Are you able to love the world without having the love of the world?
Are you personally concerned for the multiple hapless millions
lost without hope in this God-rejecting age?
ON-THE-SPOT WORLD TOMORROW radio broadcasts have been beamed to you from India, Israel, Vietnam and Japan. Other eyewitness reports have been compiled for you from dozens of additional nations and published in Plain Truth magazine. These broadcasts and reports have provided you with the most up-to-date information about world conditions. You have become familiar with the innermost thoughts, wishes, dreams and desires — the everyday problems — of the many peoples who share your world with you.
Survival — Prime Motive
Vastly different modes of life have been revealed to you. You have heard about the lives of average citizens the world over — how they work, live and die. Each nation has been different. Each has its own particular problems —compounding the already wearisome needs of survival which all peoples have in common. Yet, in spite of nationality or locality, in spite of the fears, disappointments and tragedies so characteristic of "modern" existence, every inhabitant of our troubled planet wails out in a unified chorus of emotion: "I WANT TO LIVE, I LOVE LIFE — HELP ME."
These people, sandwiched together on this minute orb, lovingly called "the Good Earth," usually don't agree with the politics of the nations around them — and in many cases they don't agree with the politics of their own nation. Their physical circumstances are all too often in desperate need of improvement. Their only wish is for a better life. But no matter what the situation, THEY DOGGEDLY CLING TO THIS LIFE! It's all they've got.
It's the same the world over. People realize that life, as they know it, doesn't have all the answers. But — sorry — politicians offer no alternative.
So most humans vaguely feel that their own personal existence must mean more than the confusion, trouble and strife which surrounds and envelops them. They know they need something more out of life than they're presently getting. But what? Man simply doesn't know; and tragically, he doesn't even care to find out. He stubbornly refuses to acknowledge what he really needs -GOD'S KINGDOM HERE ON EARTH!
This Is Your World
Recently I had the privilege of traveling through several nations of our sin-encrusted world. All were filled with dirt, disease, danger and death. And the cause of it all? MISEDUCATION.
India is probably the epitome of human misery. Why? Miseducation is her foremost natural resource. I have seen pictures, read books and talked to people about India. All have tried to describe her poverty-stricken masses. But neither pictures nor books nor talk can make you experience the sights, sounds, and smells of India. Depravity and poverty are everywhere. The air is thick with the dank, musty, damp odors which clearly bear the stench of human wastes.
You feel it here. Bony-eyed twigs — they should have been children — sit motionless in cow dung. That gets to you. The children. Not a chance in a million. If they ever get into their teens, it'll be luck — if they ever get out, it'll be a miracle. Babies purposely maimed to be better beggars. This is their one life. Never a decent meal — most dogs eat better. Home is the gutter; rain is their roof. And they'll never know any different. You feel them in the pit of your stomach. You feel guilty getting into a warm, clean bed. You feel rotten for having eaten dinner. Those helpless children out there are real!
Of course I realize that conditions like this are not limited to India. Ghettos and slums are filled with poverty and dirt; whether they be in the United States or in some less blessed nation. But being in India, thousands of miles away from home, away from the familiar surroundings and sights, helped me see far greater depth of meaning in Jesus Christ's simple words, "Thy Kingdom come."
In reading the account of how Jesus taught His disciples to pray, we often read His words without thinking at all (see Matt. 6:9-10). There's an enormous message here. There's a desperate urgency conveyed in this passage. Notice that "Thy Kingdom come," following immediately after hallowing God's name, is the very first request which Christ commanded us to make! Significant? What do you think?
Jesus Christ, the Creator of the universe and Savior of all mankind, KNEW WHAT HE WAS TALKING ABOUT! He knew what man needed. Who else could know better? Christ had formed man from dust (Gen. 2:7). He wept for man (John 11:35) and He wept for the world (Luke 19:41). But He was going to do more than feel sorry. He was qualifying to change the world. He meant it when He told His disciples — OF ALL AGES — to pray for God's Kingdom to come.
Jesus Christ knew man couldn't solve his multitudinous problems of living without help. He knew it would take the very Government of God to erase the heartaches of man. So He gave His life to make it all possible. Humanity is finally going to have all its ills cured. And Jesus Christ is going to be in charge.
BUT MAN DOESN'T WANT IT GOD'S WAY! Thank God man's likes and dislikes won't make one whit of difference.
Is There Another Way?
"There is a way that seems right to a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death" (Prov. 16:25). Carnal minds don't believe that scripture. But world leaders have been echoing strange pronouncements in recent years. They now readily admit that suddenly, in the middle decades of the 20th century, it is now possible to completely wipe all life from the face of the earth. Cosmocide — the suicide of mankind — is possible by at least FIVE DIFFERENT means!
Mankind is shocked by the specter of imminent, instant disintegration. But a true Christian — one who believes every word written in the Bible — should not even be surprised. Jesus knew man would come to the place of self-extermination when He foretold just such an eventuality more than 1900 years ago. And Jesus told His disciples — just as He is now telling us. Why? Because they were His friends (John 15:15) — and so are we!
Your Bible has borne witness to this pivotal prophecy all these centuries: "Pray that you may not have to fly in the winter or on the Sabbath, for there will be sore misery then, such as has never been, from the beginning of the world till now — no and never shall be. Had not those days been cut short, NOT A SOUL WOULD BE SAVED ALIVE; however, for the sake of the elect those days will be cut short" (Matt. 24:20-22, Moffatt translation).
Read that again. "Not a soul would be saved alive." Do you believe that? Bad question. It doesn't matter whether you believe it! It's a fact. World leaders have stated it. And we are proclaiming it!
Such a realization should make man's blood run cold. You would think that he would cover his head in fearful shame and screechingly cry out to his God for immediate help. But man is too "sophisticated" for that sort of "nonsense." Man wants to survive all right. But it's got to be on his terms. Man must be in charge. Fine. That's his choice. We won't argue. God won't interfere. Quite yet!
Man, enjoy yourself. Have all the "fun" you want. Play all your silly little games. You've still got a few more years to devise more misery and disaster. Go right ahead. Clutch vainly at the United Nations. Try "peaceful coexistence." Perhaps NATO or SEATO will be your savior? Maybe the Grand Design will work?
Forget it.
Man, you've had it. It's almost over. All your futile efforts to save yourself are pitiful and pathetic.
But man continues to shut his mind from the grim reality of impending doom. Like the little child who closes his eyes just before a rampaging automobile hits his dog, man bombards his senses and blanks his mind. But just as the little child must eventually open his eyes, man will soon be forced to see his own vile self and the incredible mess which he has labored so long to produce.
Refuse the Facts
Carnal-minded man can't stand to admit that he NEEDS God. He refuses to accept the cold fact that the way which "seems right" — HIS WAY — has failed! He blindly rejects Isaiah 59:8, "The way of peace they know not; and there is no judgment in their goings: they have made them crooked paths: whosoever goes therein shall not know peace."
That's a good verse for skeptics and agnostics. They should memorize it. It's a simple statement — real easy to refute. All these "intellects" would have to do — to totally discredit the Bible — is achieve lasting peace. (Don't hold your breath)
No, man doesn't think he needs God to show him the right way of life. He'll find it by himself. Give him a chance. Okay — how about 6,000 years? Long enough? Well it's about up — and the results are in. The tabulation is ridiculously easy to make. Man has recorded nearly 6,000 years of war after war and failure after failure.
The ways of peace have strangely eluded him — like that big fish which got away. Who can doubt? The evidence is EVERYWHERE for all to see in the misery, poverty, sickness and wretchedness of this world. The daily newspapers scream it in bold print. The suffering BILLIONS plaintively verify it by their mournful looks and famished cries. Yet poor, blind, deceived man can't see or understand that HIS WAY HAS FLOPPED!
Why can't man see the plain evidence of his failure? Because it doesn't suit him and he can't explain it. And whatever man can't explain he ignores. So the decline in morals, the increase in "Cold Wars," the shrinking food supplies and the rising world population are all nonchalantly overlooked. "Ignore it and it will go away" is the philosophy. "If it doesn't affect me, it can't be too bad." But such isn't the case. It is bad! And it does affect you.
Ninety-nine out of every hundred of the people in underdeveloped countries will never, IN ALL THEIR LIVES, have what a North American family would consider a square meal. Children in Africa and India sit staring as if blind. Their arms and legs are like sticks of licorice. They neither laugh nor cry. They've degenerated just too far for any such displays of emotion — at two years of age they weigh only TEN POUNDS. Hard to believe — but true. Two-year-old children weighing the same as many a newborn baby. Imagine YOUR two-year-old child weighing only ten pounds! If your child were in such a condition, YOU WOULD BECOME INVOLVED QUICK!
That probably doesn't mean very much to Mr. Well-off Citizen. It's too abstract. And anyway, he has to worry about his pressing problems. Which second car would look the most sporty to his associates? It's a nerve-racking decision. What about those thousands of children who starved to death on the very day that Mr. Well-off Citizen made this "critical" decision? Children? What children?"
Is There an Answer?
De Gaulle's plan didn't provide the answer. It was discarded along with De Gaulle. The "Great Society" created more questions than it answered. Where is the answer? Perhaps more aid for Vietnam? How about additional billions for space study or the war on poverty? What about more money lavished on the underdeveloped countries of the world? Sure, you name it — America gives it! But is money the answer? — No!
In the first place, the people of the underdeveloped nations don't even know how to utilize their gifts and spend their money! Often the rats eat as much of the donated wheat as do the people. Some people spend their foreign-aid money for marijuana — while the rain gushes through the roofs of their houses and between the cracks in their walls, soaking their poorly clothed families. Other people can be seen wearing expensive wristwatches and indulging themselves in hard liquor and still more unsavory pursuits — yet they don't have the necessity of a sheltered, private place to meet nature's needs.
The mind-defying BILLIONS of dollars which we have poured into Vietnam haven't made the world more peaceful. But of course we can see some tangible results for our efforts: farms have been defoliated and villages have been burned out. This hasn't bettered the lot of the average Vietnamese citizen. Nor has it been appreciated. And then there's the inevitable Black Market. It flourishes in Saigon to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars annually. And the pockets and bank accounts of a select few bulge — while the misery and wretchedness of the people abound.
No, money isn't the answer! Yet man inflexibly stumbles on in the vain hope that the panacea for all his ills is, after all, just around the corner.