Genesis 10:1 - Is it the end?

Genesis 10:1.  Even after the catastrophic flood--which changed the world--life did not come to an end. The end belongs to the providence of God. What belongs to people living is a responsibility before God to give thanks for the life that was passed to us, and to accept our responsibility to act in a way that will bless those who live into the future beyond us. Although we cannot determine what others will do, let us who believe do all within our power to leave the world a better place for the future.

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A friend, Frank Johnson, gave a talk one Sunday night years ago at Memorial Baptist Church in which he made reference to the writings of the son of Adoniram Judson. The son wrote that anyone who is prospering today can look back and see that his or her prosperity (spiritual not just financial) is tied to the suffering of someone who went before us. Likewise, when we suffer we can know that God will redeem our suffering in order to bless someone who comes after us. This understanding of the connection between generations and between people living in community is biblical. There is a corporate identity in the Bible that westerners sometimes miss with our individualism. This corporate identity is the basis of Christian humanitarianism. 

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There was a time in English villages when a bell would toll from the church to announce news of the death or near death of someone in the community. John Donne (1571-1631) wrote a devotional about the bell that tolls.

Now, this Bell tolling softly for another, saies to me, Thou must die.

    Perchance hee for whom this Bell tolls, may bee so ill, as that he knows not it tolls for him; And perchance I may thinke my self so much better than I am, as that they who are about mee, and see my state, may have caused it to toll for mee, and I know not that . . . .As therefore the Bell that rings to a Sermon, calls not upon the Preacher only, but upon the Congregation to come; so this Bell calls us all: but how much more mee, who am brought so neere the doore by this sicknesse . . . . No man is an Iland, intire of it selfe; every man is a peece of the Continent, a part of the maine; if a Clod bee washed away by the Sea, Europe is the lesse, as well as if a Promontorie were; Any Mans death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankinde; And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; It tolls for thee.

(Devotions upon Emergent Occasions, 1624), Meditation 17.