Dangerous times
Author
Alberto González Muñoz
Summary: The author emphasizes that contemporary society places too much emphasis on personal fulfillment over collective well-being, making people selfish. This is reflected in Paul's warning about dangerous times in the end times, where people will be greedy and love themselves. The author urges believers to help those around them and follow God's plan to make the world less dangerous.
Speaking of the true treasures that make our lives meaningful, I want to emphasize in this meditation something that I mentioned earlier. Contemporary society places an inordinate emphasis on the value of personal and individual fulfillment over collective well-being. In this way, personal interests are magnified and make postmodern men and women sovereignly selfish, sometimes without realizing it.
A woman, who had serious marital problems, came to seek my advice on one occasion. As we talked, her three-year-old son was playing near us. She did not like my suggestions to try to save her marriage and told me with tears in her eyes:
- Don't you realize that I have the right to rebuild my life?
When she said to rebuild my life so emphatically I looked at the boy. He played carefree, ignoring the tragedy that was coming. And his life? ”I asked him. To which she replied:
"His life is his life and he will manage." He has hardly begun to live! My life is the one that is being destroyed.
In the book of Philippians, Paul warns: not looking each one for his own, but each one also for the other (Philippians 2: 4). Sadly, those words sound out of date these days.
Contemporary men and women seem to be more in tune with the Bible's own description of people's character in the end times, as it appears in Paul's second letter to Timothy: “… in the last days dangerous times will come because there will be men who love themselves, greedy, boastful, arrogant, blasphemous, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, impious, without natural affection… (2 Timothy 3: 1-3) ”.
The most horrifying thing about this Pauline teaching is its amazing correspondence with the current state of humanity and the fact that it realizes that, as human beings manifest these attitudes, everyone's life will be exposed to a multitude of frustrating situations and will be full of insecurities. It has certainly become dangerous to live in a world where selfishness and personal interests dominate people's behavior. God's plan is another. For our sake we should follow the Lord's plan.
We believers cannot forget that nothing causes more satisfaction than helping the well-being of those around us. Let's try our way of behaving to lessen the dangerousness of the world a bit, making those around us feel safe to be loved, understood, and valued.
God bless you!