Every generation leaves behind a...
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Every generation leaves behind a legacy of some sort. It may be a purely material one of comfort and prosperity. Or it may be a spiritual one, a "vision" for the next generation, a "way of seeing things" that will help those who come after them gain a better perspective on life, a "direction" for the journey of those who follow after.
Perhaps the saddest thing about our present generation is that it seems more set on leaving behind a material legacy of scientific and technological "progress" with all that implies than it is to leave behind a spiritual one. Such visions" as we have are fractured, held by individuals and special-interest groups more than anything even remotely resembling a "universal vision," a way of seeing things" that speaks to the world at large. It is difficult to identify any particular vision of a spiritual nature that is being made for those coming after us ... there seems little to pass on by way of hopes and dreams to enrich our children.
While John's vision is born of God by his own account and therefore cannot rightfully be called "his own" at all, it is equally true that he had lived many years by precisely the vision that holds front and center of the text today. It had led him through life and into the imprisonment from which he now speaks. It is his vision that has made him a threat to Rome "on account of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus."
And this is the "legacy" he leaves behind by the grace of the Holy Spirit who gave it to him in the first place. It is a legacy for the ages: a vision of the risen Son of Man, the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end of all things by whom and in whom all things derive their meaning.
Perhaps the saddest thing about our present generation is that it seems more set on leaving behind a material legacy of scientific and technological "progress" with all that implies than it is to leave behind a spiritual one. Such visions" as we have are fractured, held by individuals and special-interest groups more than anything even remotely resembling a "universal vision," a way of seeing things" that speaks to the world at large. It is difficult to identify any particular vision of a spiritual nature that is being made for those coming after us ... there seems little to pass on by way of hopes and dreams to enrich our children.
While John's vision is born of God by his own account and therefore cannot rightfully be called "his own" at all, it is equally true that he had lived many years by precisely the vision that holds front and center of the text today. It had led him through life and into the imprisonment from which he now speaks. It is his vision that has made him a threat to Rome "on account of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus."
And this is the "legacy" he leaves behind by the grace of the Holy Spirit who gave it to him in the first place. It is a legacy for the ages: a vision of the risen Son of Man, the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end of all things by whom and in whom all things derive their meaning.
