More than bread alone

What is the meaning of life?

That’s a question only rich people have time to ponder, some folks say. The world’s poor are too busy struggling for survival to concern themselves with something as nebulous as the “meaning of life” — unless it helps put food on the table.

Not true, according to a recent study published in the academic journal Psychological Science.

The study analyzed Gallup World Poll data from more than 130 countries, including the bottom 50 in terms of gross domestic product. Citizens of poorer countries actually ranked the importance of meaning in their lives higher than residents of more prosperous nations. The study looked at multiple factors contributing to this phenomenon, but in country after country, a common element emerged: faith.

“In part, meaning in life was higher in poor nations because people in those nations were more religious,” reported the study’s authors. “The mediating role of religiosity remained significant after we controlled for potential third variables, such as education, fertility rate, and individualism. As Frankl stated in Man’s Search for Meaning, it appears that meaning can be attained even under objectively dire living conditions, and religiosity plays an important role in this search.”

They meant Viktor Frankl, the renowned psychiatrist and author, who said, “Life is never made unbearable by circumstances, but only by lack of meaning and purpose.” As a survivor of Nazi death camps, he had authority to speak personally on the subject. Echoing Nietzsche, Frankl wrote, “Those who have a ‘why’ to live, can bear with almost any ‘how.’”

The “why” for many people who responded to the Gallup World Poll is faith.

I can hear the skeptics now: Faith is a rickety crutch the poor lean on — and an opiate the powerful use to lull the weak into accepting their lot. That might apply to certain lives or particular moments in history, but it can’t explain the power of faith in the human heart through the ages.

Even in affluent societies where secularism and materialism appear to be prevailing, people want something more, something deeper, so they look for God substitutes. “Instead of relying on religion to give life meaning, people in wealthy societies today try to create their own meaning via their identity and self-knowledge,” the study reported. Materialism and self-worship have become the “religions” of the rich, but they’re obscene counterfeits of the worship of God.

When Jesus was being tempted in the wilderness, the devil challenged Him to prove He was the Son of God by changing stones to bread. Jesus answered from the Scriptures: “It is written, ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God”’ (Matthew 4:4, NASB).

Humanity needs bread to sustain life. But bread isn’t enough. People crave the Bread of Life: Jesus Christ. That’s why the proclamation of the Gospel of Christ and the making of disciples among all peoples are the primary mission of God for His church in the world.

There are many ways to carry out that mission — including feeding the poor, ministering to the sick and needy and seeking justice for the oppressed. Fair-minded observers who put aside stereotypes of evangelical Christians long enough to examine evangelical activities in the world quickly discover that they are doing all of those things (see some examples here: https://gobgr.org/). The love of Christ compels them. Above all, however, the Great Commission command of Christ and the mission of God compel them. There is no artificial division between the Word of Christ and the love of Christ in authentic ministry.

“Every time Jesus sent out His disciples and apostles, He always told them to heal the sick and preach the Gospel,” said a missionary doctor some years ago. “It’s not that we heal so that we can preach. We’re not ‘bait.’ We heal and preach together in obedience to the commands of Jesus. It’s like a two-handled plow: You heal, you preach and you push forward — and God cuts the path so He can plant the seeds of the Gospel through His power.”

The Gospel gives ultimate meaning.

God’s call is not a destination

                                                    

She wants to return to the hurting people she loves. Desperately.

Laura Miles* is a missionary on hold. At least, she feels that way sometimes. She spent two terms overseas with her husband, in places where the people she served are experiencing hard times and the threat of worse. It tears her up inside to watch them suffer from a distance. But for now she’s back home, where she and her husband minister to young adults in a local church.

“We really felt like it was a lifetime calling,” Miles says of the first stint abroad. “We went over and just loved the people, loved the ministry. We have a definite heart for Muslims. We felt like we really connected, but about halfway through the Lord was telling us we needed to go back and [prepare] for long-term career ministry.”

They thought God would lead them back to the same place, “but it wasn’t long after leaving that we felt that door kind of shut,” Miles says. “We prayed and prayed. We were very impatient with the Lord. We wanted to know where and what was next. We realized we weren’t trusting in Him, so we committed to resting in serving where we were until He revealed the next location.”

When the time was right, they went to a different country and ministered there for three years. “We left everything, sold everything, and we thought it was going to be long-term,” she recalls.

Once again, however, they sensed the Lord drawing them home — this time to reach out to American Millennials searching for God’s purpose for their lives. Young women who look to Miles for guidance and inspiration confirm that she’s doing a pretty good job.

Still, a hurting world in darkness calls to her.

“Honestly, my heart is on the field somewhere,” she admits. “So I’m trying to seek out, ‘Lord, who do You want me to be right now while I’m here? Whenever You want to send me back somewhere, I’m ready.’ But until then, it’s about trying to be faithful where you’re at, with whom you’re given.”

The missionary call of God is as clear as glass. He called Abraham to leave his home for a place yet to be revealed (Genesis 12). Abraham obeyed, setting in motion a divine plan that would bless all nations. Jesus called His followers to make disciples among all peoples (Matthew 28:19-20), a command to His church that still stands. The New Testament refers to “calling” 195 times.

But His specific calling to individuals is more mysterious. It arrives in His time, not ours. It might be dramatic or quiet. It might come gradually or in a single, powerful moment. It is personal, tailored to one’s gifts and experiences. It might involve traditional avenues of mission service, or using your professional skills to share the Gospel in the secular marketplace. (Explore God’s call in your life at www.going.imb.org. Learn more about being a marketplace professional for Christ at marketplaceadvance.com).  

“God’s call involves a personal response to the witness of the Holy Spirit within us,” says “Exploring your Personal Call,” an IMB document shared with potential missionary candidates. “In this sense, the call of God is inward, personal and even secret. People accurately say, ‘God has laid this on my heart.’ There is a sense of ‘oughtness’ or divine compulsion toward a task or occupation. This kind of conviction led Isaiah to utter the memorable words, ‘Here am I. Send me!’ (Isaiah 6:8).

“This inward call can come in a variety of ways: through reading Scripture, through concentrated prayer, through special events or a special person, or through life’s experiences. However this personal call comes, it must be followed by a commitment to do that which God intends.”

Obedience, then, is the key. God calls us first to Him, not to a place or a people. Location comes later, and it may change. Abraham didn’t know where he was going; he only knew the One who was calling.

“No one, in other words, has a call to a particular place,” writes author and speaker Joan Chittister. “The call of God is to the will of God.”

Day by day, Laura Miles is learning that truth. What about you?

* Name changed

The death of darkness

                                                   

 

I saw my friend James at a church supper after being out of touch for several years. It was like we’d never been apart.

We talked, laughed, hugged, sang and prayed together. I met his wife for the first time and celebrated with them over the way God had healed wounds in their marriage and family. It was a great evening; we didn’t want it to end. We said goodnight, promising each other we’d meet again soon.

A few weeks later, James was dead. Chronic illness caught up with him. He hung on for days in the hospital, but his body was worn out.

This life seems so strong and sure for a season — and then it’s over. We try to escape death, delay it, appease it, fight it, deny it. “Do not go gentle into that good night,” the poet Dylan Thomas advised. “Rage, rage against the dying of the light.”

Rage all you want; death will come for you one day. But darkness, its close companion, is a choice.

“There was the true Light, which, coming into the world, enlightens every man. He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him. … But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name,” the Apostle John declared of Jesus Christ, the Word become flesh who dwelt among us (John 1:9-12, NASB).

Later in John’s Gospel, Jesus Himself said, “This is the judgment, that the Light is come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil” (John 3:19, NASB).

Men love the darkness, but God sent His Son, the Light of the world, to rescue us from eternal darkness. By His resurrection, Christ put darkness to death. Two millennia later, however, not everyone knows it. That’s why missionaries and other servants of God go to places of darkness, no matter the potential cost. They bring the Light of the Gospel not only through their words and actions, but by their presence.

“There have been several attacks recently,” wrote a worker who lives in one such place. “Often the gunfire and explosions would cease, and I would think it must be over, but it would start again. I was sharply reminded that we are here to pray.” To pray, to be, to love, to speak, to lift up the flaming torch of Christ amid great darkness.

On a recent plane trip, IMB President Tom Elliff struck up a conversation with a fellow passenger who asked him, “What do you do [for a living]?”

 “I chase darkness,” Elliff replied.

 Bewildered, the passenger inquired, “Are you in lighting?”

“In a way,” Elliff told the man.

Reflecting on the encounter, the IMB leader said: “We are indeed ‘chasers after darkness,’ looking for the black holes of sin in our world and thrusting into that darkness the Light of the glorious Gospel of Christ.”

My friend James experienced darkness in his life, but when Christ filled his soul with light and salvation, he became one of the most joyful witnesses I’ve ever known. This Easter, I know James is celebrating the resurrection in the presence of the Risen One.

Where is the next James Madison?

                                                       

 

If you want to stand in the room where America as an idea was conceived, visit Montpelier, where James Madison grew up, lived most of his life and died.

Montpelier is a beautiful place, nestled in the foothills of Virginia’s Blue Ridge Mountains. On clear days, you can see the peaks rising in the distance through the second-floor window in the library of the restored plantation house. I stood in that spot recently and trembled at the magnitude of what took place there, in the mind of one man.

You can imagine Madison looking out that very window for inspiration during the months he spent alone there before the historic summer of 1787, poring over his own books and the many volumes of history, philosophy and politics sent to him by his friend and political ally, Thomas Jefferson. When he emerged from his self-imposed intellectual retreat, Madison carried the ideas that would form the basis of the U.S. Constitution and its first 10 amendments, the Bill of Rights.

Without those founding documents, our nation — which was then a shaky confederation of former colonies on the verge of squandering their hard-won independence from England — would not exist. And you would not enjoy the right to speak, worship, vote and assemble with others as you please. Neither would untold millions of other people across the world, freed from their chains by the ideas Madison not only forged but ceaselessly labored for, wrote about and campaigned to see ratified. 

To be sure, the encouragement of Madison’s great mentor Jefferson (who also wrote a little something called the Declaration of Independence) was crucial. So was the instant credibility George Washington brought when Madison persuaded the beloved revolutionary general to attend the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia in 1787. Many others contributed to the basic principles that went into the Constitution, both during Madison’s formative years in the Virginia legislature and during the long, hot summer of the convention itself, where he spoke more than 200 times.

But without Madison in his finest hour, where would we be today?

“As a framer and defender of the Constitution he had no peer,” wrote historian Garry Wills. “No man could do everything for the country — not even Washington. Madison did more than most, and did some things better than any. That was quite enough.”

He would go on to serve two terms as president, lead the young country through the War of 1812 and live until age 85, the last of the Founding Fathers to pass off the scene. Yet in that pivotal year of 1787, James Madison was 36 years old. And he was far younger when he began grappling with the ideas that would make him the “Father of the Constitution.”

I highlight Madison’s youth at the time in order to pose a question: Where are the Madisons of today? More specifically, where are the spiritual Madisons?

We keep hearing that the Millennials, born after 1980, are leaving churches in droves (or never joining in the first place), that they are wary of making commitments to faith communities, government, school, marriage or any other institution. They like having unlimited options, we’re told, and prefer digital social networks to joining or forming the groups that traditionally have held society together.

The Pew Research Center supplied more confirmation of those attitudes in its study released March 7, “Millennials in Adulthood: Detached from Institutions, Networked with Friends.”

“The Millennial generation is forging a distinctive path into adulthood,” the study reported. “Now ranging in age from 18 to 33, they are relatively unattached to organized politics and religion, linked by social media, burdened by debt, distrustful of people, in no rush to marry — and optimistic about the future. … [H]alf of Millennials now describe themselves as political independents and about three in 10 say they are not affiliated with any religion. These are at or near the highest levels of political and religious disaffiliation recorded for any generation in the quarter-century that the Pew Research Center has been polling on these topics.”

You have to give Millennials credit for being optimistic about the future, given the crummy economic and career prospects they’ve been handed. Maybe that’s the natural energy and hope of youth. The grim economic outlook of recent years, not to mention massive student debt, also explains part of their reluctance to get married and enter into other major social or financial commitments. The issue of trusting others, however, is revealing.

“Millennials have emerged into adulthood with low levels of social trust,” Pew reported. “In response to a longstanding social science survey question, ‘Generally speaking, would you say that most people can be trusted or that you can’t be too careful in dealing with people?’ just 19 percent of Millennials say most people can be trusted, compared with 31 percent of Gen Xers [born from 1965 to 1980], 37 percent of [the Silent Generation, born from 1928 to 1945] and 40 percent of Boomers [born from 1946 to 1964].”

People tend not to interact with those they don’t trust — and definitely won’t willingly work with them, join churches or other voluntary organizations with them, or cooperate with them to keep civil society functioning.

Perhaps you’re a Millennial believer in Christ, but you’ve decided to take a pass on being part of a local church. It’s an outmoded institution encrusted with irrelevant traditions, you say. You’re “spiritual but not religious,” so you intend to worship on your own or with a few close friends. You plan to do ministry and missions that way, too, rather than bothering with bulky religious organizations that might waste your time and money.

It’s your choice. But consider this: What if James Madison had decided to go it alone after the American Revolution? He could have stayed at Montpelier and enjoyed his big Virginia plantation — and let others worry about a fledgling nation on the edge of collapse. Instead, he rolled up his sleeves and plunged into the long, exhausting task of dialogue, debate, compromise and coalition-building that went into creating the United States of America out of the competing interests of 13 ornery colonies.

The church, a far older institution than the United States, is also the Body of Christ. Christ commands that we not only worship, serve and proclaim the Gospel alongside other sinners saved by grace, but that we love them. What a concept.  

In order to form a more perfect union, we must commit ourselves to renewing the imperfect one we have. We need you to be a part of it!

Karen Watson, 10 years on

                                                            

 

Karen Watson knew Iraq was dangerous.

She had left the chaotic country months before, exhausted and afraid, as it descended deeper into violence. But she went back anyway. Not as a soldier, but as a Christian relief worker, armed only with love and humanitarian aid.

 That decision cost Karen Watson, 38, her life on a dusty road 10 years ago. But she had no regrets about going back. Karen wasn’t big on regrets; she had experienced too many of them already in her short life. She was big on obedience.

 “When God calls there are no regrets,” she wrote in a now-famous letter found in a sealed envelope marked “Open in case of death” among some things she left with her pastor, Phil Neighbors, at Valley Baptist Church in Bakersfield, Calif., when she departed for the Middle East.   

 “I tried to share my heart with you as much as possible, my heart for the nations,” Karen said in the letter. “I wasn’t called to a place; I was called to Him. To obey was my objective, to suffer was expected, His glory my reward, His glory my reward.”

She had joined the wave of foreign relief workers who rushed to Iraq after U.S. and coalition forces overthrew Saddam Hussein’s regime in 2003. But relief groups didn’t realize how quickly large areas of Iraq were becoming death traps as factional attacks and terrorism mounted.

On March 15, 2004, Karen and four other Southern Baptist humanitarian workers were driving back to Mosul after a day of visiting villagers in need of clean water. Gunmen pulled alongside their vehicle and opened fire, killing Karen and her co-workers Larry and Jean Elliott died on the spot. David McDonnall died hours after the attack. Carrie McDonnall, David’s wife, suffered multiple wounds but later recovered.

I had the opportunity to write about these workers and four other Southern Baptist missionaries killed in terror attacks since 9/11 in a book, “Lives Given, Not Taken: 21st Century Southern Baptist Martyrs” (http://imbresources.org/index.cfm/product/detail/prodID/1330), published in 2005. It gave me the chance to read their letters and journals, to talk to the widows, friends and colleagues, parents and children of these workers about their lives.

Karen Watson’s story struck the deepest chord in me. She overcame a difficult early life, a broken family, devastating losses of loved ones and years of emotional pain to become a bold and joyful servant. She packed a lifetime of loving Jesus into the nine years she knew Him as Savior before her death.

“Don’t make Karen into a saint,” urged a close friend. “She would hate that. She was pretty wild when she was young. But when she became a Christian, she turned around 180 degrees.”

So who, exactly, was Karen Watson? One tough gal, to hear some tell it. Before becoming a believer, she ran a pool hall. Later, as a detention officer with the Kern County (Calif.) Sheriff’s Department, she handled potentially violent jail inmates and trained other deputies to quell disorder, by force if necessary.

During her first year as a believer, she was offered the  job with the Sheriff’s Department — and she seized the opportunity. Karen had a deep sense of justice, of right and wrong, which had been violated many times during her years of pain. Law enforcement represented a way to try to right some of those wrongs. And as a young Christian, Karen had by no means become a quiet, retiring nun. She was in charge — and when she felt it necessary, in your face.

“She was a straight shooter. She didn’t sugarcoat anything,” said Lt. Kevin Wright, her commanding officer and closest friend in the department. “I would hear her footsteps coming down the hall and know I was going to get a lecture about something. She would come in, close the door, sit on my desk and say, ‘We gotta talk.’”

Karen did her best at all times and expected everyone else to do the same. No slack, no excuses. Nearly everyone in the department liked her, though, because she backed her words with action, commitment and loyalty. “She was the kind of person you wanted on your side when the going got rough,” Wright said.

Inmates liked her, too. She was firm, but fair. “She was compassionate with them,” Wright recalled. “They knew they weren’t going to pull anything over on her, that she was strict and would enforce the rules. But she was willing to listen to them.”

Once Karen gave her heart to Jesus, He began the patient process of softening her, a process revealed in the journals she kept throughout her walk with God. They are a series of love letters from God to Karen, and from Karen to God, recording her pursuit of Him with all of her mind, body and soul.

“I'm not going to give anything to my Lord that will cost me nothing,” she wrote, way back in 1998.

 Many times during her life, Karen — like other children of broken homes — battled anger and bitterness, depression and loneliness, perfectionism and insecurity, the compulsion to rebel against authority. She also struggled with fear throughout her time in Iraq and freely admitted it.

But courage isn’t the absence of fear, as one of her pastors reminded listeners at her funeral. Courage is the laying aside of fear to obey God, trusting Him with the consequences.

When she was assigned by IMB to help coordinate post-war relief projects in Iraq, she sold her house and car and gave away most of her other possessions — whatever wouldn't fit in a large duffel bag. After relief work began in earnest, she worked with others to coordinate the distribution of thousands of food boxes sent by Southern Baptist churches and the rebuilding of damaged schools, among numerous other projects. One of her most cherished ministries: the “Widows Project,” a program that helped mostly nonliterate Iraqi women learn to read, gain work skills and generate income.

“Karen built relationships everywhere she went,” said a colleague. “People remember her. They remember the light in her countenance. They remember her friendliness.”

The spiritual battle intensified for Karen as the brutally hot summer months of 2003 passed. Threats against foreign civilians were increasing. She personally experienced several close calls in the Baghdad area as bombings and street attacks mounted. Gunfire woke her up at night; sleep seldom returned. It became overwhelming.

Karen left Iraq for several months, not knowing if she would ever return. She rested — mentally, physically, spiritually. She savored the feeling of having lunch with friends at McDonald’s without having to look over her shoulder or listen for explosions and gunfire. She studied Arabic. She spent many hours in prayer. As time passed, she confronted her anxieties about what was happening in Iraq. She studied key passages of God’s Word with close friends — grappling once again not only with current fears but with old wounds and heartbreak.

“Lord, in all my weakness I need Your strength for the future,” she wrote in her journal.

Karen was convinced it was time to return to Iraq. Shortly before she left, she bought a beautiful gold ring with several small diamonds. The purchase surprised friends, since Karen usually saved much of her small salary and lived on next to nothing.

“It looked like a wedding band,” said a friend. “I wore a wedding band before I got married, too, to remind me that Christ was my husband, that I wasn't alone.” She asked Karen if that was what she had in mind.

“Yes,” Karen replied with a radiant smile. “I guess that's it.”

When Karen’s friend learned of her death in Iraq only days later, she wept with everyone else. Then she remembered the wedding ring — and her weeping turned to tears of celebration: “It was her wedding day. Christ had so prepared her as a bride that she was completely without blemish. I don’t know if I have ever been with anyone who was more ready to meet Him face to face.”

Only Karen — and her beloved Bridegroom — know all the reasons why she returned to Iraq, and why she died there. But in the end, her joyful sacrifice wasn’t for needy Iraqis.

It was for Jesus.

World weary

                                        

Listen to an audio version of this post at http://media1.imbresources.org/files/195/19559/19559-107657.mp3

Did you see the picture of Marwan, the 4-year-old Syrian boy recently found wandering in the desert near the Syria-Jordan border?

A news photo of the refugee child went viral on social media. It attracted far more attention than the hundreds of Syrian refugees who cross the same border every day and night to escape the murderous war in their country. Turns out Marwan wasn’t alone; he had temporarily fallen behind his family members, who were among about 1,000 Syrians making the chaotic border crossing that particular day. Relief workers reunited the child with his parents about 10 minutes after the photo was taken.

People around the world responded to the photo because it depicted a lost child, dragging a plastic bag with his few belongings, seemingly alone in the world. Who wouldn’t feel compassion for this little boy? His personal, heartbreaking plight is easier to understand than the struggle of millions of refugees experiencing the same thing.

 “A single death is a tragedy. A million deaths is a statistic.” That statement is attributed to Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin, who knew something about engineering death on a mass scale. He understood that most people can’t fully comprehend events affecting great multitudes — especially if those events are happening far away.

Media have radically changed the global landscape since Stalin’s time, however. News travels instantaneously. Digital devices bring us images of tragedies, wars and disasters 24/7, if we choose to watch. But that poses a new problem. The constant onslaught of events and information dulls our senses. We have our own daily problems. We turn away. Americans in particular, living far from many of the world’s conflict zones, tend to turn inward.

“It’s not that Americans are disinterested in foreign affairs, it’s that their interest is finely calibrated,” observes geopolitical analyst George Friedman. “The issues must matter to Americans, so most issues must carry with them a potential threat. The outcome must be uncertain, and the issues must have a sufficient degree of clarity so that they can be understood and dealt with.”

There aren’t that many global crises that neatly fit such criteria in these confusing times. The outcome of the war in Syria is uncertain, but its multiple causes and combatants are anything but clear to us. Does its eventual outcome, regardless of who wins, threaten us directly? Hard to say. One could say the same of the current troubles in Ukraine, Venezuela, Egypt, Thailand, South Sudan, the Central African Republic and other places. Trouble is always brewing somewhere. Let them sort it out, we say. We’re tired of being the world’s policeman. 

“Whether this sentiment is good or bad is debatable,” says Friedman. “I would argue that it is a luxury, albeit a temporary one, conferred on Americans by geography.”

Weary of years of war and overseas entanglements, many Americans are ready to withdraw behind our spacious borders — physically or psychologically — until something so big happens that we can’t ignore it.

That’s a national choice. But God calls His followers to greater things. If we serve Him, we are citizens of the world, no matter how chaotic the world may seem. In my last column, I asked how we can continue to go into the world and make disciples as a new age of upheaval dawns. Withdrawal is not an option for world-hearted Christians, because it implies one of two things: fear or indifference.

God is not indifferent about the world. He is passionately concerned about every people, every culture. The more suffering and turmoil a nation is experiencing, the more intensively He is working to bring His grace and mercy.

“This past month we have seen an amazing outpouring of God's Spirit,” said IMB worker Brady Sample,* who lives in violence-torn Kiev, Ukraine, a nation on the edge of cracking apart. “God is moving. This event is causing people to pray, and while they are praying for peace in the land, God is trying to bring peace into people’s hearts.”

No matter how difficult the destination or the situation, He will go with us. In fact, He’s already there, waiting for us to meet Him.

Don’t miss the appointment.

*(Name changed)

Rumors of wars

                                                          

 

2014 will mark a grim anniversary: 100 years since the beginning of World War I.

It was to be the “war to end all wars.” If only.

World War I is rapidly disappearing from modern memory. At the current pace of events, we often forget what happened last week, much less a century ago. We are twice as far removed from 1914 as Americans in that year were removed from the Civil War era. Another world war and scores of smaller ones have occurred in the generations since. Revolutions have shaken and reshaped entire chunks of the globe. Technology has transformed almost everything.

But we should never forget the consequences of “the Great War.” Aside from its staggering bloodshed and suffering (more than 30 million killed or wounded), it brought the end of the old order in Europe and laid the groundwork for a new one. It swept away monarchies and empires, set the stage for revolutions and years of global economic struggle — and ultimately led to an even more devastating global conflict.

Some historians believe we are entering a similar era of endings and beginnings. If Christians intend to make an impact on the world, we must strive to understand the times. We also must deal with the world as it is, not as we want it to be. If you’re waiting for general stability and peace before you launch out to the nations or lead your church to go, you’ve got a long wait ahead.

 “[T]he coming conflicts and challenges are pretty clear,” writes Gordon Adams, professor of international relations at American University, in Foreign Policy magazine. “We will hear a lot about the Syrian civil war, the fate of the Iranian nuclear program, conflict in Iraq, the departure of U.S. forces from Afghanistan — not to speak of what applecart Vladimir Putin plans to upset next, whether the North Korean regime will implode, and whether China and its neighbors intensify their conflict over the rocky outcroppings they all want to own. …

“As we reflect on this [World War I] anniversary year, however, there are deeper rumblings afoot, rumblings that will color and shape many of these conflicts. The same was true 100 years ago. … At the start of that new century, the shape of world politics was about to transform, while class conflict rose and shook the very foundations of the monarchies of continental Europe. Between these two forces, they would wipe out the Austro-Hungarian Empire, remove royalty from power in Germany, bring revolutionary turmoil to Russia, undermine the colonial systems established by France and Germany, and bring a new power — the United States — to the center of the world stage.”

Now the United States and its allies seem to be receding as global power players, by circumstance or by choice, while economic, political and military conflicts simmer around the globe. If that withdrawal or decline continues, other forces will fill the power vacuum.

In some cases, the vacuum itself will bring chaos. It’s an old historical pattern, repeated many times through the ages.

“Why so much anarchy?” asks Robert Kaplan in a new piece for Stratfor, the global intelligence analysis service. Twenty years ago, Kaplan warned in an influential Atlantic Monthly article (“The Coming Anarchy”) of “unprecedented upheaval, brought on by scarce resources, overpopulation, uncontrollable disease, brutal warfare and the widespread collapse of nation-states and indeed, of any semblance of government. ... Welcome to the 21st century.”

Some of those predictions came true; some didn’t. But “what is not in dispute is that significant portions of the earth … are simply harder and harder to govern,” Kaplan reports. He identifies five major causes for the persistent upheaval of recent decades:

n  The end of imperialism: Empires and spheres of influence built by international powers often oppress and exploit the peoples they absorb. But they provide (or enforce) order. When they crumble, freedom may follow. Or chaos and blood.

n   The end of post-colonial strongmen: National dictators replaced departing colonial authorities in many places during the post-colonial era in the 20^th century and again after the Cold War. Saddam Hussein, Moammar Gadhafi, Hosni Mubarak and many other strongmen are gone. But who — or what — will replace them? 

n  No national institutions and feeble national identities: Post-colonial dictators typically ruled by fear and secret police, not strong social and political institutions. “It is institutions that fill the gap between the ruler at the top and the extended family or tribe at the bottom,” Kaplan explains. Without such institutions, “the chances for either [more] dictatorship or anarchy proliferate.” States with such weak national identities become particularly vulnerable to “non-state identities that fill the subsequent void.” Think al-Qaida, organized criminal cartels and other bad actors.  

n  Doctrinal battles: Religious struggles have sparked many wars in the past. It’s happening again in the Muslim world “as state identities weaken and sectarian and other differences within Islam come to the fore, often violently,” Kaplan notes. Americans tend to focus on radical Islam versus the West. But the great ideological battle now tearing apart the Middle East — from Syria and Iraq to Iran and Saudi Arabia — is the blood feud between Sunni and Shiite Islam.

n  Information Technology: Smartphones “can empower the crowd against a hated regime, as protesters who do not know each other personally can find each other through Facebook, Twitter, and other social media,” Kaplan acknowledges. But they “cannot provide [or] maintain political stability afterwards. This is how technology encourages anarchy. The Industrial Age was about bigness: big tanks, aircraft carriers, railway networks and so forth. … But the post-industrial age is about smallness, which can empower small and oppressed groups, allowing them to challenge the state — with anarchy sometimes the result.”

What comes next?

“The real question marks are Russia and China. The possible weakening of authoritarian rule in those sprawling states may usher in less democracy than chronic instability and ethnic separatism that would dwarf in scale the current instability in the Middle East,” Kaplan warns. “The future of world politics will be about which societies can develop responsive institutions to govern vast geographical space and which cannot. That is the question toward which the present season of anarchy leads.”

That might be the political question. The spiritual question for Christians: How do we continue to go into the world, declare the Gospel and make disciples among all nations as yet another era of upheaval unfolds? There are as many answers as there are nations, cultures and peoples.

 But retreat is not one of them.