Re-Post: Nearing Midnight for March 27th (Part 1)

Here We Go Again

Once again an area of the globe has been devastated by a natural disaster of unusual strength. This time around, Australia was the victim. Last Monday, Cyclone Larry struck that nation’s northeast coast.

The storm tore through Innisfail, a town of 8,000 people, about 1,700 kilometers north of Brisbane. At landfall, it was a category 5 storm with winds of 180 miles per hour. Amazingly, the storm caused no deaths, and only 30 people suffered minor injuries.

Larry destroyed more than 90 percent of Australia's $252 million banana crop. It also caused over $1 billion in property damage. The financial loss was limited by the nation’s low population density.

Larry was the most powerful tropical system to hit Australia since Christmas Eve 1974, when Cyclone Tracy made a direct impact on the northern city of Darwin, killing 65 people.

In the past few years, we have had an amazing number of number of weather disasters. In 2004, Japan was hit by a record number of typhoons. The same year, Florida was hit by a record number of hurricanes. In 2005, the Atlantic hurricane season reached a number of historic benchmarks. Three key records stand out: (1) Katrina was the most costly hurricane in history; (2) Rita was the most powerful storm as measured by barometric pressure; (3) hurricane watchers recorded the most number of storms in one season.

You would think that Cyclone Larry would set off global warming alarm bells. Oddly enough, a majority of meteorologists seem reluctant to connect the burning of fossil fuels with the recent strength of tropical storms. For now, these scientists would rather point to long-term patterns as the cause of our unsettled weather. Most scientists do agree that global warming is a problem. The change in the past few years, has been so dramatic, it’s probably too dreadful a prospect for them to lay all the blame on greenhouse gases.

I am convinced that Bible prophecy is the key to understanding why we are seeing so many deadly disasters. The Word of God says that warning signs of the tribulation will increase like birth pangs. The rapid increase in the severity of storms makes me wonder what the 2006 Atlantic hurricane season will be like.

The pattern of birth pangs is not just found in weather. Earthquakes and terrorism, which have no connection to hurricanes, have also been very active. In December of 2004, a huge quake in the Indian Ocean triggered the most deadly tsunami in recorded history. When Pakistan was struck by an earthquake in October of last year, the event marked the deadliest one-year period since the great Chinese quake of 1556.

In the coming months, I look for more indications that we are on the tail end of the prophetic timeline. If the birth pangs are going to continue to get larger in magnitude, we should expect these coming events to begin to have a profound impact on society.

I fear terrorism that goes beyond the scale set by 911 is one birth pang we may soon see. In order to arrive at the police-state environment that the Antichrist will use to control the world, something will need to happen to cause free nations to do away with civil liberties. I just don’t see the rapture being the cause. If a chemical bomb went off in some major city, killing tens of thousands of people, the world community would likely turn to authoritarianism to control the violence.

"And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring; Men's hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth" (Luke 21:25-26).

-- Todd