So, I took the Clifton Strengths Test (Gallup Research)for a Christian apologetics program I'm working on.
I think my results would have been different 30-40 years ago. But for now, they list my number one strength as Context. In a nutshell, they say I enjoy thinking about the past.
I understand the present by researching its history. But the kicker is that I didn't always feel this way. In my youth, I would have probably seen competitive, strategic, or creativity at the top of the chart. But like many Americans, I was caught up in the need for constant progress, looking forward rather than backward.
Maybe it's just a product of my age, but like many, I wanted to break from the tyranny of a past in the search for a new and mightier world(to poorly paraphrase Walt Whitman). But as I've grown older, I've discovered that the past can inspire us. The familiarity of the past can help us confront humanity through time; though we may think we're more innovative or more refined or advanced than those of the past, in reality, we really aren't. And I mean this more in a metaphorical sense. We aren't better than them. We're part of the same river of time, just further down the stream. We're all connected by the same experiences, struggles, and challenges of those before us.
Although, we certainly have the advantage of intelligent advances through discovery and learning. And a constantly changing culture that includes the good and, more often than not, the bad. Technology & invention have given us an advantage over our forebearers. Advances in diet and nutrition, exercise, medicine, science, engineering, computers, artificial intelligence & the arts have given us a leg up in some ways over those from the past. Those advances have helped bridge the gap of thinking about the strangeness and apparent ignorance we sometimes believe many in the past had.
But even with all this, we should never assume we're better. You have to look at each era of history through Context.
Things were different. Perspectives were different due to different economies, situations, and geography. And the lack of technologies we have now. Change takes time. Often far longer than we expect or want. Many good changes happened. (think the 2 Great Awakenings in America in the early to mid-1700s, the formation of the United States(1776), abolishing slavery in 1863, women gaining voting rights in 1920, and the Civil Rights Act in 1964). Many changes weren't good (think Nazi Germany, Marxism, communism, totalitarian governments, despot leaders, constant wars, pestilence, famine, disease, and oppression). Every historical outcome depends on prior conditions that led to whatever happened. We make the same mistakes, start wars, hurt each other, help, show evil, and show kindness because our human nature is inherently the same as it always was.
But as a nation, we first must care more about what happened before us. We must do more than cut up the past into small pieces and think we can fully understand it. The past is highly complex; we need more than the mediocre treatment of history these days in elementary, high school, and college to easily discern this complexity.
Most importantly, for us to understand each other now and then, we must realize we each have intrinsic value and are made in the image of God, and we each have the capacity for good and evil. We must value the lives of others with our last full measure; all lives matter on this globe. We have free will to choose right or wrong. But God is sovereign. Unfortunately, our human will is bound by sin, as it always has been in the past, now and in the future.
I don't think of this strictly in Calvinist terms but rather know that divine grace has to be given to us to achieve salvation for the evil of our existence. Humans have always been free to respond to this grace. We can learn much about our civic identity and role in society by studying the Bible, the ultimate authority and guide for life, and its central figure, the world's savior, Jesus Christ. But we can also examine the writings, philosophies, and thoughts of other great leaders, including Christians, those of different faiths, and ordinary individuals of the past. Historical knowledge is an impenetrable force that helps us understand each other and the world.
There's much to be done. God is here and now, as always, from before time began. He has given us minds and bodies to use for his glory, and it is up to us to teach the next and coming generations what can be achieved through thoroughly learning about the past so we can have a better present and a brighter future. Sure, time brings change, but much does not. I see that daily in my children's actions, who are often far too much like me. I sometimes wish I could go back and write a manual for how to live and give it to myself at the age of 10 in hopes I would somehow do this thing called life better. I certainly could have been a better example to others. It's a fault I regret, but I can't change the past; I only hope for the present and the future to improve.
As a wannabe historian, trying to bring the dead alive is just a way of constructing a vision for others of what humanity was, is, and shall be until the return of Christ. Thanks be to God. My next adventure is to forego the path of historian and run for office to fix this country. Lol!
Dallas Reese
Hilton Head, SC
October 2 2024
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