Basic HTML Version
What theWorld
NeedsNow ls...
HOPE
A favorite song of recent years is titled "What the World
Needs Now Is Love, Sweet Love"- but
befare the world can have !ove it must have hope!
very morning we wake
up to a cacophony of
fear and despair, chaos
and cruelty, coups and
corruption. In the
newspaper, over the
...__. morning cup of coffee,
we rcad of crime increases and social
disintegrations, bloody revolutions
and civil disorders taking hundreds
of lives somewhere else whilc we
slept, natural disasters (also some–
where else, hopefully) killing
hundreds or thousands in their bcds,
with perhaps tens of thousands
homeless.
Governments are unstable, shaken
worldwide by epidemics of distrust of
officialdom, the yawning chasms of
credibility gaps, the outside pressures
of aggressive world powcrs bent on
world domination.
Sword of Damocles
While sorne of us are dying from
overeating, nearly twenty thousand
around the world die of starvation
every day. The hunger bomb and the
population explosion seem about to
unite in a critical mass and blow civ–
ilization as we know it off this beau–
tiful round blue ball of life we call
earth. Our own breadbasket seems in
36
by
Jon
Hill
jeopardy, as weathermen tell us that·
we are entering a drought cycle simi–
lar to or worse than the dust bowl
specter of the 30s. The future looks
glum- the black horse of Revelation
has just been saddled up for his end–
time run.
The sword of Damocles in the
form of nuclear holocaust hangs over
our heads. There is weather upset.
fuel crisis, mindless crime. dope ad–
diction. political corruption at alllev–
els, a degenerate low in education for
our next generation, pollution of the
air we breathe and the water we
drink and the land we live on, glow–
ing sparks in intcrnational politics
that could ignitc World War 111 (lit–
erally the war to end all wars, be–
cause it could end all life on earth).
Our own personal problcms seem
small in comparison. but they are
real: You just lost your job, your
family is about to break up, you can't
make ends meet, your son is sick,
your mother just died ...
It 's just too much. The modern–
day pace, communications worldwide
and the instantaneous broadcast of
all the problems of the world into our
own living rooms, combined with the
personal crises we face. add up toan
overload on our capacity to cope.
Hope has long since ned; despair
hangs heavy. ' 'What's the use?
othing's going to turn out all
right!" is the plaintive cry of many.
Household Word
Doomsdayers,sundowners and proph–
ets of doom all have a heyday- their
moans and críes of despair and nega–
tivism seem very credible in today's
world.
Armageddon
is a household
word no longer the propertyofthe reli–
gious fanatic. People are more famil–
iar with the four horsemen of the
Apocalypse than they are with the
winner of the Kentucky Derby. Politi–
cians, ncwsmen, educators, historians,
even businessmen have taken over
from the luna tic fringe of the clergy
the expression "theend ofthe world"!
Purpose, direction, a set goal are
all missing from our collective lives
and from most of our individuallives.
Peace, security. happiness are all
empty words that have lost meaning
in the hopeless world of today.
Thankfully, God has no intention of
allowing mankind to meet his demise
in either a bang--or a whimper- of
despai r. Our Creator is not going to
allow mankind to die in.the throes of
World War 111. He is not going to si t
by and Jet mankind commit suicide
(cosmocide) througb anycombination
of population explosion, lack of food,
pollution. disease, natural catas–
trophes and
economi~
chaos. He has a
The
PLAIN TRUTH February 1979