TEN YEARS AGO TODAY

“But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.” (3 Peter 3:8)

A few nights ago, I was at the “Christmas Open House” at the home of Pastor Rich Hurst and his wife Robin (of Lutheran Church of Framingham). Rich asked the folks over 40 if any of us (when we were teenagers) seriously thought we’d be around to see the year 2010. Most of us said “no”! Several at the Open House also remembered as kids trying to figure out how old we’d be in the year 2000. I remember doing that. Finally, Rich asked if it seemed possible that the whole “Y2K” thing was TEN years ago! It really doesn’t seem possible!

I remember that on December 31, 1999, I conducted the funeral service of an elderly lady named Germaine Gallant who’d died from emphysema. Behind the scenes, Y2K was on people’s minds. I remember the funeral director telling me that the switchover in Australia had gone off without a hitch so that could indicated there would be no problems. There was something about conducting a funeral on the last day of the 1900s that really made the 1900s seem so FINAL and so OVER. I remember at the time that Worcester’s WSRS-FM was running a clip of John F. Kennedy talking about “the torch being passed to a new generation”. There was certainly the feeling that starting 2000 was embarking on a whole new era.

With just a few minor exceptions Y2K did not happen. (In a very few communities, they DID lose traffic lights, etc. but even in those instances the problems were corrected within minutes.) But the 2000s have been a tough decade. We will never forget September 11, 2001. For years, the famous Reverend David Wilkerson had been prophesying the collapse of the American economy. Some of his prophecies seemed pretty far fetched until September of 2008. I’ve heard a lot of people say they did not like the 2000s and they’re looking forward to 2010. I’m looking forward to 2010, also, but only God knows what it holds.

Technology really has come a long way in this decade. Our 2000 Dodge Grand Caravan came equipped with a cassette tape player. Today’s teenagers look at cassette tapes and ask, “What are THOSE?!” (Our church still produces cassette tapes of our services, but even our church has recently begun producing CDs for those who don’t have cassette recorders.) In 2000 there was no youtube. There was also no Wikepedia. In 2000, VHS tapes still outsold DVDs. I’m not even sure if telephones had “texting” in 2000. IF they did, it wasn’t used much. (I’m one of the few people who still doesn’t text, but maybe I’ll eventually start...)
I am old enough to remember the start of the 1960s. At 5, I still couldn’t grasp numbers much above the number 12. When my mother told me we were about to have a new year and 1959 was ending, I asked her, “What comes after 1959? Nineteen-fifty TEN?!” The answer of 1960 made no sense to me! I do remember 1970 starting when I was a Sophomore in high school. I was kind of sick of the ‘60s and looked forward to a new decade. I felt the same way at the start of the 1980s. Now, at 55, I’m wondering how many new decades I’ll see coming in. If it’s God’s will, maybe the 2020s, but the actuarial tables don’t it’s likely I’ll see the 2040s or even the 2030s.

Well, as I told Rich, I never thought I’d see 2010, so maybe I’ll be a “George Burns” and see 100 in 2054!

Anyway, those are some of my New Year musings. Happy New Year, one and all!