On Saving the World...

Day and night .... I am obsessed with finding the "secret" to saving the world. The picture of me above was taken 20 years ago. At that time, in 1984, I didn't know I was going to try and save the world yet, but I did know that something was terribly wrong.

Possibly one problem is that people have different ideas about what "saving" the world means. In the Middle East, "saving" the world means saving fundamentalist Islam from the evil infidels. In the U.S., Christian evangelicals believe that "saving" the world is all about saving human souls from hell and from saving our culture from worldly influences. Then there are the followers of Daniel Quinn's book Ishmael who believe that "saving" the world means saving it from our own, destructive culture. Oh yeah, and the environmentalists are trying to "save" the world from human pollution and destruction.

What Me Thinks....

To me, "saving" the world means living in such a way that doesn't degrade our future. It means, in effect, we need to live more for the future instead of catering to our immediate gratification. Right now a lot of our beliefs, especially religious, are damning the world because these beliefs create an atmosphere for violence, intolerance, indifference, and denial.

Conservative religious folks, for example, are dealing with the fate of the world by digging their head in the sand. Today I read an article about a great contemporary Christian musician named Steven Curtis Chapman. He and I are about the same age (now in our 40s!) and we both began our journeys in our early 20s. Right now he is on a new music tour that focuses on "renewal."

Yes, Steven, that's what we need — a "renewal." You and I are thinking alike. I agree with you that we need a spiritual awakening and renewal.

"Ultimately there is a day coming when there will be a new Earth and Heaven. Knowing that that's coming it's not just kind of a distant crossing my fingers and hoping it all works out .. I think that's really a lot of what's been stirring in my heart and what inspired me to write this album and this song for the tour."

Right on, Steven! I remember once when we used to play your hard rock songs in church and it would freak some people out. We thought WE were the radicals because we broke away from the choir robes and dusty hymnals and we played your music. You liberated us and helped create a new generation of more contemporary Christians.

Oh, but maybe not. Maybe you just created more yuppie Christians who believe that the "American way of life" and Christianity are synonymous.

And this talk about a "new Earth and Heaven" hits the very core of our problem. See, the conservative Christian feel this whole Planet is just temporary and that the world decline is a good thing, since it is a sign that Christ will return soon. If we're getting a new Earth, what the hell, why try to save this one?

But Stephen, I'm so sorry to say that there won't be a new Earth. I believe in God too and I'm a spiritual person, but in my 20 plus years of searching I've come to a different conclusion — this Earth is all we get. To focus on some new Earth is just shirking responsibility for THIS Earth.

"All of us need to hear that message, a message of renewal, and be encouraged in that. To know that God is a God who does make things new."

Well, God also made us responsible creatures, and it's not up to God to make things new — it's up to us, both in our individual lives and collectively on a global level.

"Every time we turn the news on the television, there are reminders that there are things that are declining. We look around the world, we see the AIDS crisis in Africa. I've spent time in China seeing how many orphans there are. I believe there's a Creator, a God who's saying this is what I do, I do renew things. There is a fallen world that we live in and the results and the effects of the fall are great, and we live with those and yet we're not powerless to respond to it. We can respond ... and he wants to use us in that process."

Bravo, I applaud you Stephen by saying we are NOT powerless to respond to it.

Next to Jimmy Carter and a few other folks, I've only known a handful of REAL Christians in my lifetime, and Stephen Curtis Chapman is one of them. See, after raising his own family, he adopted three little girl orphans from China. Stephen is making a difference on the personal level, and though he and I view things differently, I salute him and respect him deeply.

But, again, it is not God who is going to renew things — it is up to us. God gave us a brain much larger than all other animals, and I believe He expects us to use it.