We live in an age of information and it can be overwhelming.
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I was 18 years old on September 11, 2001. Like anyone who is old enough to remember that day, those events will forever stick in my head for a range of reasons.
I went to bed and turned on my TV but fell asleep before I could turn it off. By the time I woke up the next morning there was only one thing you could watch. The tragic coverage of the events that had taken place while most of us were asleep.
One thing which struck me about that time was the way in which it was reported. Every channel was broadcasting around the clock coverage from various American news agencies. As I sat in the car on the way to school, it was all that was on the radio. Every newspaper for days reported on little else.
I am sure it was not the first major event to receive the almost undivided attention of the media. Yet it was the first time I remember what was then a rare occurrence.
However what once stood our for how all encompassing it was, seems fairly light on by modern standards. The barrage of news is near inescapable. TV stations have created 24-hour channels devoted to news.
Papers are increasingly read on-line where news is updated constantly. Social media allows people to broadcast events as they are happening. And in my pocket sits a phone which keeps me connected to every development.
Many times I've talked with people who feel overwhelmed by the barrage of information. This is especially true when we consider how much of what we hear of in the news is negative.
Never before have we been confronted with so much of the tragedy in our world. Never before have we seen so much terrible detail.
Never before have we been confronted with so much of the tragedy in our world. Never before have we seen so much terrible detail.
Never before have we had so many voices placing their concerns in front of us, telling us that we should care just as much for each one of them.
Not that this is entirely bad. It is good that those who suffer have been given a voice with which to speak out. It is great that people can take up their cause. Nor would our world's problems cease to exist simply because we remain blissfully unaware of them.
However the reality is that many people seem to be left almost paralysed by the scale of the problems our world faces.
So what are we to do? Do we become so calloused to the plight of others we simply stop caring? Do we spend our lives overcome by our inability to fix the world's ills?
I have seen both of these happen. Far better is the answer that Jesus gives us when he says:
"I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world."
Spoken to a group of friends who faced a problem which was far beyond them, these are words which assured them that Jesus had things in hand.
For in Jesus they had one who would suffer the fullness of evil to free them from it. Who would rise from death to defeat evil. One who would one day return to hold evil to account and put an end to it once and for all.
These words of assurance are as true for us today as they were when Jesus uttered them.
Of course, this is not to say that we should stop caring about the flood of horror which fills our media. But we can face it with great confidence in the one who has overcome it all.
Rev David Robinson is the Vicar of Holy Trinity Church in Glen Innes.