There was a news story last night answering the question ‘why has the weather been so extreme this year?’ The weather guy blamed it on ‘la nina’ or maybe it was ‘el nino’—whatever. But in the last several years (did it begin with the 2004 tsunami in the Indian Ocean?) the world has experienced unprecedented suffering from natural disasters. And in our country too, though to a much lesser degree, of course.
This morning as I was reading in Joel’s little prophesy, these words seemed apocalyptically relevant. After an unprecedented draught and locust invasion destroyed all the crops in the land, Joel asks, Has anything like his ever happened in your days or in the days of your fathers? Then Joel declares it to be a harbinger for the Day of the Lord. Now I am no “Joel,” and I'm not prophesying the Day of the Lord. But the Bible says, “nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and in various places there will be famines and earthquakes. But all these things are merely the beginning of birth pangs.” (Mat 24:8). Could our generation be seeing the beginning of birth pangs?
Though ‘natural’ disasters are limited in sphere, there appears to be a coming calamity from which no one will escape. It is a financial crisis of ‘biblical proportion.’ For the first time in modern history, a country (Greece) has gone bankrupt. For the first time in our nation's existence, unmanageable debt has shut down a state government (Minnesota). Bill Clinton was interviewed by Wolf Blitzer last weekend; the former president was asked what would be the effects of Congress’ failure to raise the debt ceiling by August 2. He basically said, “Since it’s never happened before, I don’t know.” I think I know. Birth pangs.
No comments:
Post a Comment