ARMAGEDDON and CHRIST'S SECOND COMING: 21 Prophetic Precursors

PRECURSOR 5: FAMINE--GOD’S MORAL JUDGEMENT

In the previous Blogs on the “21 Precursors” we dealt briefly with the first four SIGNS or INDICATORS [Precursors] namely: 1) Doctrinal Deception 2) False prophets within the Church [naturally there cannot be false doctrines unless there first be false prophets or teachers, but we retained the sequence as outlined by Christ] 3) Wars and 4) Rumors of Wars.

All these precursors prevailed from “the last days”. We indicated that such was indeed the case from the time of Christ, which inaugurated “the last days” as indicated in Acts 2:17 when Peter applies “the last days” to the phenomenon of the outpouring of the holy spirit. Paul also understood that “the last days” were in effect during the time of the Apostles, stating that “God … hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son” [Heb 1:1-2].

The fifth precursor Christ introduces is famine. Famines were not unknown to mankind. Scripture records that there was a “GRIEVOUS” [SEVERE] FAMINE during Abraham’s lifetime in the area he occupied with his vast herds and flocks, east of Bethel, just north of Jerusalem. It forced Abraham to relocate his considerable company of over one thousand men, women, and children, with their immense herds, to Egypt [Gen 12:8-10].

Some 60 years later [c. 1830 BC] Isaac experienced a similar devastating drought that caused him, by instruction from the Almighty, to move southwards into Philistine territory. There he dwelt on the edge of the Negev desert, in Gerar [Gen 26].

The next scripturally recorded drought and ensuing famine we discover is about 130 years later [c. 1700 BC] being that legendary seven year drought in Egypt where we encounter the God-inspired dream interpreter Joseph that saved the biblically known world from total devastation [Genesis 41]. Jacob and his family survived due to Joseph’s inspired foresight; they could, as the rest of the surrounding peoples, purchase grain from Egypt.

The bible also records drought and famines in the days of David [c. 1045 BC] and Elijah [c. 920 BC] when there was a “sore famine in Samaria” [that is Israel, the northern kingdom of the ten tribes]. About thirty years later this was followed by drought and famine during the prophetic ministry of Elisha [c. 890 BC].

Tangentially, a significant issue arises from these drought episodes. Firstly, from the Old Testament we learn that when drought and famine occur even the most righteous people on earth may be unpleasantly affected. Abraham, Isaac and Jacob had to relocate and experience trials in the process. Elijah and Elisha [with the school of the prophets] had to relocate in order to survive.

Altogether over a dozen great famines are recorded in Scripture, two of which are referenced in the New Testament. The last historic drought and famine which affected the whole habitable world [the Mediterranean Roman Empire at that time], severely affected the Church in Judea to the extent that food offerings had to be collected for famine relief, arranged by the Apostle Paul. This demonstrates again the fact that God’s elect are not necessarily always unaffected by natural disasters striking the earth. [See Acts 11:27 ff. and compare with 1Corinthians 16.]

A noteworthy doctrinal perversion arose from this famine episode and Paul’s instructions to the churches regarding a “collection” for the saints in Judea.

The “collection for the saints” referred to in 1 Corinthians 16:1 has been twisted by biblically ignorant—or exploitive—ministries to take up church “collections” on Sunday mornings. This grossly distorts and misinterprets the verse. What Paul refers to in the text is a relief offering for the “poor saints” – members of the congregations in Judea who were suffering famine due to a major drought in the region. This offering “upon the first day of the week” has absolutely NOTHING to do with church collections on Sunday mornings! It relates to gathering up, or accumulating, FOOD--edibles--for famine-stricken brethren. Essentially dried foodstuffs were collected or gathered (these two words in verses 1 and 2 of chapter 16 are the same in Greek, logia), by each member privately. Each household head were to “lay by him (in his own home) in store”. This was not an instruction to take up Sunday morning CHURCH COLLECTIONS! These privately gathered provisions were later cumulatively collected by Barnabas and Paul and shipped to Jerusalem under their personal supervision (Acts 11:30).

Thus we have recorded in scripture historic drought-famine episodes from the time of Abraham until the time of the Apostles’ administration of the church in Jerusalem. Drought and famine are common occurrences on earth. Thus, it is not a surprising revelation Christ makes when he prophesies future famines. What is significant is the fact that the prophetic projection of this famine precursor is the severity and the magnitude of the devastating consequence upon the entire world. All nations will be affected. And severely so!

Hunger will grip the entire world and produce hundreds of millions of vacuously minded skeletal humans with shattered psyches gazing aimlessly into steel-grey skies, hoping for rain, and crops, and food, and survival. [See these links for pictures and information on the Boer War Concentration camps. Please note: some pictures are graphic and not for sensitive viewers.]

Christ completes the famine precursor continuum in Revelation 18 when he, inspired by the Father, pronounces judgment upon modern wicked “Babylon”. Because “her sins have reached unto heaven, and God hath remembered her iniquities… Therefore shall her plagues come in one day, death, and mourning, and famine; and she shall be utterly burned with fire: for strong is the Lord God who judges her” [Rev 18:5 and 8].

Since famine and death from the ensuing hunger, do not “come” in “one day” the period must be seen as a prophetic “day for a year” time indicator which we deduce from Numbers 14:34 and Ezekiel 4:6.

We can certainly expect a worldwide famine and resultant starvation of millions of people before the return of Christ! This will be part of the punishment upon mankind steeped in BABYLONIANISM. Maybe history holds some warning notes for us, the final “last days” generation.

As in early history, droughts and famines will continue to ravage mankind. It is indeed a divine paradox that God who is omnipotent and benevolent, permits—if not causes!--such regular natural devastation and human suffering. This paradox is known as theodicy, meaning God’s judgment. “Why”, so goes the mantra, “if God is all-good does He, being all-powerful, not prevent such natural droughts and famines?”

In the beginning everything God made, all the natural seasonal cycles, were “very good” [Gen 1:31]. WHY THEN, millions ponder philosophically, does “nature” [God’s “very good” work] produce these disasters? Why does God allow millions to die agonizing deaths by drought, famine and disease?

Leibnitz’s and Milton’s penetrating philosophic analyses in attempted vindication of divine justice flounder because they misunderstood the mystery of the judgments of the Eternal. [This mystery, understood by hardly any philosophers or theologians, will be addressed in the future.]

The theology of theodicy of the “great theologians” require serious reconsideration. They all claim God’s creation is teleologically sound, i.e. everything in creation has a purpose. WHY THEN do they ascribe injustice to the Creator? Are all droughts and famines and disease pandemics "God-made"? Are some not also “man-made”?

Drought and famine ARE, in one way or another, due to HUMAN SIN! THESE ARE CYCLICAL EVENTS CREATED AS OPERATIONAL FORCES BY THE ETERNAL TO SERVE HIS GLOBAL OBJECTIVES. MAN'S BEHAVIOR--SIN OR OBEDIENCE--WILL ACTIVATE THE ETERNAL TO RESPOND THROUGH NATURE. RAIN AND ABUNDANCE FOR OBEDIENCE. DROUGHT AND FAMINE FOR SIN! If any should think that human sin does not bring about the Eternal's intervention in global climate change, just remember the FLOOD!

Hosea makes this interrelationship clear when stating: "Because there is no truth , nor mercy, nor knowledge of God in the land .... therefor the land mourn and everyone that dwells therein shall languish with the beasts of the field and with the fowl of heaven; yes, the fish of the sea shall also be taken away!" [4:1-4].

Whoever would have thought that man's moral misconduct will result in Gods moral judgment upon the whole of creation? [See also Romans 8:21.]

Earth is convulsing under the load of human sin! Man-made or not, the forces, viruses, etc., placed in nature by God to punish man for immorality are being unleashed in quick succession. The now resurgent Corona-19 pandemic having decimated millions of lives thus far should provide us with a clear enough answer. AND NOW THE MONKEYPOX! According to epidemiologist, Dr. ANDREW BOSTOM, "THIS PATICULAR OUTBREAK HAS BEEN FUELED ... BY GAY BACCHANALIA." The New England Journal of Medicine [c. 20-22 July 2022] states that 98% of infected people are gay or bisexual men.

The man-made variety of drought and famine is the result of immoral human conduct. Believe it or not, married couples’ adultery, the raunchy nightclubs, the pornographic magazines, the political lying and deception, theft by moral miscreants, the one-on-one violence, plotted murders, assaults, all the stabbings, shootings, vicious child abuse, pedophilia, rapes and fornication, the abortions, pimping, prostitution, human trafficking, deceitful advertising, fake foods, agricultural poisoning, pharmaceutical murders, man-made epidemics and all the wicked inventions of mankind have heaped upon humanity the wrath of the Almighty God manifest in drought, famine and disease.

It is divine punishment for evil behaviour! People of the flesh are punished in the flesh! Drought and famine cause hunger, then the immune system runs down, resistance to various viral infections becomes low, weakness sets in, diseases strike, suffering and pain follows, then death.

THEREFORE “it shall come to pass, if thou wilt not hearken unto the voice of the LORD thy God, to observe to do all his commandments and his statutes which I command thee this day; that all these curses shall come upon thee, and overtake thee: … The LORD shall send upon thee cursing ... And thy heaven that is over thy head shall be brass, and the earth that is under thee shall be iron. The LORD shall make the rain of thy land powder and dust: from heaven shall it come down upon thee, until thou be destroyed [Deut 28:15-24].

Human sin has a direct effect upon the environment. However, the Eternal intervenes and controls the levels of intensity, the number of plagues, the frequency and sequence. Revelation 6 introduce the seven seals, with the last seal transitioning into the seven trumpets, which are followed by the seven last plagues. Every curse and plague, is God-initiated and God-controlled. The Eternal manages these global crises—even to breaking point! He will punish mankind for its grossly evil and sinful actions—just as He did the antediluvians in the time of Noah [when the earth suffered great devastation], and as He annihilated five cities, including Sodom and Gomorrah by fire, at the time of Abraham, circa 1900 BC.

Hosea directly correlates human sin [breaking the Ten Commandments] with environmental disasters. These are hardly “natural”—they are God-made disasters due to human sin. Married women committing adultery or politicians embezzling state funds and stealing IMF loans, or drug smugglers, do not directly cause a drought or famine—but they are the reason, the cause, of the Almighty producing the disasters which destroy whole communities in whatever way he sees suitable to the human cause, and condition.

Speaking about people who fancy themselves “God’s people”—whether Jew, Christian, or Muslim—scripture reveals their immoral behaviors will directly affect the environment. The prophet Hosea, in a prophetic principle applicable to all people at all times, is inspired to declare: “They make promises and break them; they lie, murder, steal and commit adultery. Crimes increase and there is one murder after the other. And so [as a consequence of the immoral and lawless behaviors] the land will dry up [drought] and everything that lives on it will die…” [Hosea 4:2-3a, Good News Bible.]

In the midst of such drought and ensuing famine bad things will happen to good people. This reality is indicated in the lives of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Elijah and Elisha, and the church in Judea, but “the Lord delivers them out of it all” [Daniel 6:27, Psalms 34:19].

Famine episodes experienced by humanity “in the last days” present us with startling facts:

During the past 140 years, from the 1870’s till 2011, there were about 75 million drought-caused famine fatalities, with China being affected the most severely, suffering 40 million deaths.

For the many self-righteous theologians, smarmy sentimentalists, ignorant and arrogant God-accusers struggling with the concept of theodicy [God being the cause of a natural disaster like drought], who think God is monstrously insensitive and guilty of some universal crime, we should compare this 140 year drought-famine history with the United States’ 674 million man-induced murders and abortions of the born and unborn during a 45.5 year period. The drought produced on average just over 500 000 deaths per annum. The murdering medical and pharmaceutical fraternities of the United States have, since the mid-sixties, massacred about 14 000 000 lives per annum! The American Life League website provide the following statistics:

“Total number of abortions in the U.S. 1973-2020: 63.6 million. These statistics include only surgical and medical abortions. Because many contraceptive measures are abortifacients (drugs that induce or cause abortions), it is important not to overlook the number of children killed by chemical abortions [emphasis added]. … Using formulas based on the way the birth control pill works, pharmacy experts project that about 14 million chemical abortions occur in the United States each year, providing a projected total of well in excess of 610 million chemical abortions between 1965 and 2009. [Emphasis added.]

O holy Christian nation, who will protect you from the wrath of God!? Will it be an unfair cruel God that will strike you with famine and pestilence?

Viewed in the light of these shocking statistics—not considering the rest of the nations which bring the abortion rates into the billions!—we ask, is the decimation of millions in the coming famines—even if directly caused by God’s intervention and just punishment upon mankind—more horrific than man’s own cruelty and heartlessness?

Who are the monstrously insensitive and guilty? Emotional sentimentality is no substitute for logic and morally appropriate judgment. People blaming God as the guilty one when seeing grotesquely emaciated people in holocaust camps and feeling simultaneously revolted, repulsed, horror-struck and self-righteously distressed and holding God culpable will eventually face the heavenly tribunal, as we read: “Let God be true, but every [unbelieving accuser] a liar; as it is written, ‘That you [God] might be justified [free of guilt] in your sayings, and might overcome [conquer them] when you are judged [condemned by man]’” [Rom 3:4].

As there are “God-made” droughts, famines and diseases inflicted upon mankind so there are man-made famines. The effect of moral turpitude accumulates steadily to finally crunch a region or a people. Currently the South West United States experiences the gripping and devastating impact of drought that slowly turned good earth into desiccated dust. Lake Mead is drying up. The frightening financial impact will soon be overtaken by starvation if not supported from outside the State. Already farmers are selling off stock at low-low prices.

But consider another form of man-made famine. WAR! For example, Ukraine suffered the loss of millions of people in a severe man-made famine when the Bolsheviks confiscated all their food during 1920-21. It was noted that “peasants began to eat dogs, rats and insects; they boiled grass and leaves; there were incidents of cannibalism.”

Only a decade later [1932-33] Ukraine was subjected to yet another Russian-made famine known as the “Holodomor”, that is “to kill by hunger”. Whether or not it was an intentional weaponization of hunger against Ukraine, when all factors are considered---shortened life expectancy due to injuries, disease, etc.---estimated deaths, directly and indirectly famine related, hover around the 9 million mark!

“[T]he vast majority of the population lost their sense of humanity, as so many were starving to death on the streets that it became mundane and commonplace.” An eighty year old survivor stated that “human nature was malleable according to the circumstances.” He added, “... famine makes animals, entirely stupefied, of nice, honest people.” “In some instances, people who were starving ate their children for sustenance, and some, realizing what they had done afterwards, were driven insane from guilt. All in all, millions died in Ukraine, and there were so many bodies that there were no people to bury them.” [From: Red Famine: Stalin’s War on Ukraine; Appelbaum.]

Scripture attests to this fact. During the Elisha famine in Jerusalem about 2 ounces [55 grammes] of dove’s dung sold for five shekels [about 5 dollars]. Mothers cooked their own children to survive [2Kings 6:24-29]. In the siege of Jerusalem mothers aborted to eat their own fetuses [Jer. 19:9, Lamentations 2:20 and 4:10].

The current Ukraine war has thus far seen about 5 000 Ukrainian deaths, including hundreds of children. About 5 million fled abroad, mostly to Poland. And what does this mean? A worsening global food crisis. Since farming activities are highly curtailed and Ukraine produces about a quarter of the world’s grain, world famine is sure to follow. Similarly Russia, also a major food producer, has decreased food production ability due to the war.

Famine, thus, is not always the result of drought. Wars destroy productive agricultural land and farming communities. The devastating aftermath upon land and populace through war cause severe restrictions upon food production. Such famines are thus “man-made”.

Consider the Boer War where the British through their “scorched earth” policy created a famine by burning to the ground virtually every farm homestead, slaughtered or stole all livestock, burned all crops, and sent women and children to concentration camps. The semi-starvation food supply and lack of medical facilities eventually caused the deaths of more than 35 000 Boer women and children. Over 50% of children under 16 years of age died. [South Africa Today News, June 17, 2015.]

Additionally 66 black concentration camps were set up in the two Republics. Conditions were as bad as in the Boer internment camps. The horrendous suffering and disease epidemics exacted a death toll of 2 000.

“The food rations were meagre and there was a two-tier allocation policy, whereby families of men who were still fighting were routinely given smaller rations than others. The inadequate shelter, poor diet, bad hygiene and overcrowding led to malnutrition and endemic contagious diseases such as measles, typhoid and dysentery to which the children were particularly vulnerable.”

Pestilence follows war and famine.

“Thus saith YEHOVAH unto this people ... they loved to wander [away from the law. of God] ... he will now remember their iniquity, and visit their sins. Then said YEHOVAH unto me, Pray not for this people for their good. When they fast, I will not hear their cry ... I will not accept them: but I will consume them by the sword, and by the famine, and by the pestilence” [Jer 14:10ff]. Tough words from a merciful but just God!

Famines are horrible. They are real. People suffer. People starve. People die. Maybe in the face of such terror soon to strike the vast majority of humanity you may want to open a bible and read the following scriptures. Read and meditate upon them. Offer them up in prayer as faith-confirmations. They are filled with hope for the hopeless. The Eternal alone is our confidence, hope, support, and salvation!

We do not suggest that we should be insensitive or unsympathetic towards those who suffer the onslaught of drought, famine and disease. But feeling emotionally traumatized about the suffering of others does not make us better people, nor will it deliver us in time of famine. Deliverance depends on our relationship with the Eternal. He will do his part. Be sure to do yours—for your own sake and that of your loved ones. [Read Psalms 33:19; 34:7 and 17-19; Proverbs 10:2, 11:14; Romans 8:35.]

References:

For further insights into historic famines visit Alex de Waal’s research published under the World Peace Foundation site https://sites.tufts.edu/wpf/historic-famines-and-episodes-of-mass-intentional-starvation/

For details on the Boer Wars see, inter alia, https://www.africanliberty.org/author/fransjohanpretorius/ and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Boer_War_concentration_camps.