A careful observer said that we have improved means to unimproved ends. He remarked about how the young take to the latest gadgets, and feel they are improving themselves over previous generations because of the advanced technology they use. It is likely that perception in America seeps over to older generations – not only found in the young. The young make much of new things and styles, while their elders feel apprehensive about alleged results. But the elders help feed the patterns – to keep peace. We need to remember that the voice of the young would not be so easily heard if the older generations did not provide the means for expressing cultures, even gross ones. The precedence of youth to dominate general culture is partly from capitulation of the elders own doing, from the publicity they afford to youth life games. After all, the young are free spenders. That is good for business. So the media play to money profits. Values are not protected, but are often amended by celebrity accents. Healthiness is not automatic and may not be bought, as the suffering woman in our text above discovered. Many doctors were not enough.
Serious students of history encounter it all from the past. Absalom rebelled against King David, his father, and lost the benefit of the deep love his father held for him. He didn’t lose the love, but the benefit of it. Absalom, by his conduct at the gate, showed that he believed that whatever his father, the King, would do for the people he would do more. Samson made fools of his parents and people, who wanted the best for him. They were in the right, even if naïve, and he the wrong. The Prodigal ran from his father, a father who scanned the horizon every evening for the return of his son. One imagines that, in the depths of their rebellion, Absalom, or Samson, or the Prodigal may have said, My father doesn’t love me, because he doesn’t give me what I want.
Perhaps wise persons will intervene who will be able to say, No, to some things, and, Yes, to others about which, heretofore, they have been silent. They will build their children on better values, both natural and spiritual, rather than values of wealth, temporal vision, and common custom. In talks with Christian youths today one discovers that their current precedents are much the same, without their realization, as are those peers who do not admit personal faith in God. They may live unexamined lives. They are frank in saying they are looking for higher pay, for nice homes and gadgets. They want to have lucrative jobs or businesses, and then they will have time to make themselves into God’s children. They do not cast it quite that way, but that is what it is. A few acknowledge it. Others are uncertain. But the shock is that they have not been sufficiently challenged by parents and others to discover that there are issues that should take precedence, and used to build foundation for whatever is to follow. They seem now to be ordering their lives to build superstructures before setting firm foundations. One may recover and build a foundation later, but the process is tedious, difficult, messy, and may be impossible for the time period remaining. We can be grateful that God has provided, for all who will listen, an orderly way of living that is meant to fulfill, providing joy, perhaps some prosperity and peace in life’s journey. Whatever his/her status in world society may be, the Christian is also called to Christ’s Lordship, and life’s moral applications. Community ought to articulate and live orderly patterns for God’s emerging generations. This is best done when God is acknowledged, but is available for those who, in common grace, accept the benefits of the value structure provided of God. His structure works, if mortality wishes to use his standards, even for those who do not regard his preeminence. Out of that frame of reference some will find personal the author for life. *Mark W. Lee, Sr. — 2016, 2020