People These Days

What does the Bible say about the social landscape in the last days? What will society look like? How does the Bible’s description compare to what we see today?

According to 2 Timothy 3, good moral character will give way to selfishness and brutality. Look at this passage and compare it to what you hear in the news, see on your facebook feed (I must admit though, most of my FB friends are pretty awesome :), or just observe in daily life:

(NIV) But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. ² People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, ³ without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, ⁴ treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God— ⁵ having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with such people.

Now, I don’t want to come across as a self-righteous, judgmental person, but I believe that anyone can agree that the verses above accurately describe our society. I know how easy it is to slip into the pattern we see around us!  

People pride themselves in their pride. We revel in our sin today. How often have we heard, “I want to go to hell because that’s where the party is going to be!”? Looking at the verses above, I think a lot of people today view half of those qualities as being just fine!

Our American society has become very entertainment driven. We fill our lives with whatever fits our fancy at the time; video games, television and movies dominate our younger generations in particular. Although I fully support relaxing and enjoying a reasonable amount of time of entertainment (I love watching football), we can’t substitute our momentary pleasure for God.  

Time is precious! We can either throw away hours and days on things that will not last or we can invest them in eternity. If I spend 6 hours playing a video game, what will I have to show for it the next day, week or year? Absolutely nothing. If I spend countless hours in the gym sculpting my body into the likeness of a greek god, what will I have to show for it when I grow old or when I die? Look at Arnold Schwarzenegger! Tragically, our bodies are like wildflowers, here today, gone tomorrow. But what if I spend time investing in important things? Instead of vegging out, what if I invested that time with my kids and taught them the way of the Lord? What if I spent time serving other people?

Matthew 10:42

(NIV) "And if anyone gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones who is my disciple, truly I tell you, that person will certainly not lose their reward."

 

Let me tell you, my reward in heaven has grown exponentially since my wife and I started having  kids! My me-time is almost gone, but you know, that is actually a really good thing! I now have seemingly endless opportunities to serve my kids at every hour of the day and practice self-control :-).

 

The obesity pandemic in America is an obvious result of our lack of self-control. I am very glad that I have the opportunity to work out as a part of my job. I LOVE to eat and I am sure that if it wasn’t for getting to exercise regularly I would be overweight as well. What we need to do is find satisfaction in the bread of God’s word. This is healthy to indulge in, and is much more satisfying.

 

A recent episode here in America really stood out to me as an example of the moral decay within our society. There was a glitch in the food stamp card program and suddenly a lot of people in a certain town realized that their cards had no limit. In no time 2 Wal-Marts shelves were cleared of food with some people buying over $700 worth of groceries. I’m sure they felt as if their day had come and they deserved it. They stole because they were selfish and knew they could get away with it (they probably viewed it like winning the lotto). When I was a kid, people hesitated before accepting government aid. People were more likely to actually make sacrifices, work extra hours and try to be frugal than they are today. Obviously this is my own personal observation, but I am sure that this rings true for most people (especially the further back one remembers).     

We Christians should be a refreshing contrast to those described in this passage. We won’t be clawing our way to the top like others do, rather we should be humbling ourselves and putting Jesus at the top. And instead of building some online video game character and accomplishing amazing things in the cyber realm (which is a meaningless world of binary 1’s and 0’s), let’s invest our time and passion into being the greatest servant of the Lord and other people as we can. No one can deny that this is worthwhile. Death seems to creep up on people…let’s exhort each other to make the most of our days here on earth, and never cease in doing good.