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byJon
Hill
Here we are again with an–
other new year. Festivity. Res–
olutions. Predictions. Income
tax around the comer. What
wi/1 happen- let's say over the
next ten years? Nobody
knows the future for sure, but
there are some good guesses
that can be
nuuk
putting to–
gether present trends and bib–
lical prophecy.
E
here are a bevy of New
ear's Days every year.
early every culture has its
wn. The Western world
calls this 1978 A.D. (for "the year of
our Lord," going back to an arbi–
trary year picked by a monk cen–
turies ago to begin counting years
anew from the birth of Christ).
The Hebrew calendar shows a dif–
ferent year (5738 from creation)
which began last September 13-
and with typical ftair, the Jews will
also have a second New Year in the
spring which begins their religious
year. (Have you ever wondered wby
the last four months of our Roman
calendar bave names that mean
"seventh," "eighth," "ninth" and
"tenth month" when we label them
9, 10, 11 and 12?)
The Mos lems are working
somewhere in the thirteen hundreds
according to their calendar, and the
16
•
Cbinese will probably be ready to
launch a new "Tet Offensive" when
theír
New Year rolls around this
spring!
Religious Background
Most New Years find their origin in
sorne religion. Since mankiod has
been an observer and worshiper of
sun, moon and stars from time im–
memorial, and since those celestial
objects are the keys to our calendar
and to time, it is only natural that
priests of one sort or another would
be involved in setting up New
Years. The most popular time of
year chosen by myriad pagans from
ancient days has been the winter
solstice. Worshiping the sun as their
main deity, they naturally regarded
the lengthening days of late Decem–
ber (which means
"tenth
month") as
a sure sigo that their sun-god had
been born anew and therefore a
New Year had begun. The reckon–
ing captured the imagioation of the
Christian world and we have hap–
pily followed this pagan practice- as
we do so many others- without
question. So, for us, when the
month named after the pagan god
Janus begins, it's " Happy New
Year!"
I wonder what the real God of
creation thinks about all this con–
fusion?
Good News-Bad News
With every New Year comes the an–
ticipation of what the future holds.
• •
I'm sure you've heard dozens of
"good-news-bad-news" jokes (which
tend to lean to the bad), but let me
tell you one anyway: It seems that
this Indian chief was addressing his
smaiJ band just before a hard winter
set in. He told them he had good
news and bad news. The bad news
was that al! they had stored up to
eat during the winter months was
smoked skunk. The good news was
that they had
plenty
of it!
When you cast a wary eye to the
future of our poor old world, that
joke seems to set the tone: Even the
good news doesn' t look too good!
Thankfully the God of your Bible
does have genuine good news just
over the horizon, but between now
and then there seems to be a lot of
bad news.
Let's take an educated guess as to
what the immediate future holds
over the next decade, and compare
it with the God-promised good news
of His Kingdom on earth.
Let's be practica( and look at the
everyday items that make up our
lives, and then get the whole over–
view.
Food
Everybody has to eat. Yet about
two-thirds of mankind goes to bed
hungry every night! All this next
year about twenty thousand people
will die of starvation
every doy!
And
the number will undoubtedly rise in
the years ahead.
But you are not one ofthose-yet.
The PLAIN TRUTH January 1978
)