Where Has the Decade Gone?
It is hardly believable that is has been ten years since we all worried about the impending disasters almost sure to occur when the millennium ended at midnight December 31st, 1999. Officials regularly told us that we did not want to be in a hospital or on an airplane when the clock struck twelve! There were runs on generators and instances of people hording food, batteries, and bottled water in their basements. There were websites and printed material which served as survival guides. The potential for danger was comparable to that of an imminent nuclear attack! Thankfully, as you know, none of this materialized.
Ironically, the things people feared the most in 1999 never came to pass, but something that was not on anyone’s mind would come like a “thief in the night” just over a year and a half later on September 11, 2001. On that date, we experienced the worst terrorist attack ever on American soil. When people were worried sick about how to power the lights in their homes if the power grid became disrupted, never did it cross their minds that Muslim extremist were plotting and training to use commercial jetliners as missiles to destroy the World Trade Center, the US Pentagon and even the Capitol building and White House.
Until that day most people probably could not have told you what the NTSB (National Transportation Safety Board) was, who the secretary of defense was (Donald Rumsfeld) or even how many sides the Pentagon had (look that one up if you don’t know). To most Americans, out of sight means out of mind.
Who could have envisioned ten years ago this month that we would be standing in long lines at airport security checkpoints, be well into our 8th year of war in Afghanistan, be finishing up a prolonged conflict in Iraq, or have elected as president a man with the most liberal voting record in congress? Who foresaw that the media would largely make themselves irrelevant by spinning stories to fit their personal belief system or the standard of beliefs promoted by their news organization.
We have seen two presidents leave office and seen two former presidents die. We have seen television shows come and go by the dozens, the rise of “reality” TV, hit songs too numerous to count, celebrities come and go, scandals plastered across the front page only to be replaced by other, newer scandals and then be forgotten. We have seen the famous leave this world and newcomers be born into a world of glamour and celebrity. New York Times bestsellers are out of print and those topping the list today will soon be forgotten. We have seen the “ins” and “outs” of fashion trends, and even ways of life.
All really is “vanity” (emptiness) as Solomon put it in Ecclesiastes. All these things are nothing more than “grasping at the wind.” These things are here today and gone tomorrow. God watches over all the trends and is hardly impressed. From God’s vantage point, all of this is gross, misguided stewardship of the resources given to mankind. It is taking the things He gave to be enjoyed and making dumb idols out of them. As is so clearly stated in Romans 1, our society is one who eagerly worships and serves the “creature” or “created” but not the “creator” – God. This decade, perhaps more than any other in the history of mankind has seen that happen.
Satan appears to have this world by the tail with a down-hill drag. Homosexuals have made great strides in this decade in their militant march toward “preferred” status in society. Internet pornography has utterly exploded! Now more than 60% of the entire internet is adult oriented sites. Culture has moved to be ever increasingly more vulgar, disrespectful, anti-traditional, mean-spirited, selfish, and hedonistic. Political polarization is at an all-time high. Almost every vote in both houses of congress is on party lines. Almost every decision handed down by the Supreme Court is a 5-4 ruling. As the godless culture presses against the church, evangelical leaders are scrambling to organize themselves against the wave of attacks which are already beating against us. The recent Manhattan Declaration is notable among the organized efforts to stave off these attacks.
In my entire life, I have never worried that much about the federal deficit, quite frankly. Even when Ross Perot was giving us dire warnings about it ballooning out of control in 1992 and then again in 1996 I still was not paying much attention. But now, I can honestly say I am deeply worried about it and think about it often. President Obama and congress are spending money and increasing the deficit like they are using up tokens at a video arcade, laughing and slapping each other on the back while they are doing it. Never have I seen such pride and arrogance as everything good and decent is being undermined.
To be perfectly honest with you, I am deeply concerned as we enter the next decade. As I feel considerable pessimism about this nation right now, I do find two sources of hope. One is that I believe we have leaped so far to the left in leadership so quickly that there is going to be a huge pendulum swing back to where the majority of Americans are in their ideology. Whether that happens or not remains to be seen. But my greatest source of hope is that, no matter what happens I serve a God who has everything under control. It doesn’t matter how determined the left or the right, for that matter, are to promoting and pushing through their agendas, my strength comes from the Lord God. I love the words that God gave to Joshua in chapter 1 and verse 9 of that book, “Have I not commanded you? Be strong and of good courage; do not be afraid, nor be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.” I believe as Christians in this perilous time, as we look to another decade here on earth, we must be strong. It is now that we need to be ready for a fight. Satan will not give up! Will you?
In Christ,
Pastor Allen Raynor