You and I may get so busy with our own lives, and with the issues and cares right around us, that we forget about the rest of the world -- those people not connected in some perceptual way to our own lives.  And no matter where we look, we seem to have our own lives, concerns & desires reflected back at us.

The news media, for example, isn't doing much to help.  They have the technology & resources to awaken us to the whole world of people -- our own human family on this planet -- in meaningful ways, but they seldom do anything like that.  Trying to anticipate our self-centered interests, they tend to cull out everything that won't fit into a 5- or 10-second sound bite.

They sometimes do tell us about other things, but all their news stories and reporting tend to revolve around the same kinds of "industry standard" concerns.  Every day.  They talk about medical issues, political issues, the same kinds of social issues.  And even when they take us to our own war in Iraq, or elsewhere in the Middle East, they tell us only about the fighting, the unrest, the continued hatred, the death.  Those things are very important, but that's not what the whole world is about -- or even what the Middle East itself is all about.

They could show us families and children.  They could tell the daily story of a dad who works in his own small shop everyday, building necessary items for the market.  They could give us weekly insights into a fishing crew, or into the life of shepherds, or even show us some of the newer manufacturing, or technologies and fashions in the cities and villages of distant regions.

There are many families today living in Iraq, in the Palestinian communities, in Afghanistan cities and villages, In Israel, and Iran and other countries.  A great many of these people are working and raising families -- even in the middle the terrible conflicts that surround and involve them. 

There are good, solid people in all these communities, brave moms, dads, & children, potential local and national leaders.  But we never hear about them.  We never see them.  The only thing we get from the news is a story of another suicide bomber, another conflict, another threat, or more ranting against the USA.  Such conflict is considered news.  But how can such things continue to be news, month after month, and year after year?

To see the world as it really is, we need the whole story.  The more we see others as real people, and not just occasional angry mobs, or militant idiots, and the more we learn to communicate with other cultures as equals, as fellow human beings, the more likely we'll be to help the peoples in all nations to find real, working solutions to some of the problems causing war today. 

The Bible makes it clear that all people are of the same human family.  We may look different and we may communicate with different sets of symbols, expressions and gestures, but we're all of the same essential blood.  We have the same original parents.  Such claims do not sound make the news today, but the Bible was saying that long before science was able to tackle the question or prove the point. 

In fact, I remember seeing a very scholarly-looking book in an East Texas "Second Hand" store that tried to claim that the African Negro was a subhuman species, and not really human at all.  That books reflected a social debate that raged in the late Nineteenth and early Twentieth centuries.  Such stupidity is never very far away, even today.

The Bible says that all people are in the same boat.  We're all sinners.  Those who reject God's truth usually get stuck on that point (being offended by it) and never go on to see that God has also provided the cure for everyone who will accept it.

Jesus is still often called the Great Physician -- and not because He went around healing people of physical infirmities.  (He healed them with His touch, or even with a spoken word, not with medicine.) Jesus is called the Great Physician because He's the cure for the dreadful disease of sin that afflicts the entire human race.  He Himself said, "Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick.  I've not come to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance."  (Luke 5:31,32)

While it may be very difficult for us to believe, there is no nation of people on earth more evil or more righteous than another.  True, the leaders of nations may do terrible and evil things.  And the culture of any nation can drift into a pattern of accepting evil as good.  Our own "enlightened" and "civilized" western culture has drifted into accepting many twisted & corrupt ideas and behavior as "normal" and sane.

But the Bible teaches that all people are in the same boat.  We all need the direct & personal help of God in order to keep our feet on a path of decency and civility toward others.  We need God's help in raising our children, in writing our laws, in knowing how to share our planet and its resources with other human beings and with other living creatures.

Religion, all by itself, will not take us as far as we need to go, in making things work socially, politically, or environmentally.  Religions may even sanction the oppression and abuse of our own family members, our neighbors, and those we see as "the others" who live outside our nation, or outside our own cultural heritage.  Even so-called "Christian" religions have not always fared so well, as history itself shows us.

But God Himself is righteous -- totally fair and ethical -- in all His ways.  He does judge sin, but He also loves and accepts the repentant sinner.  And He alone has the power, by the Holy Spirit, to forgive our sins, to change our hearts, and to give us a truly new and eternal life.

This new life is in God's Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.  All who come to Him in genuine faith will be accepted by God, forgiven, and transformed into the very children of God's own household.  By grace, through faith, we become heirs of God and joint-hears of Jesus Christ.

In the kingdom of God there is no distinction between east or west, north or south, white or black, red or yellow.  All who place their hope in Jesus Christ for the remission of sins will become as one family, one blood, with one Father and one Lord, walking in the one Spirit that makes all people one in Christ.

The key to this kind of experience and relationship with God is faith in Jesus.  We must believe what God Himself has done for us in Christ.  And we must place our hope in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ -- He died to take our sins away, and He rose up from the dead to conquer death and hell forever.  Whoever belongs to the Lord Jesus will also have victory over death and hell.  We will rise again, even as He has, and we'll live with Him for eternity.

In the mean time, we also can help to reach out to the whole world with the good news of Jesus Christ, sharing His life and His truth with all people.  We owe that much to the rest of our human family.  They need peace with God.  They need to be born again even as we do.

You can get more information about what it means to make peace with God, through faith in Jesus Christ, by visiting this web page:

http://www.goodwordusa.org/word/peace4.htm

And you can discover more about how Christians reach out to the rest of the world by visiting:  http://www.wgm.org/cms/Story/Story.asp?tid=14&did=267

and browse the site itself at--  http://www.wgm.org/Default.asp

There's a whole world out there, and billions of people are trying to make it through their day, just as we are.  Some of them have little or no food, no protective shelter from the elements, no safe place to run to, no family, no help at all.  Whole nations need real help in getting on their feet.  While people in other lands, like Japan, commit suicide because life simply holds no meaning or hope for them.

Take the time to learn more about the everyday people in China, in India, in Russia, in Africa, in the island cultures, in the American nations, both north and south.  Take the time to understand that each person in these other places is a human being, basically just like us.  They all have hopes and dreams and needs.  They have things to teach us, and they have needs we may be able to fill.

As individuals, we can be part of positive changes in our own local, regional and national policies.  We can also become part of what God Himself is doing all around the world.  If we will surrender to His call, our own lives will be changed into positive forces, locally and even globally.  And the light of Jesus Christ inside of us will help to make a difference for many others.

Jim