Greta Thunberg’s image on the cover of Time Magazine is soft and lovely. She is Time’s 2019 Person of the Year. But that image is not the one we tend to recall when we hear her name. The lasting image of adolescent 
Greta is her angry-to-the-point-of-tears face twisted with anguish and frustration.
“How dare you!” she roared at the United Nations’ Climate Action Summit in September, blaming every adult who ever turned over the ignition in their car. “You have stolen my dreams and my childhood with your empty words.”
What comes to mind is Dr. Suess’s green Grinch going through Whoville greedily taking everything that was there to make children like Greta happy and healthy. Is that what we did?
Let’s put aside the debate on fossil fuels and ask, “Are we the grinches that took the carefree bliss of childhood from Greta?” I don’t think so.
The true story of Greta’s rise to fame on the world scene is not the one we have been told. But what I need to point out here is that Time Magazine’s article about Greta tells us she was a severely depressed 11-year old who almost totally stopped speaking and eating because she was so sad about the world being threatened by climate change. It’s heartbreaking that any 11-year old would feel so hopeless.
Which brings me to a very interesting recent article in the Wall Street Journal by Erica Komisar, a child and family therapist. The title of the article was “Don’t Believe in God? Lie to Your Children.” Komisar makes the case that the rise of depression and anxiety among children and adolescents is caused by a declining interest in religion: “Nihilism is fertilizer for anxiety and depression…… The belief in God — in a protective and guiding figure to rely on when times are tough — is one of the best kinds of support for kids in an increasingly pessimistic world.”
The Grinch that stole Greta’s childhood was atheist, materialist, nihilistic thinking. You’re a mean one Mr. Nietzsche.
According to Time, Greta was eight when she first heard of catastrophic global climate change but assumed adults, “the politicians,” would take care of it. However, by age eleven she realized no one was taking charge and she became deeply depressed. Her elders could not offer her any hope. “The buck stopped,” and no one was there.
But Someone is there! All we know about the earth and the universe points to a designer. Science reveals an amazingly fine-tuned universe that perfectly supports life on earth. Exploration into our cells reveals stunning machines and systems that give us life. Just look around at the earth and up at heavens and see beauty and purpose from a creator who cares about us.
We need to wisely care for our world, but we don’t need to panic. The Creator cares so deeply about us that he stepped into a human body and lived with us. Jesus promises never to stop caring for us.
I would like to spend a day with Greta, or with any child frightened by climate doom. I would show her all the ways God designed her and her world for life and for love. I would invite her to trust and love her creator back.
And I would end the day sitting around a campfire singing “He’s Got the Whole World In His Hands.”
For indeed He does.
Hope Walking 