Volume 52 | Number 2 | March–April 2024

Inglés Español

“How Should We Then Live” in the Days of the Demise of Biblical Hope? (Reprint from August–Ocober 2017))


By Dr. H. T. Spence

Coming to the end of the nineteenth century, mankind began to anticipate that the twentieth century would be the century of hope for which man for thousands of years had been looking. In fact, the 1800s eagerly predicted that the twentieth century was almost guaranteed to be the century to usher in peace; it was prophetically called the “Christian Century.” This optimism was soon shattered by the ominous tensions that led to World War I. This bloodbath event brought a rude awakening to the continued reality of the true sinful nature of humanity.

Man’s Hope for Utopia

Following World War I, there continued to arise a growing hope that if mankind could indeed craft a world society where there was a wise administration of law, where an end to war and oppression could be achieved, and the basic necessities of life for every human being could be guaranteed, then world peace could be known. For three thousand years man has been dreaming of this hope. England’s Sir Thomas More coined the term utopia to represent this ideal when he published his work Utopia in 1516. This work was his suggested perfect government and social system.

The word utopia is from one of two almost identical Greek words that can mean either “good place” or “no place.” In our language utopia has come to mean not only “perfection” but also in some contexts “unrealistic” or “impractical.” The idea of a perfect mythical kingdom in the ancient teachings of Tibetan Buddhism inspired James Hilton’s novel Lost Horizon (1933). Hilton named his Himalayan utopia Shangri-La. His Shangri-La was a paradise where people slowly grow old, never age in appearance, and live in perfect harmony.

The earliest concept of a utopian society was conceived by Hesiod (750?–650? b.c.). In Works and Days, Hesiod described his dream of such a place in a time when “the fruitful earth spontaneously bore abundant fruit without stint. They live in ease, and peace upon their land with many good things, rich in flocks and beloved of the blessed gods.” Yes, this was the longing of man for a place free from war, disease, famine, injustice, and marked by tranquility. These concepts of utopia have been the hope of man seeking a place of peace and abundant blessing amidst all of the sin and destructive side effects of sin. Even the prophet Haggai spoke of a day when “the desire of all nations would come” (2:7).

The Greek philosopher Plato was more of a realist in his utopian vision. It is this platonic vision of a new world that our present world leaders are urging upon us. Plato knew that people were too indifferent or lazy to want his version of utopia. Therefore, he crafted an ideal society in which the wise men or “philosopher kings” would rule. In turn, they would control every aspect of social existence in the name of justice, order, freedom, peace, strength, stability, and goodness. The wise philosopher kings would not perform any of the work; they would organize the masses in their proper training, appointing their designated places in society. According to Plato, these philosopher kings were the only ones educated; the rest of the people performed their prescribed duties in which they were trained to contribute to the perfect utopia. Abortion and euthanasia helped control world population, more efficiently utilizing the planet’s resources. To complete his view, Plato also wrote of the imperative need of a class of soldiers who enforced the implementation of the continued plan of the philosopher kings.

It is interesting to note that all utopias of mankind have their origin from the utopian hope found about one hundred years after the Flood. This hope was Cush and his son Nimrod’s great plan of building the city of Babel with a tower that would express man’s tenacious desire for a global city and religion that would become the perfect city and religion of man without God. The limited population at that time in Genesis 11 was perhaps around 35,000. But God came down and stopped what man began to do in his rebellion against his Creator. Ever since that time, man has endeavored to revive his hope of such a place.

Population Problem for Man’s Utopia

A growing problem for man’s utopian hope is the increasing world population on the earth. In a.d. 1, the estimated population of 300 million on the planet continued with moderate growth. By 1750, world population reached about 760 million. After the start of the Industrial Revolution (1760 to the early 1800s), living standards rose diminishing widespread famines. In some regions of the world, epidemics diminished and population growth accelerated. By 1800, the population had reached 1 billion; by 1950, 2.5 billion. In 2005, the world reached an astonishing 6.5 billion inhabitants. Today the population is over 7.5 billion with an estimated 9 billion or more by 2050.

As world leaders contemplate where we are in history (believing mankind has come to the greatest hour of every form of technology, medicine, and science), they now believe that they must take over humanity’s evolutionary process. They desire to meticulously control the world and its people in every aspect of human existence. World leaders now are talking more about the grand vision of a world order to finally realize the long-held hope of man’s Utopia or Shangri-La. If the world is to come to universal peace and abundance of living, certain powers will have to negate all reasons for war. Collectively, the tens of trillions of dollars now spent on national defense could be rerouted and used for peacetime. This change could greatly improve global energy, ecological balance, the supply of pure water, medical health, bountiful food supply, and the necessary infrastructure of cities and villages around the world. The hope of such a world seems to be in sight. Yes, it is the hope of a day when one law will rule everyone, every country, all economies, and all of mankind.

The Demise of Hope

How do the rulers of this “new world order” initiate such realities amidst the need to address so many facets simultaneously? Its logistics are staggering. Throughout history one of the great strategies of Satan has been the powerful, intimidating use of chaos to bring a country or a people down. He intentionally foments anarchy within all branches and infrastructures of governments by terrorizing its people and producing hopelessness in the ensuing chaos. Once this hopelessness is stirred up, the present context of existence can be overthrown. As a result, leaders are able to rebuild their desired government out of the ashes.

America, the last bastion of Western civilization existing on the planet today, has now witnessed a president whose administration recently has brought our nation to a most ripened hour for a national revolution in the world of ideas. We are poised on the threshold of a new era, a new world, and a new political theory of government. Everything is now collapsing, including a calculated implosion of the former ideology of constitutional history. America is dead in every aspect. We are now witnessing newly revealed international forces swiftly coming in that may initially take us into a trilateral world, but eventually into a new world internationalist system.

We are caught in demonically-empowered currents of ideology that are the offspring of postmodernism. All law and order has been thrown to the winds of relativity. Sadly, the people seem to love to have it so. In our lifetime, we have witnessed the rise and fall of communism. This atheistic ideology began as a star of hope, becoming the great utopia not only for certain countries but also for the world. It marched for nearly a century conquering everything in its wake. But in our lifetime, we have witnessed its dismantling; now only five countries are fully given to its hope. Other communist nations now seek the hope of a better ideological power with an oligarchy.

We are now beginning to witness the fall of the revolution of secularism. From its beginning, secularism was focused intently on the overt de-Christianizing of America (as in the French Revolution). Secularism started with the dialogue about pluralism, tolerance, and relative values and morality. In the beginning of this revolutionary movement, secularism allured the intellectual. The educated population was tantalized by the ideas of the humanist dream, the logic of Darwinism, Freudian psychology, and even the Marxist-Leninist social theory. What secularism did was to open the American mind to become a playground of ideas. It was the hunger for the fruit of that tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and the promise, “Ye shall be as gods.”

From the rise of secularism to the fall of communism, the world has been enduring a 150-year assault on its very soul. We are in a global death so deep that the very idea of a utopian hope has proved unsuccessful. When something dies, that is its end. However, when a world dies, its existence transfers into another estate that is far deeper than merely death. We have come to the hour when God is in the process of giving us over because of what we have killed and aborted in truth and righteousness. Yet man believes that out of the chaotic death his sin has produced, there is still hope to become like God in order to re-create a paradise, a utopian Babel, that will be the gate to eternal deification of man.

The world is now ripe for the final scene of this historical drama of fallen mankind; it is now the hour for the rise of a beast out of humanity that will convince man that we have come to a time in our mental powers that we can create the future of mankind and the future of the planet Earth.

We have observed in these articles the 2045 Initiative, a term declaring man’s active first steps for this next frontier. Postmodernism has completely done away with the beliefs and absoluteness of six thousand years of fixed logic; now man is liberated to do what he wants, to believe what he wants, and to create his own new world, a world without God. And he believes this new transhumanistic world will reach up into heaven itself and establish its throne as the throne of God.

Conclusion

We must remember that existentialism (the mother of postmodernism) is built upon that which does not exist. Man has come to such a point in his dying that he would rather have a false hope than no hope at all. Mankind is living in a world of false hope; its virtual reality is now believed to be its reality.

How should we then live in days of the demise of true hope? There is no hope for humanity in humanity.

Mankind’s dreamers and evolutionary transhumanists have left out three important ingredients that guarantee the sabotage of their utopia: (1) the fallen nature of man; (2) that death will always be in man’s wake; and, (3) the ever-growing power of deadly sin in whatever man touches. Violence and terrorism will always be imminent if man as a sinner is in the driver’s seat of this world. We must also remember that the presence of spiritual evil on this planet is led by Satan himself; he is ever involved in all the workings of man.

Yet we must remember as a Bible-believing Christian that God is in absolute control of history, that even the wrath of man one day will praise God. Additionally, we must remember that His coming and His Kingdom are based upon Christ Himself.

How should we then live in the days of the demise of hope? Is there hope for the natural life, hope for the hereafter, and hope for the planet and mankind? We must emphatically declare, “Only God is the answer for man’s hope!”

When a fallen, sinful man comes to God, he comes in hope, believing God will do what He says in the Scriptures He will do. God has promised that if we confess our sins, He will forgive us. He promises if we turn our lives over to Him, He will perfect everything concerning us. He promises that all things will work together for good, for our good if we love Him and are called according to His purpose. Yes, we come to Him with the hope that He will change our lives. He has the power, the ability, to do exceedingly, abundantly above all that we could ask or think.

There is hope for a purpose for my life. I come to Him with the hope that He can change my marriage, my home, my children, and the state of my heart. No matter what circumstances may come outwardly upon my life or upon this world, I have hope for my life in this world. I have hope that when I die I will go to be with God in the utopia of the city of Sion in heaven.

But I also have hope regarding this earth and its future. This earth was a love-gift from the Father to His beloved Son. Though the earth has fallen and become the footstool of God, He has promised the hope of what He will do with this earth. We have hope of good things to come; we have hope that God will right all the wrong; we have hope that the kingdoms of this earth will become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ. He will do what the United Nations cannot do: beat the swords into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks; and make the earth a place where a lion and a lamb will lie down together, and a child will lead them. Yes, we have the blessed Hope that Christ will return one day, destroying all that man has made in his worthless, fruitless, miry-clay hope based on himself. Christ will come and set up His kingdom and rule and reign on this earth. His peace, His knowledge, and His Word will cover the earth as the waters cover the sea. We have hope that He will literally make a new heaven and earth; that men, human beings born without sin, will populate this earth; that this world will be restored to perfection; that God will move His throne to this planet; that we shall see His face; and, we shall serve Him forever!

Oh, dear reader, this is our hope in the day of the demise of human hope! How should we then live in this day when the hope of man is fabricated, false, and existential? We must live in biblical, God-promised hope; we must walk in God’s provided hope; we must converse in the hope of biblical language; we must love through God’s eternal hope; and we must worship Him in the blessed hope of His Son’s soon return. For hope in God is the only true hope! Yes, Christ’s Kingdom’s consummation is our hope, our Great Expectation in this life and in the life to come!