Monday, August 30, 2010

Waiting by the Window

The beginnings of Christianity were based on the return of Jesus to implement the Kingdom of God. His return was expected sooner not later. Two Thousand years have gone by since the time of Jesus. He has not returned and I personally think we have waited long enough. I believe that no matter how difficult the days ahead may be, and they will be difficult, the resolution of our problems will not be coming to us from the sky. The Greeks ended their plays with something called Deus Ex Machina. (God from the machine) At the end of the play, no matter how severe the problem, God would come in and make changes to the satisfaction of the play goer. Hollywood follows suit, and the good guy usually defeats the bad guy. History tells us another story. Very bad men led very bad armies into the land of the beautiful people and left rack and ruin in their wake. In my own lifetime, Germany and Japan owned half of the world. For three to four years. Then they lost it all. Not because Jesus came, but because the good guys got stirred up and put an end to this outrage. Now Germany and Japan are part of the good guys. Let's put it bluntly. Jesus is not coming back. Not today, not tomorrow, not ever. We are in up to our earlobes in trouble, but like always, we have to find our own way out of it. Like World War II, we have to make the sacrifices necessary to save ourselves. The universe that God created many billions of years ago is far more complex than our religion seems to realize. I suspect that there are gadzillions of sentient beings as smart as us, and many smarter than us, who face the same problems that we do. God is responsible for all of them. He has given them all the means to survive if they (and us) are willing to use them. Many, I suspect, have fallen and disappeared. We could do the same. Together we can get the job done. If we continue to fight over non-essentials like who has the best religion, we will certainly fail. We need to all get together and find a common set of rules to live by. We need to do it fast before all of the bad things that loom in our horizon come to pass. I'd like to make it easy for everybody. Whatever your religion may be, it is not the end all and be all of the universe. It may have good parts to it, and you may be proud of it, but ultimately it will not unite us all under one tent. We are too large and too diverse for that. I am not suggesting that we get rid of all religion. That is not a practical solution. Instead, I am suggesting that we ease up on the idea that we have all of the answers in our own basket. There is no reason why all of the people of the world, whatever their point of view might be, should not get along with each other. It does not diminish me if somebody disagrees with my view of God. None of us know the real answer to that one. Lets put aside our differences and get to work saving the world. We will all be better off for it. Those of you who are awaiting the return of Jesus, go ahead and wait. Just don't sit on your hands and do nothing about our problems while you are so doing. The end result of that strategy will be disaster.

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