This evening I will begin teaching through the book of Genesis to our home fellowship group. Tonight we will be talking about what was there before the first verse: "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth."
Our current society is built upon the premise that science has the answer to every question. Given enough time and chance to experiment the answer will be able to be displayed. But even science has some basic pre-suppositions:
1. Everything that exists can be proven. If it cannot be proven then it does not exist.
2. We can measure everything and repeat the measurement again.
The current view of our world is that we are the result of 'billions and billions' of years of time and during this interval of time amazing things have happened. These amazing things have happened by the laws of physics and science and are not the result of any intelligent being called God.
It is this belief is now beginning to bear fruit among the young people of our country: There is nothing to believe in. No great cause for which to sacrifice. The only reality is the relatively short 70 or 80 years of life and so the best thing to do is to experience as much of life as possible. Don't worry if that experience ultimately leads to your death as you are going to die anyway. "Better to burn out than fade away" was in the suicide note of Kurt Cobain summing up all that is left for our younger generation. Taste it, try it, explore it... this is the new mantra.
As always, the old generation doesn't get the new one. What man learns from history is that man learns nothing from history. Easy to get pessimistic. But we will see where this series of lessons will go.
Don't worry too much. If there is one thing I've learned from history its that this is just the swing of the pendulum. Science was propagated and persecuted by religion for hundreds of years; baby boomers come from a generation that saw too much burning out due to three separate wars not including the cold one.
ReplyDeleteThere are negative aspects to all generations. What makes the difference is the people who understand the negative but can see the positive. As RFK said: "Some men see things as they are and say why; I see things as they are and say why not?"
Erik