Danny Hillis is a computer engineer and inventor who thinks all types of leaders should care more about the long-term future. He is so committed to that end that he designed a 10,000-year clock. He explains why: "I want to build a clock that ticks once a year. The century hand advances once every 100 years, and the cuckoo comes out on the millennium. I want the cuckoo to come out every millennium for the next 10,000 years.”

Danny's motivation in building the clock is to inspire people to take more responsibility for the future. He hopes the clock will raise the question, "Are we being good ancestors?" and cause people to start projects that will outlast their lifetime.

For many reasons long-range thinking is harder and harder to come by these days. Steward Brand, who is working on the same 10,000-year clock project, writes: "Civilization is revving itself into a pathologically short attention span. The trend might be coming from the acceleration of technology, the short horizon perspective of market-driven economics, the next election perspective of democracies or the distractions of personal multitasking. All are on the increase. Some sort of balancing corrective is needed.”

Possible Preaching Angle:

New Year’s Day; Reflection; Self-examination – New Year’s Day should be a moment of reflection on how we have used our time and of setting goals for the coming year and beyond.

Source:

Will Mancini and Michael Bird, God Dreams (B&H Publishers, 2016), Page 28