So, what happens next? Next as in the history of our world.

I remember a common cartoon image, when I was young. It was common, in newspapers, to see a picture of someone holding up a sign with the words “The end is near!” That picture is not as common now, when I read, but the question is important. 

What happens next? Is the end near? Is there something we should be doing, to prepare?

Apparently, all major religions predict an end to our time in history, including Jews, Muslims, and certainly Christians. Did you know that Muslims commonly believe that Jesus will return to our world, specifically to Jerusalem, and he will be a judge?

Christians have given us the word “apocalypse” which means an unveiling, or revelation. From that we get the name of the last book in the Christian Bible “Revelation.” Christians also speak about this event as the “Second Coming” when they believe that Jesus will return, as a king, and of course, a king is a judge.

If you like to research topics online, you might want to search the word “eschatology.” It seems that every major religion has some belief in the end of our history, and the beginning of something new. That includes the ancient Mayans, and ancient Egyptians, and Zoroastrians, and Hindus, and the list continues. 

Human beings believe in some kind of doomsday, that what we have now must come to an end. 

So, what if we are all correct? What if the end is near? How do we know, and how do we prepare?

I am writing as a Christian, and it is common for Christian teachers to tell us that our modern history points to the end, and to a new beginning. If you don’t know, this is a common part of modern human culture. People around the world are asking; What is happening, and what is coming down on us?

This is news that doesn’t get reported, but it is a huge issue. People everywhere want to know where we are going.

If you want one common explanation, a teacher named Jesus promised us something, in history, and what he promised seems to be happening. It’s like a spooky coincidence.

So, here is what Jesus said about our time in history:

You will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not alarmed, for this must take place, but the end is not yet. For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places. All these are but the beginning of the birth pains. (Matthew 24: 6 to 8)

In the book of Revelation, we have a picture from a vision:

And I looked, and behold, a white horse! And its rider had a bow, and a crown was given to him, and he came out conquering, and to conquer. (Revelation 6: 2)

That rider on a white horse is known as the first horseman of the Apocalypse. We are promised three others: famine, pestilence [a major health crisis], and finally death. You can read more in Revelation and chapter six. We are told that the human race is taking itself into a very predictable cycle. Wars will disrupt food supplies, in an overpopulated world, and diseases will spread, and people will die.

With more than eight billion people in the world, human conflict could have those four effects. This is a case of the Bible predicting the news and there is a modern interest in tracking to wars that are happening, in the modern world. 

Here is one example:

Many experts are following the war between Ukraine and Russia, that seems to have no end. One expert studied Russian progress in defeating and conquering Ukraine. That expert predicted that Ukraine would lose, eventually. The best estimate was, if present trends continue, that Russia would conquer Ukraine, in about three hundred years.

It is easy to see the cycle promised in Revelation. Wars and invasions seem to make sense, and then they become complicated. It is easy to predict the last three horsemen, in an endless war; famine, pestilence, and death. The same pattern can be seen in the conflict in in Gaza, between Israel and Hamas. Modern wars degenerate into destruction, with no real victory.

We make wars, but we are not good at making peace.

We seem to be living in that time; as predicted.

It is interesting that the Bible does not predict some strange supernatural events, at the beginning of the end. We will just be ourselves, in an overpopulated world. Eventually, God must intervene, to save us from ourselves. The prediction is that we will be who we already are, until we must be stopped.

Bible prophecy is in the news.

Jesus told us about ourselves:

If those days had not been cut short, no human being would be saved. But for the sake of the elect those days will be cut short. (Matthew 24:  22)