Many biblical prophecies leave us in no doubt that increasingly cataclysmic
events will occur before God's direct intervention in human affairs.
For thousands of years people have been fascinated with predictions of
the end of the world.
People who read and study the Bible are not the only ones concerned about
where our world is headed. The late author Isaac Asimov, in his book The
Choice of Catastrophes: The Disasters That Threaten Our World, listed
and explained at least 15 dangers that could jeopardize human survival.
Many of these potential global disasters, including nuclear war, have
arrived at our door only in the last few decades.
At times people thought they understood when and how our age would end.
But failed expectations about the end of the age have brought profound
disappointment to scores of sincere religious individuals and groups.
They thought they were correctly discerning the time and manner of the
fulfillment of prophecy. But all have been wrong, or at least premature.
In spite of centuries of such disappointments, they haven't put an end
to attempts to associate world events and conditions with biblical prophecies
concerning the end time. This is especially true in America, where books,
television and radio programs focusing on biblical prophecy abound.
If we look into the inspired writings of the Old Testament prophets and
Jesus Christ's apostles, we find many prophecies that refer to the time
of the end. Should we take them seriously? Should they mean anything to
us? Are world conditions such that the predictions could be fulfilled in
our day? Are we near the climax of the prophesied period in which the world
is faced with insurmountable problems and globaldistress of holocaust
proportions? Are we approaching Armageddon?
