100 Years Ago

One hundred years ago, in 1908, the world was a very different place. It’s rather hard to grasp, in fact, how much the United States and the world have changed over the course of a single century.

One hundred years ago, the average life expectancy in America was 47. Only 14% of American homes had a bathtub, and just 10% had a telephone.

In 1908 Henry Ford began production of his Model T. William C. Durant established the company that would become known as General Motors. There were fewer than 10,000 cars in the United States and less than 200 miles of paved roads. The maximum speed limit in most cities was 10 mph.

Alabama, Mississippi, Iowa, and Tennessee were all more heavily populated than California. About 30 people – ranchers and their families – lived in a desert hamlet known as Las Vegas, Nevada.

One hundred years ago, sugar cost four cents a pound. Eggs were fourteen cents a dozen. Most women washed their hair only once a month, using borax or egg yolks for shampoo. Some 18% of American households included at least one full-time servant or domestic.

More than 95% of births in the United States took place at home. About 90% of US physicians had no college education. Only 6% of Americans were high school graduates.

One hundred years ago, marijuana, heroin, and morphine were all available over the counter at corner drugstores. Coca-Cola contained cocaine instead of caffeine. One pharmacist gushed, “Heroin clears the complexion, gives buoyancy to the mind, regulates the stomach and is, in fact, a perfect guardian of health.”

As 1908 came to a close, Republicans were celebrating president-elect William Howard Taft’s victory over Democrat William Jennings Bryan. Europeans were confident that a century of peace and prosperity lay ahead. Germany was considered the global center of Christian scholarship. A number of scientists and politicians predicted that the emerging field of eugenics would soon allow humanity to purge itself of undesirable breeding populations.

On hundred years ago, the Boy Scout movement was founded. Mother’s Day was celebrated for the first time. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid were gunned down in Bolivia. And the Chicago Cubs won the World Series – something that only seems like 1,000 years ago.

Looking back over a long stretch of history can be an interesting exercise. It can even be provocative. But one would hardly consider it transforming. History is, well…history. If it’s a change of life that we’re seeking, there’s only one direction to point: We must look ahead.

Specifically, what will be true in your life one year from today?

At the doorway to a fresh set of 12 months, people generally wonder how many pounds they will lose, what vacation spots they might visit, and how their investments will fare. But certain other questions are of considerably greater value.

Within the next year, what significant books will you read? What habit will you confront and leave behind, by God’s grace? What broken relationship will you seek to restore?

What changes will come about in your prayer life? What experiences will stretch you beyond your current comfort zone? What will you sacrifice to help the poor?

What teacher from your past will you go out of your way to thank? Who will be emotionally richer because of your friendship and encouragement? What more will you know of God’s love, grace, and faithfulness by choosing to be brave instead of safe?

As Alfred, Lord Tennyson once wrote, “Today is yesterday’s tomorrow and tomorrow’s yesterday.” The intersection between our recollections of life a hundred years ago and our hopes for 2009 is today. We can remember the past and we can yearn for the future, but today is the only day that in which we can actually live. It also happens to be the only place where we can trust God.

May God bless you, then, with an entire year of today’s – incredible, unrepeatable 24-hour gifts in which your life becomes more and more like the thing of beauty he intends it to be.

In Search of the Real Enemy

In his book The True Believer, Eric Hoffer makes this significant statement: “A movement can exist without a God but never without a devil. There has to be an enemy to be destroyed.”

Identifying a dangerous enemy that is Out There is without question the most effective short-term mobilizing principle for groups, including entire nations. Religious movements have long known that money, passion, and commitment will come flowing their way if a scary enough devil can be shown to be a clear and present danger.

As a seven-year-old I remember hearing that John F. Kennedy would endanger our country if he were elected. After all, he was Catholic. Protestant America feared that an Oval Office resident who bowed to the authority of Rome would subvert our entire culture.

Communists were a target of Christian preachers and teachers for generations. Entire denominations sustained their momentum for ministry by appealing to the need to block Communist incursions into the West.

But as sociologist Tony Campolo puts it, “All of a sudden one day the Communists were gone… We needed a new devil and we found one. He’s called the secular humanist. ‘They’re taking over the whole country. Look what they’re doing in the public schools.’” Campolo goes on to quote a study by the National Education Association that 72% of all teachers in America attend church at least once a month. He concludes that it would be far more redemptive for churches to honor and thank public school teachers for their tireless service instead of assuming they are agents of the evil one.

My pastoral email inbox is regularly filled with dire warnings about the many enemies who are confronting Christians in the 21st century. Islamic terrorists are trying to destroy our way of life; Hollywood is ruining our values; gay activists are targeting our youth; Darwinists are attempting to exclude all mention of God from public dialogue.

In recent years even Christmas has been thrust into the culture wars. The new enemy is the person who sends out a greeting card that says “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas.” Some church leaders have agitated for shopping boycotts against stores that have removed Nativity scenes or Christmas trees. In his book, Lord, Save Us From Your Followers, Dan Merchant (who is an ardent follower of Jesus) asks, “Why is the gospel of love dividing America?”

Before we divide the entire universe into ideological camps of Us vs. Them, it would be wise to check out what the Christian sourcebook has to say. The Old Testament prophets loudly proclaimed that all of God’s people must indeed battle an enemy. But instead of locating the devil “out there” somewhere, they bluntly told their audiences to look within. The Old Testament perspective is summed up in 2 Chronicles 7:14: “If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.”

You can pick over the words of Jesus with a fine-toothed comb, but you will never find a summons to fight a holy war or draw lines of cultural demarcation. Yet Jesus had a great deal to say about battling the inner enemies of prideful stubbornness, unforgiveness, and refusal to walk with God. Before we call out the evil in others we must take a fearless personal inventory of the evil that remains deeply rooted within our own hearts.

As the infomercials might put it, “But wait. There’s more!” Jesus commands us to pray for the terrorist, the pornography distributor, and the secular humanist who wants to cleanse school textbooks of even the option of believing in God. We are to reject their messages. We should resist their means. But we are not to think of them as enemies to be destroyed. They are people for whom Christ died – men and women who stand, as we do, in constant need of his love and grace.

In short, Jesus' message is that if we courageously choose to be the right kind of people, we won't squander our lives trying to figure out how to eliminate the wrong kind of people. That's a strategy that would almost certainly prompt our "enemies" to give our faith a second look.