It’s a moot point that the 21st century begins on January 1, 2001, not 2000. In fact, due to the mixup in changing to the Gregorian calendar from the Julian in 1582, we’ve actually been in the new millennium for several years already. But it isn’t just the passing of this significant date that we have slept through. Joseph Stowell writes:
A culture that wants to do what it wants to do must somehow dethrone a God who rightfully calls men to live under His authority…Like Rip Van Winkle, we in large measure slept through these last four decades, and as the alarm clock rings to usher in the twenty-first century, we wake up to notice how dramatically different our world is now…1
Different indeed! Our world has cut loose from its moorings, wanting no one at the helm, and is being blown by the winds of change directly into the teeth of the last great storm.
President Ronald Reagan gave us the definition: “Status quo is Latin for ‘the mess we are in.'” And what a mess it is. In seeking to select the top three “hot spots of the new millennium,” USA Today reporter Barbara Slavin chose from “among a depressingly high number of candidates.” The article goes on to list 38 “countries in conflict” where disputes led to more than 1,000 deaths in a one-year-period during the last decade. P. S. “More than 1,000” would include the mass genocide in Kosovo, Burundi, and 43 years of war in Sudan leading to the deaths of 1.5 million! (Nov. 1, 1999, p. 11.)
Things are no brighter at home. We have our own 1.5 million figure–the unborn babies aborted in America alone each year since 1975. The wide acceptance of the evolutionary model has led to the devaluing of human life, bringing with it the growing threat of euthanasia and the Pandora’s box of cloning and genetic manipulation. The “harvesting” of fetal tissue and organs is becoming a profitable sideline for abortion clinics.2
I hardly need to repeat the dire societal ills listed in our daily newspapers: rampant crime, family breakdown, the “gay” agenda, uncontrolled illegitimacy… As Mohandas Gandhi observed, “Wildlife is decreasing in the jungles, but increasing in the towns.” Yet just when society desperately needs a word from God, Christianity is being censored by the monopolistic media and, as John Whitehead states, “privatized” by the government:
In Utah, homeowners conducting private Bible studies in their own homes were accused of violating zoning ordinances. In Illinois, a kindergartner who was grieved about having to cross out the word “God” in her spelling book was chastised for writing “I love you God” on her tiny palm to show her remorse…In Texas, teachers have been enjoined from participating in any prayers at their high school or at its extra-curricular events.3
C. S. Lewis remarked, “The world says, ‘You can be religious when you are alone,’ and then adds under its breath, ‘And we’ll make sure you are never alone.” But as Decision editor Roger Palms notes, “The world wants us to keep Christianity private. They should have thought of that before they crucified the Lord in public.”
This is no time to retreat. Christianity has met paganism before, and swept the field in the first century. Our Lord’s command is still in effect: “Occupy till I come.” The entertainment gospel, political gospel, social gospel, health and wealth gospel, are shams. “The weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds” (2 Cor. 10:4). Busy-ness, superficiality, compromise, and worldly distractions are the scourge of the church in the West.
But returning to the following seven Cs would demolish the devil’s strongholds again: clean lives who take sin seriously; clear thinking about the real issues; courage in the face of mounting opposition; compassion for a lost and lonely world; commitment to the life of the church, manifested by sacrificial living; confidence in the inerrant Word of God for all matters of faith and practice; and Christ-centeredness that looks to Him alone for “all things that pertain to life and godliness.” Our world needs us now because it desperately needs to meet Him.
1 Shepherding the Church in the 21st Century, Victor Books, 1994, p. 17
2 See World magazine, Oct. 23, 1999, pp. 16-19
3 Religious Apartheid, Chicago: Moody Press, 1994, p. 157