In the continuing news coverage of the war in eastern Europe, one observation by reporters and commentators has been ubiquitous: “This is the twenty-first century; how could these terrible things be happening?” The assumption behind such reasoning is that humanity has presumably outgrown—or should have outgrown—the evil proclivities of past ages, and that the horrors now witnessed in the present conflict should be viewed as relics of a bygone era—much like manual typewriters, record players, and long-distance telephone bills.

What we are seeing, yet again, is the death of an illusion—the belief of certain ones that the wickedness in human hearts can be eliminated through education and cultural enlightenment much the way technology has rendered obsolete so many former methods of communication and transportation. Despite the horrific events of the past century, the basic premises of Darwinian evolution continue to persist in many minds, in particular the notion that the bettering of the human spirit is inevitable with the passage of sufficient time.

Prelude to the Guns of August

The world has been here before. Over a century ago, in the waning years of the period some historians have termed the Belle Epoque (the years from 1871-1914) [1], many truly believed war and state-sponsored violence were about to go the way of the horse and buggy, the covered wagon, the stocks, and the whipping post. Especially did this notion of societal progress affect the way many viewed the working class, whose aspirations to economic justice were believed to transcend national boundaries. Barbara Tuchman, in her magnificent account of this era’s final moments, writes as follows regarding the outbreak of the Great War in 1914:

In England where there was less sense of national danger than on the Continent, Keir Hardie, Ramsay MacDonald and a few Liberals spoke out against the decision to fight. Elsewhere there was no dissent, no strike, no protest, no hesitation to shoulder a rifle against fellow workers of another land. When the call came, the worker, whom Marx declared to have no Fatherland identified himself with country, not class. He turned out to be a member of the national family like anyone else. The force of his antagonism which was supposed to topple capitalism found a better target in the foreigner. The working class went to war willingly, even eagerly, like the middle class, like the upper class, like the species [2].

Tuchman goes on to observe, on the following page:

The four years that followed were, as Graham Wallis wrote, “four years of the most intense and heroic effort the human race has ever made.” When the effort was over, illusions and enthusiasms possible up to 1914 slowly sank beneath a sea of massive disillusionment. For the price it had paid, humanity’s major gain was a painful view of its own limitations [3].

It seems humanity may well be due for another glimpse of the same!

Further Disillusionment

In the generations to follow, Auschwitz and Hiroshima inflicted even greater damage on positive views of the human spirit and the potential for global harmony, perhaps best summarized in the musings of the infidel scholar in Chaim Potok’s The Promise, who stated at one point: “The concentration camps destroyed a lot more than European Jewry. They destroyed man’s faith in himself” [4].

But despite overwhelming proof that progress in science and technology has not been paralleled by similar progress in basic human goodness, the optimistic outlook has persisted in certain minds. The end of the Cold War in the 1990s encouraged many to believe a peaceful global society was just over the horizon. But the surge in religiously-motivated terrorism, the rise and resilience of rogue states, together with the ugly rebirth of nationalism, have again discredited these hopes.

The Only Real Hope

Original sin is not a Bible doctrine; the evil in human hearts is depicted in the Sacred Pages as a chosen, not an imposed, condition (Eze. 18:20; Rom. 5:12; James 1:14-15). But the saga of history is clear that nothing except God’s forgiving, transforming grace can subdue the urges of a fallen nature and make gentle the life of this world. Outward compliance with God’s commandments offers any number of temporal, self-focused benefits—keeping out of jail and avoiding weekend parenthood being among them. But in the end, like the rich young ruler, one or more plague spots in the character will prove unconquerable in the absence of Biblical conversion and the surrender of one’s heart to the Biblical Savior.

Albert Einstein noted sadly, after the loosing of the atom bomb: “The release of atomic power has changed everything except our way of thinking . . . the solution to this problem lies in the heart of mankind” [5]. One day the world, and the universe beyond, will be witnesses to this solution as it is lived out in the lives of a global generation of divinely transformed and victorious saints, “a spectacle unto the world, and to angels, and to men” (I Cor. 4:9). In the words of the modern prophet:

The last rays of merciful light, the last message of mercy to be given to the world, is a revelation of His character of love. The children of God are to manifest His glory. In their own life and character they are to reveal what the grace of God has done for them.

The light of the Sun of Righteousness is to shine forth in good works—in words of truth and deeds of holiness [6]

The church, being endowed with the righteousness of Christ, is His depository, in which the wealth of His mercy, His love, His grace, is to appear in full and final display. . . . The gift of His Holy Spirit, rich, full, and abundant, is to be to His church as an encompassing wall of fire, which the powers of hell shall not prevail against. In their untainted purity and spotless perfection, Christ looks upon His people as the reward of all His suffering, His humiliation, and His love, and the supplement of His glory [7].

REFERENCES

1. “Belle Epoque” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belle_%C3%89poque

2. Barbara W. Tuchman, The Proud Tower: A Portrait of the World Before the War, 1890-1914 (New York: Ballatine Books, 1994), p. 462.

3. Ibid, p. 463.

4. Chaim Potok, The Promise (New York: Fawcett Crest, 1969), p. 315.

5. https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/17014-the-release-of-atomic-power-has-changed-everything-except-our

6. Ellen G. White, Christ’s Object Lessons, pp. 415-416.

7. ----Testimonies to Ministers, pp. 18-19.

Pastor Kevin Paulson holds a Bachelor’s degree in theology from Pacific Union College, a Master of Arts in systematic theology from Loma Linda University, and a Master of Divinity from the SDA Theological Seminary at Andrews University. He served the Greater New York Conference of Seventh-day Adventists for ten years as a Bible instructor, evangelist, and local pastor. He writes regularly for Liberty magazine and does script writing for various evangelistic ministries within the denomination. He continues to hold evangelistic and revival meetings throughout the North American Division and beyond, and is a sought-after seminar speaker relative to current issues in the Seventh-day Adventist Church. He presently resides in Berrien Springs, Michigan