2 Every day I will bless You, And I will praise Your name forever and ever. 3 Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised; And His greatness is unsearchable. 4 One generation shall praise Your works to another, And shall declare Your mighty acts.
In the process of spiritual duplication, or discipleship, as we talked about on The Meeting House, yesterday, we realize that we are not in it merely for ourselves - God desires that we make a deposit in the lives of other people, telling His story of His faithfulness in our lives, and being prepared to share Christ's love with those who desperately need to hear it and to experience a touch of God's presence in their lives. We are the ones who can bring answers, who can minister healing, who can radiate hope - and we could be used of God to bring lasting change into the life of another.
Psalm 78 provides a reminder for us that we are making a deposit for generations to come by the decisions we make:
5 For He established a testimony in Jacob, And appointed a law in Israel, Which He commanded our fathers, That they should make them known to their children; 6 That the generation to come might know them, The children who would be born, That they may arise and declare them to their children, 7 That they may set their hope in God, And not forget the works of God, But keep His commandments;
Today is the day of the dedication of the George W. Bush Presidential Library and Museum in the Dallas area. 3 of his predecessors and current President Obama will be in attendance. It's the second largest Presidential library, exceeded only by the Reagan facility in California.
And, as the Los Angeles Times puts it: "Dedicating a new presidential library is a chance for the ex-president and his supporters to cast him in the most favorable light, and for the news media to reassess his record." And, not everyone is exactly enthused - the article quoted Benjamin Hufbauer of the University of Louisville as saying, that the new library will in effect be "a huge, glitzy, glamorous museum of spin. A giant campaign commercial in museum form." And, indeed visitors will have the chance to view the information that contributed to the former President's decisions, have a chance to make their own decision, and see the President's rationale. Mark Updegrove, director of the Lyndon B. Johnson Presidential Library in Austin, is quoted by WORLD as saying, “Bush wants people to know the kind of decisions he had to make in the course of his presidency and give [a rationale] for why he made those decisions."
In his 2010 memoir, Bush wrote that it was "too early to say how most of my decisions will turn out." But he noted that the verdict of history had changed for the better for previous presidents.
Still, the legacy of Bush 43 is essentially "in the red", according to polling data. An NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll this month found that 35% of Americans viewed Bush positively and 44% unfavorably (a new ABC News-Washington Post poll on his performance as president showed a smaller net negative assessment, with 47% positive to 50% negative).
Yesterday on The Meeting House, we dealt with such issues as spiritual duplication, ministering to the millennial generation, and teaching spiritual truth to our children during family mealtimes. These are all related in the sense that we are talking about making a deposit into the lives of future generations - leaving a legacy, if you will (thank you, Crawford Loritts). So, there is some degree of permanence to what we do, how we react and respond. So, the challenge is to process information well, get good, true information, carefully seek God in prayer, and realize that we are not just living for ourselves - the decisions we make today could affect the course of our lives, and could also affect people around us.
So, many will celebrate George W. Bush in the days to come - he had 8 years in the world's most powerful office and was governor of one of the largest states before that. He has made a stamp on the timetable of history. But, through your decisions, you have a chance to shape history, as well. That realization can challenge us to make sure that we are acting consistently with God's Word.
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