The ideology of “moving on” seems to characterize this generation as none before. With Y2K under a 100 days away, it makes sense to take stock and ask ourselves about the direction that our life is taking.

With every upcoming new year, it is our fervent hope, of course,to believe that this one will be a good one. However, sitting back and letting things just take their course is sometimes a good stance, but not always.

Like a rat in a maze, or sociology's Pavlov dogs, we eventually discover that when one way doesn't work, then we must try another!

Sooner or later, reliance on others will be discovered to be a misguided way of handling a given situation, or even life itself. It is true that in a sense we are all dependent on one another, but in due time we will find that we will have to go back to square one and fall back on our faith.

Are we going to be realists or are we going to live in a dream world? If we say to ourselves that life is not worth living and that we must never be taken by trusting others, then we lose. But when we gather up the fragments of broken and shattered dreams after a crisis or failure, then we will discover that there is One Who watches over us even in the midnight hour of our lives and gently sets us back in place and encourages us to try again.

Are we “moving on?” An author once said that in all growth to higher life there is pain. It is then we must look to the One Who will wipe all our tears away. Yes, the words to the famous church hymn are, “Kings and kingdoms will all pass away, but there is something about that Name.”

Norm J. Barlow
Fayetteville

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