Signs Of The Times

When I was a child growing up in India, the Seventh Day Adventist Church used to publish a periodical called "Signs Of The Times." It was an American publication that was circulated widely among the church members, and had articles about the Biblical prophecies predicting the end of the world. I'm not sure if this is in publication these days, but I remember vividly the beautiful illustrations by American artists depicting the end times in those glossy magazines that so captivated me as a little girl. The Adventists believe in the Second Coming or Advent of Christ at the end of the world, and I was raised on all those prophecies and signs that would alert one before the big event, and the calamities and disasters that would occur before it.

This is not a religious post, but just a shocking, chilling reminder to myself of the lessons learned at church as a child about the signs of the times, considering the various tragedies unfolding across the globe. The recent triple whammy of the earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear fallout that Japan is currently reeling from, beginning last Wednesday, and the preceding earthquake in Christ Church, New Zealand, are truly epic and apocalyptic in nature. Just when we think that one natural disaster is over and get over the terror and shock of that event, another one is unleashed upon an unsuspecting populace, more intense and more destructive than the one before. How much more can the planet take, one wonders! For the coastline to have shifted by a couple of metres, and for the earth to have shifted off its axis by a few inches speaks of the magnitude of the calamity in itself.

"And you will be hearing of wars and rumors of wars; see that you are not frightened, for those things must take place, but that is not yet the end. For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and in various places there will be famines and earthquakes" (Matthew 24: 6-7), are verses that come readily to mind as I look at the unrest unfolding and sweeping across the Middle East and North Africa, from Tunisia to Morocco to Egypt to Yemen to Jordan to Bahrain to Iran to Saudi Arabia to Libya. One cannot open the newspaper without any news of an uprising or protest or killing or war. Famine is widespread in Africa and many other parts of the globe, and earthquakes are increasing in frequency, wiping out sizable chunks of the earth's population. And so are tsunamis, volcanic eruptions, hurricanes, floods, and a multitude of other disasters. A frightening spectre indeed!

Armageddon is yet to come, but with the heightened threat of terrorism these days, all it takes is for one mad man to get hold of a nuclear weapon and trigger a battle that will wipe out the entire planet. We live in truly dangerous times these days, needless to say. With natural disasters decimating human beings on the one hand, and men killing each other in uprisings and wars and acts of terrorism on the other hand, the future seems so bleak and dismal. I hate to dwell on the theories related to the Apocalypse and the doomsday scenarios of the end of the world, but the recent happenings around the globe have made me pause and take stock of all those prophecies I was introduced to as a child. All I can do now is to hope and pray for those in suffering and in need, and keep my fingers crossed for merciful deliverance for all of us at long last!