Progress toward the Promise

“Never again will there be in it
    an infant who lives but a few days,
    or an old man who does not live out his years;
the one who dies at a hundred
    will be thought a mere child;
the one who fails to reach a hundred
    will be considered accursed.
- Isaiah 65:20
 
Human society has made tremendous progress over the generations. Rates of infant mortality have plummeted. Diseases that used to strike people down in their prime now have cures (or life-prolonging treatments). We’ve made progress, but we still have so far to go.
 
We all know people whose lives have been cut tragically short. We grieve their loss. A future without them in it looks like a puzzle that’s missing certain important pieces. We long to live in a world where this doesn’t happen.
 
Today’s passage gives us a glimpse of that future world. Isaiah asserts his prophetic imagination to see a day when children will all get to grow up to be adults and when no one will go to an early grave. What a wonderful world!
 
But we live in the in-between times now. We’ve made progress, but haven’t reached that promised place. What’s God doing in this in-between time?
 
He’s comforting those who mourn the early loss of loved ones. He’s agreeing with the cries of our hearts that it isn’t right and it isn’t supposed to be like this. He’s close to us in these sad times.
 
But God is also empowering us to make a difference. He’s strengthening our hands and feet to beat back the darkness and extend his kingdom of light to every corner of creation. He’s blessed us with scientists who work to understand and cure disease. He’s given us activists who revolutionize political systems to create new possibilities for human flourishing. And he’s given us to our communities.
 
Our tiny acts of service, performed with great love, link together into a great chain of progress. Pulled by the Lord, this chain of progress lifts our community a little bit every day, a little bit every year.
 
How has God enabled you to make the world a little better today? 

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