The desperate appeal of deus ex machina

"Deus ex machina" is a term used to describe the plot device by which intervention from outside the action appears just before some catastrophic disaster, and solves an apparently impossible problem. 

In "real life" DEM has long formed the basis of optimism - the hope that something not-known (or known but previously inactive) will emerge unexpectedly to save us. 

Or to put it negatively, despair may be staved-off by hoping that "Something will turn-up". 

This may, of course, be true! 

Because we really do not know or understand much about how the world works; so there is never reason to give-up hope.

But hope is not the same as optimism - and it is a very different thing to hope for rescue, than it is to expect rescue by some unknown event.

In particular, it is foolish to construct a specific hope from a logical sequence of double-negative assertions. 

For example, that (for all we know) we cannot be sure that "leader"-X isn't really a genuine saviour, who is (despite superficial appearances) cleverly plotting behind the scenes towards some kind of decisive last-minute master stroke. 

Or, spiritually; the worse the world is apparently getting, and the weaker and more corrupt "my church" seems to be - nobody can disprove that this won't make it more likely that the Deity will (at last!) step-in, make a personal intervention, and save things in some unexpected fashion.

(Such a "saving might itself be negative - as in saving-from the default of Hell; or it might be positive in the sense of establishing a redeemed Church as dominant and pervasive across society.)

Such reflections were provoked by my again considering the (in retrospect) extraordinary optimism that was prevalent among spiritual people in the years approaching and just following the millennium. 

Among many or most such people existed a near-consensus that the whole world was shortly to be raised to a higher spiritual level (higher "frequency" or "vibrational" level); that would affect everybody and every-thing (like it or not).

...Although the more discerning in the New Age clearly acknowledged that for this external influx to be effective would also require a receptivity - or even some positive spiritual move - from each individual; in order to meet this incoming spiritual "energy" halfway. 

So an element of at least consent, and probably collaboration, was also required -- nonetheless the primary cause was a new, or greatly amplified, external influence. 

My interpretation of this apparently anachronistic millennial expectation is that it was the product of a kind of desperation; especially among those genuinely spiritual people who had rejected (or simply did not believe) Jesus's offer of reasserted eternal Heavenly life. 

And, mutatis mutandis, I think the same applies to the optimism (as contrasted with hope) of so-many of those Christians who are serious and motivated about their faith. 

The Christians who believe-in some kind of external saving of this mortal life and the earth; are guilty of conflating the true and sure hope of Heaven, with a false optimism concerning this-world. 

This false-optimism among Christians seems particularly pernicious, insofar as it entails God intervening to save (what seems to me) the most deeply evil civilization the world has yet known - I mean a civilization that is already, and increasingly, strategically and officially inverted in its values.  

The answer is simple, but difficult; and is to strive to be motivated primarily by next-worldly hope rather than this-worldly optimism - and to root this in the faith that God will (indeed, by Jesus, already-has) made it possible for anybody and everybody, in whatever situation, time, or place) to attain salvation.  

The next inference is more controversial among Christians, which is that this can only be attained by taking personal responsibility for salvation. 

In other words; I am assuming that there will be no worldwide, or even culture-wide, deus ex machina intervention; because everything has already been done; and "all" (!) that remains is for us as individuals is to recognize that reality - and to make our commitment, to choose to follow Jesus...

That is the essential starting-point. 

And then... we each need to discover what that actually means for us; for us specifically - here-and now.