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ALOVE
examines the past and the future to see what
kind of light they can shed on the present.
One of my all-time favourite movies is Memento,
a reverse time-line suspense thriller whose
plot revolves around a man suffering from
extreme short-term memory loss. A serious
head trauma has left the man in a unique position:
he can only remember what happened to him
up to the moment of his injury. Anything said
or done to him after this event disappears
entirely from his memory after only a minute
or so.
This makes life extraordinarily difficult
for him. He cannot remember conversations
he has just had, does not recognise people
he just met, has no real home he can go to,
and is very easily confused or misled. His
way of coping is to take Polaroid photographs
of important things (such as his car, people
he comes in contact with, and his hotel room)
and to tattoo important information onto his
body – these are the mementoes of his
life. Even with these precautions, he is still
very much at the mercy of those who want to
take advantage of his condition. This character
is forced to live in a perpetual present,
without any confidence in the past, and without
any real hope for the future.
Can you imagine living life like that? You
probably can. This is, in many ways, the kind
of world that we are living in right now.
We don’t care for the past and have
no idea about the future. We have our mementoes
from the past - our monuments and some historical
facts and figures - but they don’t really
make any sense to us anymore. Do they really
connect with anything we are experiencing
now?
Even if we do try to remember what has gone
before, the past is very quickly replaced
by the new fashion, the next “in”
thing, instant pleasure, and the assault of
media upon our senses. Our commercial-length
attention spans have taught us to forget the
past and to live for the “now”.
Author Douglas Coupland has famously said
that history is dead.
As for the future? Our generation has given
up on the myth of progress, the one that says
that everyday, in everyway, things are getting
better and better. We know that this is not
true; one look at the world around us confirms
it. It can feel like we have no way of predicting
what the future will hold, and no guarantee
that it will be anything worth experiencing
at all. Many in our generation have chosen
to opt out of the future, choosing instead
to drift from meaningless momentary pleasure
to meaningless momentary pleasure until their
lives come to an even more meaningless end.
So it seems that we have lost the ability
to remember and lost the will to hope. Is
this how it has to be?
Maybe it would be helpful to view the past,
the present and the future in terms of a continuing
story. It is important to remember where you
came from, and how the story of your past
has helped to create the person you are now
and the person you are going to become. You
played a part in shaping this story, but this
story also played a part in shaping you. And,
importantly, this story is not all about you.
You exist in a series of relationships, and
your story intersects with all kinds of other
stories. Remembering these stories is essential
if we want to be able to navigate in an uncertain
future.
A number of times in the Old Testament the
action stopped so that God’s anointed
messenger could recount the narrative of Israel
and her God. This was so that the story of
God choosing Israel, the deliverance from
Egypt, the miraculous provision in the desert,
and the occupation of the Promised Land would
be consistently fresh in the minds of a people
who were prone to both short and long term
memory loss. Through the story they were reminded
of where they had come from and of who they
were in relation to their God, their world,
and each other. The story also made clearer
the actions they were to take in the future,
and gave them a reason to hope that the God
they came to know in their story would continue
to be faithful to them.
In the same way, we need regular reminders
of where we have been if we want to have any
idea where we are going. Otherwise we will
wander aimlessly between a series of experiences
in the “now”, neither learning
nor gaining anything from them. I have to
think that life is more than just a compilation
of meaningless events leading to death.
So at the beginning of this year, we should
pull up some reminders from our past. Look
back at the past year and identify key moments
in your story. Write them down, and ask yourself
how each moment impacted upon your life, and
what this story of yours has to tell you about
the year to come.
Think also of other stories that intersected
with your own: relationships, world events,
school or work. What difference did these
stories make to your own?
Finally, look back through your year and see
if you can identify where the story of God
was most evident in your story. Look carefully
though. You may be surprised to find that
what you thought was an important memento
really wasn’t, and that God chose to
make himself known through things you thought
were insignificant.
This exercise should help us connect our past
with our present and future. It should also
help us to see the wide variety of influences
that help to form our stories, and should
give us a much clearer idea of the kind of
story God wants to make of our lives. |
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Further Thinking: |
Two books worth
checking out on the subject:
Futurise
– by Russell Rook
Red
Moon Rising – by Pete Greig |
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ALOVE,
Youthwork Magazine, Youth For Christ, Spring Harvest and
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