I was recently taking my daily constitutional, and was stepping it out along an impeccably kept marble concourse. It was in a shopping mall of the ritzy, glitzy variety–Phipps Plaza in Buckhead, on the north side of Atlanta.
Having been in the advertising business for several years, I tend to notice the varied attempts to woo money out of our pockets. For some reason, I noticed this one.
In large, bold type were the banner words, HISTORY IN THE MAKING. Beneath that were two photographs. The one on the left was an old black and white, of a street musician with drums on his back and a harmonica poised before his lips. He looks dolefully, disinterestedly toward the camera. The other photo, in full color, shows an upscale bistro-type restaurant.
Then the copywriter explains: “A hundred and twenty years ago, folks at Riverside used to spend Saturday nights at jamborees on the town square, sipping a local concoction known as Forester’s Wild Root Ale and listening to the foot-stomping music of Zebulun ‘Harmonica’ Harris and his jug band…” The ad goes on to tell what’s happening now at Riverside: a new development of apartment homes. Toward the bottom there was the expected contact information.
Then there was one more line, in very small print. “Disclaimer: Any resemblance between this account of Riverside 120 years ago and actual fact is purely coincidental.”
So they had told the truth–more than we suspected–when the lead caption read: “History in the making”!
This trend of tailoring history to your advantage might be expected from unscrupulous ad men. But postmodernist historians are also being “creative” in their rewriting of history these days–sans the disclaimer.
Politically correct descriptions supposedly attempt to repair centuries of discrimination. Now anyone who wishes may select, delete, or adjust “facts” to their heart’s content. “Since we can never know absolute truth,” they say, “all we can do is construct fictions, interpretations, rhetorical models that can persuade others.”
There is, however, absolute truth and only one true Historian. His records are accurate and final. How different His view of history is from man’s. We catch a hint of this as we read the Bible. For example, Luke 3 begins:
Now in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius Pilate being governor of Judea, and Herod being tetrarch of Galilee, and his brother Philip tetrarch of Ituraea and of the region of Trachonitis, and Lysanias the tetrarch of Abilene, Annas and Caiaphas being the high priests, the word of God came unto–none of the above, but to–John the son of Zacharias in the wilderness (vv. 1-2).
Some of the greatest empires in history by man’s reckoning don’t even appear on the pages of Scripture. Others show up only because they dared to touch the apple of God’s eye, the Israelites. Abraham and his family gets a detailed look; the great Hammurabi perhaps receives a single reference. The fishermen from Galilee are stage center in the New Testament; Nero and the Roman government only appear as walk-ons. The Lord Jesus never once mentions Pilate or Tiberius or Herod by name; but He called “His own”–Lazarus, Mary Magdalene, Simon Peter–“by name” (Jn. 10:3).
It won’t be CNN or the London Times, USA Today or the Toronto Globe & Mail that will be the final arbiter of truth. One whose titles include “Author and Finisher” will do the last edit on this world’s history. Little things done for the Lord–a word of witness, a comforting note sent to a weary saint, a rebuff (or something worse) suffered for His sake, an intercessory prayer uttered in the night watches–will mean more in the cosmic scheme than military battles or political campaigns.
“Therefore judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come…” (1 Cor. 4:5). “Seeing then that all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to be…?” (2 Pet. 3:11).