2010 years ago Jesus Christ came to earth. He brought salvation to humanity through His life, death, and resurrection. Now, Christianity has seen almost 3.1 millennium continues to look to the future when our beloved Saviour will return. Sometimes we have waited patiently, other times we have crowded in churches begging for the Lord to return. We have paced across our homes, we have listen to predictions of His return that proved to be false opinions, and we have learned to make the most of our time on earth. Now the first decade of the 3rd millennium of the Christian calendar has 2.16 hours left. Boy has it not been quiet!
Technology
I have to agree with IGN on this one. In many ways PC and video games have pushed technology to maturity as new games demand more out of the hardware. Games have lead the charge into digital audio and high definition video. They have called to an end VHS and analog, in order to give birth to DVDs and digital media. Just like the steam engines and locomotives (trains) kick started the industrial revolution, computers and video games kick started the post-industrial revolution and continues to push humanity forward.
A lot has been happening this decade. It is not much different from the first decade of the 20th century. Back then, new technology from airplanes to automobiles wowed human beings with our accomplishments. Now personal computers and cellular phones help to make our lives easier, or for some people hectic! And like air planes and automobiles, the inventions of the information age are here to stay.
Now, a person such as myself, cannot talk about technology without discussing video and computer games. Games are often known for bringing computers into their prime as they push the hardware to its limits and beyond. IGN states that "Until the 00s videogames were mere child's play. The average gamer had been aging with the medium since the 70s, but it was still a medium associated with nerdy teens and little kids. The 00s mark a major turning point for games and digital entertainment as a whole. This was the decade that the DVD player stormed into every living room, and for many families the upgrade to digital movies was tethered to Sony's cutting edge game system the PlayStation 2 " (Clayman & Miller, 2009).
Continued Transition
The first decade of the 21st century is a continuation of the transition that started after WWII. Our technology today is partially a result of the Allies defeating Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan. After this the Cold War began with the race to acquire bigger and better weapons and better technology in the battle between democratic, capitalist America against Communist Russia. During this time the Industrial Revolution was over and people were content in the industrial world.
Then the computer came to town in the late 1980s, early 1990s. This began the transformation of the world into a post-industrial globe. The computer, coupled with the fall of communism in 1991-1992, started the transition out of a primarily industrial economy. The 1950s and aftersaw the transiton into a more liberal, sexualized, and media saturated world. It also saw modernism be replaced by postmodernism.
Although I am not a fan of liberalism and the sexual revolution, I do agree with much of postmodernism. This is especially true when it comes to my Christian faith. In modernism, people were big on hard core facts. If one could prove beyond a doubt that Jesus Christ and Christianity were historial fact, and the Bible's claims could be verified beyond doubt you won people over. For some contemporary evangelical scholars, that is fine and dandy but postmodern people want more.
Considering I am a postmodern person, I must ask if this is true. In some ways, it is. I have 200 years of modern history to look back upon. All the science, technology, and secualar humanistic thinking had a very sharp double-edged sword. The airplanes and automobiles that came out of the late 19th and early 20th centuries because weapons of mass destruction through bombers by 1945. Even now that 1 decade of the 21st century is about to be completed I can see the negative side effects of my computers. For example, as I am now typing this blog article some 40 year old pedophile could be luring a 13 year-old girl through a chat room or some cracker/hacker is about to steal $40billion from a corporation over the internet. Even the latest Die Hard film was about the power and potential of computers- for better or for worse- of computers. WOW.
In my faith, thankfully, I have more then facts. I have experienced God on a deeper level then what I am learning in the classroom. Although the facts I am reading about in Bible College are quite interesting, they would not mean much to me if God did not connect with me through them. Thankfully, my God has and He will again through school, life at home, and even playing with my dog, Charlie.
September 11, 2001 and Beyond
Now, many believe that WWI was the start of the 20th century. However, I disagree. I think it was the sinking of the Titantic two years prior that kicked off the 20th century. Why? Because it was a warning about what happens when we place all our trust in technology and human intellect: it is doomed to failure. By calling the Titanic unsinkable, and saying things such as "not even God could sink this ship," people were in a way challenging the Creator. When human beings challenge the Creator they are going to get run over! Or in the Titanic's case sunk.
The Titanic warms up for WWI as it shows us that technology does not solve all of our problems or make the world a better place. The largest ocean liner at the time sank to the bottom of the Atlantic and killed 1500 people. WWI shows us that we humans have a bad habit of causing destruction and using our inventions for hurt instead of help. The Bible calls this our sinful nature and WWI, WWII, The Cold War, the Korean War, and the War in Vietnam of the 20th century proved the Bible's point, "for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God" (Rom 3:23) on a more global scale.
Wars are nothing new as they have been happening throughout earth's history. The reasons for war have not changed either, although the war on terror might have a legitimate reason behind it, it is still nothing new. Al-qaeda, with the approval of the Taliban, attacked the United States of America. America, and America's allies, declared war on Afghanistan and blew them up in retaliation. The basic elements of it are that a country was responsible for an act of aggression against another country, and that country that was attacked retaliated against the other country through declaring war and overthrowing their government. I am sure this is not original to 9/11 and the surrounding events. It was just different countries in a different time period using different weapons.
Is the world completely different after 9/11? No. Many things, such as technology, woud have kept marching right on with time with or without the event of 9/11. Is the US more humble about its security and view as an invisible nation? Yes, just like people re-thought the term 'unsinkable ship' when the Titanic sank. However, things continued to move on with some differences after the Titanic just like things do now. So, I would say that 9/11 is more of a Titanic event in terms of the world and consequences as opposed to a global changing event.
Now, the assasination of Archduke Francis Ferdinand was the shot that was heard around the world. Remember those armed conflicts I named above? Well, all those are a result of Francis Ferdinand and his wife getting shot. As you can see, 9/11 did not result in something of that magnitude yet! However, that does not mean an event similar to the assination of the Archduke is not coming as that ocured early in the second decade of the 20th century. Is 9/11 a warning? It could be as it is the result of two armed conflicts and it sent the message that the richest and most powerful country in the world is not invisible, just like the Titanic warned the industrial nations that technology has a very sharp double-edged sword. The ultimate question is whether or not the US and other countries have learned the lesson now? As WWI showed, the 20th century world did not learn the Titanic's lesson.
I think the ultimate lesson here to learn is about pride. In both events, humanity may have had too much pride in itself or technology. The pride came to the point where God was seen as inferior and irrelevant with the Titanic, and now we could be doing the same thing as our nation seeks to eliminate God from our countries. It was a lesson that the 20th century did not learn until WWI. Now, 9/11 has happened and our pride has been called to the fore-front. Have we as human beings truly learned our lesson? Or does the 21s century humanity require another Francis Ferdinand-like incident to get the message?
Hopefully human beings, myself included, have learned from our history so it will not come to that.
Happy New Year everybody! I hope God wonderful things instore for the rest of the 21st century!
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