christians want to go back to those days.

The problem is that as Christians remove themselves for society, society loses its moral compass. How Christians can expect non-Christians to act like a Christian would; it doesn’t make sense. Non-Christians act like they do because they do not have Jesus! Without Christ a person is not a Christian and cannot be expected to think or act like one.

Thus the doctrine that the world is getting worse comes out. Yeah it seems that the depravity of those around us seems to be getting worse, but does that really mean that the best is behind us? It almost seems like that mindset is “we’ve lost the battle, lets give up” I would like to think that God in his infinite mercy and grace (and the fact that He’s all knowing and all powerful) would provide ways for the Christian populous to transform this culture back to one focused on him. (What that looks like I don’t know and maybe I’ll discuss later.)

I suggest that we as Christians fight to make the future a better place in this world! Just because the trend seems to be moving away from God and morality, does not mean that the sky is falling, and we should start shouting, “Come quickly Lord!” Thus taking away that which keeps it preserved.

Be the catalyst that changes your community, that’s the way that the Golden Years are yet to come.