Dakota Beacon

Everyone seeks meaning in their life. Everyone wants to be relevant to someone or something or some cause. Significance matters.

There was a time not long ago when people found their relevance grounded in Christianity. Their belief in the fundamental message of Jesus Christ and their ultimate reward in another life was the bedrock of truth. It defined the relevance and significance of people for themselves and their relationship to those around them. This truth held for two thousand years in western civilization.

Today this truth is rendered fuzzy by an unrelenting attack on Christianity. As a result, many folks try to create their own significance in the temporal world.

Some become storytellers. They are prone to fabricate their lives in story far beyond reality. A real world experience expands into a heroic embellishment in order to raise themselves in the eyes of others.

Similar to storytellers are the braggarts. These folks boast more than embellish. They are quick to sing their own praises all for the sake of creating meaning in their lives.

Then there are those who find meaning in their daily work. They see themselves as relevant in the work they do. Their identity is wrapped up in their work. They are known as workaholics.

Some folks even create meaning in life through their hobby. They identify with their hard work and effort.

It is not uncommon for people to associate with likeminded people. For one thing, they relate to each other on common ground. But, more importantly they find prestige in the eyes of others. By raising themselves up in the eyes of others they become relevant, meaningful and significant.

These instances of people creating their own relevance seem benign; shallow but benign. Others seek meaning in their lives with action that is not so benign.

What about those who find meaning and significance in destructive behavior? Gang members, westerners who join ISIS, people who riot in Ferguson, Missouri, fall into this category. Aimless people wandering seeking meaning in their lives are very susceptible to finding it in all the wrong places.

Why would people born in the United States want to join a gang or join ISIS? What is their interest? What is the attraction to rioting in Ferguson? Where do these people come from?

It is easy to say some of these people are weak and mentally unbalanced. You will always have a few wackos with guns who are willing to kill people. But the mentally disturbed cannot account for all who are driven to find significance in unacceptable behavior.

There has been a steady drumbeat of anti-western civilization propaganda over several decades. Western civilization is bad; it is dangerous. This translates into America is greedy, racist, murderous. America is the problem in the world, not the solution. Those seeking radical change portray America as founded by a bunch of wealthy white racists who wrote the US Constitution to protect their own selfish slave-holding interests.

This anti-western propaganda has been pounded into the heads of school children for generations. It is reinforced through the media and from Hollywood. From their youth people are pummeled with the message over and over again. Subjected to a daily tirade of how unjust and unfair America is; how much discrimination and inequality and inequity are practiced; and how rotten and guilty the United States is ultimately creates a breaking point. People seeking meaning and significance in their lives will hear the message and will be gullible enough to put their thoughts into action. Voila! Riots, ISIS recruiting and more become manifest.

When folks long for the “good ol’ days,” when meaning and significance in their lives and in the lives of others could be taken for granted, they hearken back to a time when shared beliefs and values were rooted in the ageless and eternal truth of Christianity. Maybe those days can be restored. Every person can discover who they are in Christ. The Christmas season is as good a place to start as any.

Dennis M. Patrick can be contacted at P. O. Box 337, Stanley, ND 58784 or (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).