Chaplain's Corner

In just a short time from when this blog post is published, 2011 will officially be history. I was born in 1953; I have little recollection of my existence until I was 5 years old in 1958. It seems that when I became 5, someone decided to turn my memory on, prior to that, as far as my own memory goes, I didn’t exist.

I did exist, I simply have no recollection of my history from 1953-1958. After that I have some vivid memories then many that are not so vivid. Many of the things I remember are of little or no significance to anyone by me. Who else in the world cares just how much I loved my red bike?  Who else would have any reason to think that the big tree in the back yard of 910 Dogwood Lane in Hatfield, Pennsylvania provided me with hours of enjoyment as I climbed among its branches?  Who else would even care that sitting in the kitchen at Joey Sedick’s having Pepsi and buttered bread for a snack would still illicit in me such warm feelings?

But at 5 years of age in 1958, I couldn’t fathom the year 2011. As I got a bit older, the future became something I began thinking about. It seems that children live in the bliss of the present; the farthest in the future they generally think is to anticipate their birthday, Christmas or summer vacation. As a child ages, concepts like “the past” and “the future” begin to develop.  By 1969, when I was a student in grade 10 at the Altoona Area High School, the future was becoming of great concern to me. What was I going to become, where would I go to college, who would I marry and create a family with all began to become of concern to me. Parents and teachers all seemed to be concerned that I begin making decisions about my future, those concerns became mine.

!n 1969 there seemed to be a rather ominous fear of the future that at times is expressed in books and movies. The Vietnam War was still going strong and I secretly feared being drafted and being sent into the midst of that “hell”. When I turned 18, one of my duties was to register for the draft. I for one did not think this a rite of passage worthy of celebration.

When I was in High School the 20 year old novel written by George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-four, was required reading in most high schools. It foreseeing a foreboding future living in a society in which “BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU”. Well, 1984 came and went and here we are 27 years later and life is nothing like that depicted in Orwell’s imaginative novel. But, many of us look to the future with a bit more foreboding than we may have a few years back.

Not that there aren’t some Orwellian realities in 2011. With our growing connection to the World Wide Web, with that connection growing beyond desktop computers to a vast variety of hand held, portable ones, with the fact that many contain GPS chips; privacy has become a front page concern. Our buying habits are tracked and sold to marketing companies, our spending habits are used to develop new strategies for businesses, on-line banking and the accompanying criminal developments around stealing our pin numbers and credit cared numbers have led to spin off industries designed to stay one step ahead of those who would seek to electronically best us.

As we look back at 2011, it has been a year of political unrest, especially in the Arab world where countries like Syria, Jordon, Bahrain, Yemen, Tunisia, Libya, and Egypt. Much of the news coverage of world events in the past year has centered on the unrest and changes taking place in these nations.

It has been a year of economic uncertainty. The buy now pay later philosophy that has dictated the habits of both nations and individuals has come home to roost in the past  few years and 2011 didn’t see any appreciable developments that give us hope that things are on the turn around. The European Union keeps working to stave off fiscal disasters caused by the failed economic policies and practices in Greece, Italy, Portugal, Ireland and others of the member nations. The efforts in the United States to pull sharply out of the recession of the past few years are stalled and Washington is embroiled in ideological debate over who has the answer while the people look on doubting that any of them have the slightest idea how to correct the problem.

As we look back over 2011, it has been a year of natural disasters, widespread flooding in Australia, Manitoba, the Mississippi River basin, Vermont, New Jersey, South Carolina, to name but a few. Fires, have raged in Russia, the United States, and Canada destroying in some cases large parts of communities. The earthquake in Japan with the tsunami and resultant nuclear disaster which followed is and will be felt in that part of the world for years to come. There have been no less than 35 earthquakes of 6.0 in magnitude or greater this year, all around the Pacific Rim and elsewhere. Many of these quakes did little or no damage and resulted in no loss of life, but in others the damage and loss of life was devastating; all causing a bit of anxiety wondering when the “big one” will hit the west coast of North America.

Famine has once again come to the fore in Somalia and aid agencies have ramped up efforts to provide food and medical assistance to those affected. At the same time a troubling but growing suspicion grows around governmental and non-governmental agencies who receive the donations, for too many reports have surfaced that the donations are never getting to the people in need.

Yet, many still look towards the future with hope: hope of better economic times, hope of an end to the many conflicts in the world, and hope that somehow, humanity will have the wisdom to learn from its mistakes. When I was a young boy, almost every choir that I ever sang in had “Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me…” in its repertoire, recording artists continue to record the song but the prospects of peace on earth become dimmer and dimmer.

As I look out across the horizon and wonder what 2012 will bring, I have no rose-coloured glasses and I doubt that you do either. The best I can do is step over the threshold into the New Year with God, believing that He is sovereign, that the chaos that swirls around me is little more than a “tempest in a tea cup” to the LORD and that he is still and always has been and always will be in perfect and uncompromised control.

Such faith allows me to rest and not get panicked by the news of the day. Such faith allows me to rest at night, unconcerned and free of anxiety. Such faith enables me to see beyond the remaining years of the earth’s yet unwritten history to see the glory just over the horizon, the glory of God’s promise, that a time will come when He will establish peace, a peace that will never again be disrupted. Look to the horizon!