Although our time has a self-imposed image of making it the easiest time of history to make this transition, nothing could be farther from the truth. Time after time in history generations have said their good-byes. Sometimes the trigger has been economic. Sometimes natural disaster has played a role. War, whether actual or supposed, has often moved generations around.
But one of the most interesting triggers of generations leaving their personal history has come as a result of these triggers as well as one that is intensely personal. That final trigger is religion.
In our time we can trace these triggers easily. The Pilgrims and Puritans, the missionaries and the rest who had visions of converting the American Indians all were at least part of a zeal that force huge waves of migration.
But perhaps most importantly for our discussion was an event that lasted around three hundred years, and ended about four hundred eighty years before Christ was born. This event, the Babylonian Exile, is one of the most powerful and best documented events of Old Testament history.
Yet the event is easily the least understood, least taught and least preached event of general Old Testament faithfulness. In the impoverished community, the Babylonian exile offers multiple treasures of faith, courage, hope and strength for the would-be entrepreneur. The congregation has the responsibility of spreading these treasures around.
Around the year 700 B.C. in what we know as the Middle East, Iraq, Iran, Syria, and surrounding territories, there was a pattern of violence rather similar to that of today. The most significant difference is in the nature of the natural resources. In our day the fight is over territory and oil. In that day the fight was over territory and slaves.
The cities of the Tigris and Euphrates valley plains, represented by the upshot community of Babylon, sent armies into the various nations around. In order the guarantee the peace in these nations, their common practice had their armies capturing the upper classes, the leaders, the fighters, and bringing them back to Babylon.
